Given that throughout history, writers have sought to make bee society into a reflection of our own, lets see how well that reflection holds up. In the episode, Tom is joined by Graham Duke and Ali Hood from Rex Factor, to see how well the queen bee holds up when held to the standards by which we have historically judged monarchs. Finally we can answer the question: does the Queen Bee have the Rex Factor?
We look over some old natural history texts, examining the errors and misrepresentations made in giving an account of bee society, throughout previous centuries, and discover the moments in which honeybees have intersected with the bloody and scandalous history of the British monarchical line.