Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991.  The entire show is streaming on Youtube.

This week’s episode is all about bee keeping and the wages of sin!

Episode 1.3 “New York Honey”

(Dir by Gerald Cotts, originally aired on November 5th, 1988)

Actually, this episode felt kind of pointless.  I usually try to come up with at least 500 words whenever I write a review but it’s going to be a struggle tonight.

Jay Blake (Lewis J. Stadlen) and his wife, Emerald (Elaine Bromka) live in an apartment in New York.  Their new upstairs neighbor is a mysterious man named Dr. Homer Jimmerman (MacIntyre Dixon).  Hardly anyone around the building ever sees Dr. Jimmerman but they definitely hear him moving around and working in his apartment.  When Jay and Emerald get annoyed by the loud music coming from Dr. Jimmerman’s apartment, Jay heads upstairs to complain.

When Dr. Jimmerman opens the door to his apartment, Jay barges in and discovers that Dr. Jimmerman is keeping bees in his apartment, a clear violation of his lease.  However, Jay gets one taste of the honey that the bees produce and he decides that, rather than evict Dr. Jimmerman, he wants to go into business with him.  Dr. Jimmerman says that he doesn’t have enough honey to start selling it but Jay blackmails him into accepting Jay’s offer.

Rich people in New York love the honey and Jay finds himself falling for Dr. Jimmerman’s femme fatale of a girlfriend, Desiree (Andrea Thompson).  Jay even sends Emerald to Dr. Jimmerman’s apartment so that he can get some alone time with Desiree.  Desiree declares that there can only be one queen and suddenly, all of the bees attack Emerald and kill her.  Desiree then explains to Jay that Dr. Jimmerman’s time has come to an end and now, Jay’s going to be the worker bee who gets to look after her needs.  That’s right …. DESIREE IS ACTUALLY SOME SORT OF BEE CREATURE!  Out the apartment window goes Jay.

And that’s pretty much the entire episode!

Seriously, there’s not much to say about New York Honey.  From the minute that Desiree arrives, it’s obvious that she has a secret and that it is linked to all of the bees that Dr. Jimmerman is keeping in his apartment.  It doesn’t take a genius to guess that her secret is going to somehow involve her being the “queen bee.”  It’s also pretty easy to guess that Jay is eventually going to go out that window because Jay is such a smarmy character that there’s no way he isn’t going to end up getting tossed out a window.  Such are the wages of sin and all that.  Andrea Thompson gives a good performance as Desiree the Bee Lady but otherwise, this episode was way too predictable.

How many words is that?  503?  That’ll work!