- Bee Positive, bee confident, bee a leader!
- --Bumblebee in "Royal Jelly"
Karen Beecher-Duncan, also known as Bumblebee, is the former leader of Titans East, a former member of the Teen Titans and a superheroine in Teen Titans Go!. She made her first debut and cameo in "Starliar". She temporarily becomes the 6th and newest member of the Teen Titans in the Sixth Titan arc, from "Forest Pirates" up until "The Viewers Decide" when she leaves both Titan teams to work as a solo hero with the alias "Bat Bee."
She is voiced by Ozioma Akagha.
History[]
Bumblebee appeared with her teammates at the annual Titans East party in "Starliar." She was disappointed with the Teen Titans' behavior and did not want them to join next year's party.
In "Two Bumble Bees and a Wasp," at the hospital, there was a balloon next to Beast Boy that reads, "You'll bee OK," with a picture of her face on it.
She also makes a cameo appearance in "Yearbook Madness." Her head is seen in a photo along with Starfire, Raven, and Jinx. She ís later seen dining at the Yum Yum Kitty Diner with her fellow teammates. Robin forces her team to sign his yearbook.
She is seen fighting Mother Mae-Eye over a television set in "Black Friday." In "Garage Sale," the balloon with her face on it appears again in the attic.
In "Snuggle Time," she is seen being tortured by the rest of her team. In "Shrimps and Prime Rib," she assisted Aqualad in taking out The Brain's generator. She is seen participating in the competition in "Justice League's Next Top Talent Idol Star," twirling hoops as her act.
In "Costume Contest," she was dressed as a Grim Reaper, scaring Más and Menos and taking their candy.
As shown in "Flashback," Bumblebee was invited to a Teen Titans tryout by Robin. During the tryouts, she experience Robin's temper towards the other superheroes that would later become his teammates. Because of this, Kid Flash suggests that they kick Robin out and that he should be the leader instead, to which she, Speedy, and Aqualad agree. They take the Titans Tower from Robin and form their team.
Later on, Bumblebee and the others are challenged by Robin's team to a competition to take back the Tower and reclaim Robin's status as leader. Eventually, the Titans overthrow Kid Flash, breaking his leg and throwing him out of the Tower. She sees Kid Flash hobbling away, telling them they should form the Titans East on the East Coast.
She competed once again with her team in "Justice League's Next Top Talent Idol Star: Second Greatest Team Edition." From "Forest Pirates" to "What We Learned at Camp," she became the extra member of the Titans during her stay with them at the summer camp. By the end of the summer camp, she was ultimately counted as the sixth member of the Teen Titans. She moved into Titans Tower in "Communicate Openly."
After staying with the Titans for a few months, she grows tired of her life hanging around with a group of degenerates and ultimately defects herself from Titans West in "The Viewers Decide" by becoming Bat Bee.
Personality[]
Bumblebee is positive, enthusiastic, and peppy since she enjoys seeing the optimistic perspective, like Starfire. She is always hyped to join the rest of the Titans; she also seems to be the only member to voice out her own opinions, such as stating her disagreement about Robin's claim of holding a hilarious campfire will attract wolves in "Campfire!."
Bumblebee also seems to have an interest in romantic subjects, namely camp romance as shown in "The Bergerac," when she gets pumped up over Robin's budding romance with Wonder Girl and does display her pity when Wonder Girl breaks up with Robin, although she apparently dislikes the 80's in the said episode.
Despite her upbeat characteristic, Bumblebee can still get enraged on certain occasions, such as in "The Bergerac," when the four other main Titans refuse to support Robin and when Beast Boy is about to pig out the picnic. This weakness of hers is further demonstrated in "Communicate Openly," when she originally fails to adjust her lifestyle to match with the other Titans and gradually causes her rage to pent up.
Physical Appearance[]
Similar to her 2003 counterpart, Bumblebee is a superheroine, whose attire consists of a sleeveless yellow & black turtleneck outfit (revealing her midriff), black pants, and built-in black boots. She also wears a yellow belt, armband, and golden hoop earrings. She has blue wings allowing her to be able to fly. Bumblebee also has her black hair tied into two afro puffs.
In "Forest Pirates," her appearance has changed quite a bit. She has become slightly shorter, has a bigger and rounder head with slightly different-looking hair and no prominent lips. She wears black and yellow wristbands instead of armbands and is given yellow boots. Rather than having wings on her back, she wears a yellow pack in which her wings can appear at will instead.
Powers and Abilities[]
Bee Physiology
- Shrinking: Bumblebee can shrink to the size of an actual bee.
- Winged flight: She can fly using the bee wings on her back.
- Electric Stingers: She has a pair of B-shaped "stingers" that can create powerful blasts of bright yellow, electrical energy that she can shoot at her enemies and can sting like actual bee stings. She is only seen with these in the comics.
- Bee Hive/Honey Generation: She can create cannons from her hands that shoot bee hives filled with honey.
- Bee Manipulation: She can give orders to bees by whistling.
- Bee Transformation: By consuming a large amount of royal jelly, she can turn herself into a queen bee.
Episode Appearances[]
Season 1[]
Season 2[]
- Two Bumble Bees and a Wasp (cameo on balloon)
- Yearbook Madness (cameo)
Season 3[]
- Black Friday (cameo)
- Garage Sale (cameo on balloon)
- Snuggle Time (cameo)
Season 4[]
- Shrimps and Prime Rib (cameo)
- The Streak (cameo)
- Justice League's Next Top Talent Idol Star (cameo)
- Costume Contest (cameo)
- Flashback Episode
Season 5[]
- Justice League's Next Top Talent Idol Star: Second Greatest Team Edition (cameo)
- Forest Pirates (speaking debut)
- The Bergerac
- Snot and Tears
- Campfire!
- What We Learned at Camp
- Communicate Openly
- Royal Jelly
- Strength of a Grown Man
- Had to Be There
- Girls Night In
- The Great Disaster
- The Viewers Decide
- Collect Them All (as a toy)
Season 6[]
- The Cast (cameo)
Season 7[]
Season 8[]
Appearances in other Media[]
Comics
- Sleep Over (comic debut)
- Fouled Out
- Misadventures in Babysitting
- Whatzit? (cameo)
Game Appearances[]
Trivia[]
- In the original DC Comics, Bumblebee wore either a mask or goggles.
- She is one of the few characters to receive a redesign at some point in the series.
- She is the only character to appear in the original series to have a major design change in the middle of the series.
- In the original series, she was voiced by T'Keyah Crystal Keymáh.
- She spoke for the first time in the series in the episode, "Costume Contest". However, all she said was, "Boo!", and her voice actress was uncredited.
- Since "Forest Pirates", she is voiced by new voice actress Ozioma Akagha.
- She is the eighth character to not have their original voice actors reprise his or her role from the original series. (Along with Speedy, Killer Moth, Silkie, The Brain, Billy Numerous, Kid Flash and Slade.)
- She is also the first and currently the only female character from the original series to not have her voice actor return.
- In the original series, Cyborg made Bumblebee the leader of Titans East when he left the team to return to his original team.
- Mostly due to her status as the sixth Titan, Bumblebee holds the record for the most speaking appearances of the Titans East, at 13 episodes. Ironically, it took her the longest out of all the Titans East to have a speaking debut.
- In "Superhero Feud", she was supposed to return in this episode. However, the executives decided not to include her because they wanted to focus on a 5-member team. This was causing fans to get upset because they wanted two Bumblebees of two universes in that episode.
- She enjoys all girl slumber parties, and she also teased Raven about her crush on Beast Boy through a game of Truth or Dare, as seen in the Teen Titans Go! comic issue #12, titled "Sleep Over."
- The outlines of her wings are white instead of light-blue in "Flashback".
- Despite getting a redesign in "Forest Pirates", her original design is still used for her chibi form as shown in the opening sequence and "The Bergerac", as well as her toy form in "Collect Them All".
- Only in the Teeny Titans game, her B-sharped stingers of the original series were shown, although it is only in her figure form.
- She has a tendency to speak with bee puns.
- She has two grandchildren, Jeremy and Honeybee, as shown in “The Great Disaster”.
- In several episodes, such as "Communicate Openly" and "Had to Be There", Bumblebee is heavily indicated to dislike being hugged.
- She doesn’t like being called with nicknames, as she gets offended by how the Titans refer her as "Bumbles" in "Communicate Openly".
Gallery[]
The image gallery for Bumblebee may be viewed here. |