| The Wasp Woman | |
|---|---|
 | |
|
Real Name |
Janice Starlin |
|
First Appearance |
The Wasp Woman (October 30, 1959) |
|
Original Publisher |
Santa Cruz Productions |
|
Created by |
Roger Corman |
Janice before her transformation.
Origin[]
The founder and owner of a large cosmetics company, Janice Starlin, is disturbed when her firm's sales begin to drop after it becomes apparent to her customer base that she is aging. Scientist Eric Zinthrop has been able to extract enzymes from the royal jelly of the queen wasp that can reverse the aging process. Starlin agrees to fund further research, at great cost, provided she can serve as his human subject. Displeased with the slowness of the results she breaks into the scientist's laboratory after hours and injects herself with extra doses of the formula. Zinthrop becomes aware that some of the test creatures are becoming violent and goes to warn Janice but, before he can reach anyone he gets into a car accident. He is thus temporarily missing and Janice goes through great trouble to find him, eventually managing and then transferring his care to herself.
Janice continues her clandestine use of the serum and sheds twenty years in a single weekend, but soon discovers that she is periodically transformed into a murderous queen wasp. Eventually, Zinthrop throws a jar of acid at her face, killing her.
Public Domain Appearances[]
- The Wasp Woman (1959)
The film's poster.
Notes[]
- Although the opening credits indicate that Santa Cruz Productions copyrighted the film, the film's copyright was neither renewed nor registered with the copyright office.
- The film's poster is highly misleading, as it portrays Janice as a truly gigantic wasp-like creature with the face of a woman. In the actual film, her size doesn't change during the transformation, and her appearance becomes almost the opposite: a still humanoid creature with a monstrously insectoid face and antennae.