The Hive Of BEEttie Page In Bettie Page Unbound #8
by Josh Davison
Mild Spoilers Ahead
Bettie Page is on a train to New York after escaping the bee aliens only to find out that the one impersonating Bettie is sitting right next to her. Bettie is none too happy about being copied and the alien pretending to be her tells Bettie to go to the back of the train so that they can finish the replication process. Two more guards join the two Betties and the real Bettie picks up on the fact that the bee aliens aren’t accustomed to the human bodies they’re inhabiting. This gives her an opening to fight back, but more bee reinforcements are on the way. During the fight, Bettie gets a vision of the bee aliens’ life and why their species is fleeing to Earth. This frightens the bee-Bettie and they want Bettie dead more than ever as a result.
Bettie Page Unbound #8 finds Bettie on the run from alien bee invaders trying to impersonate the human population, starting with Bettie Page herself. It’s still quite bizarre that this is what Bettie Page comics have become, not that I’m some sort of Bettie Page aficionado–I just wasn’t expecting this many bee aliens and Lovecraft references.
That said, surprising the reader is almost never a bad thing. Bettie Page is full of personality and there is a fair amount of ass-kicking to keep things interesting.
Bettie Page Unbound has deliberately been derivative of other Dynamite titles and this one is overtly going for the Invasion of the Bodysnatchers motif. I can’t say that throwing Bettie Page into the formula is completely transformative, but it’s still a fun experience regardless.
Matt Gaudio, Julius Ohta, and Pasquale Qualano team up for the art in this comic. It maintains the classic aesthetic quite well and the detailing is excellent. The action scenes are good too and deliver a fair amount of impact. Ellie Wright and Sheelagh D bring a lively shot of color to the book too and it all comes together quite well.
Bettie Page Unbound #8 is a bizarre yet fun issue finding the eponymous Bettie Page taking on alien bees and I’m still a bit befuddled at typing that sentence. Regardless, it’s a solid read and is worth a recommendation. Feel free to check it out.
Bettie Page Unbound #8 comes to us from writer David Avallone, artists Matt Gaudio, Julius Ohta, and Pasquale Qualano, color artist Ellie Wright, color flatter Sheelagh D, letterer Taylor Esposito, cover artist John Royle with Sebastian Cheng, and variant cover artists Scott Chantler; Anthony Marques with J. Bone and Luis Antonio Delgado; and Pasquale Qualano.
Final Score: 7.5/10