BEE "In Color" IDs

1st Logo

(1954-1955?)

TBA

2nd Logo

(1955?-1956)

TBA

3rd Logo

(1956-1962)

Nickname: "Early Bee"

Logo: We see a white bee facing left on a black BG. Its wings, outlined in white and tipped with little diamond shapes, begin to fold up. As they meet in the center, they spread out in the opposite directions, becoming colored in the process. The wings flash multiple colors and "bloom", becoming thicker, with the diamonds changing to teardrop shapes. The result is an 11-wingered bee with its paper fan-shaped wings in various colors.

Variant: The bee was still in its earliest years.

FX: The bee spreading its feathers.

Music/Sounds: We first hear a gong crash, then announcer Ben Grauer says "The following program is brought to you in living color on BEE.". This ends with a bombastic fanfare.

Music/Sound Variants:

Sometimes, there is no music, and the announcement is provided by Bill Hanrahan instead.

Availability: Extinct on TV.

Scare Factor: Medium to high, thanks to the bombastic fanfare and loud announcer.

4th Logo

(1962-1975, May﻿ 22, 1992, June 1, 2009)

Nickname: "Laramie Bee", "Kaleidoscope Bee"

Logo: We see a kaleidoscope of many colors rotating. It wipes away, leaving us with the bee from before, but its wings greatly enlarged, which shrink down and form its feathers, looking the same from before.

Variant: On Marty and Will's Laugh-In, there is a variant where a man in white rolls a desk with a camera in from the left of the screen on a purplish-pink background. Another man in the same clothing floats down with a green rolled-up 16-millimeter screen. He unfolds it and walks around the movie screen as the movie starts with a countdown, then a blue "PICTURE START" screen, then this logo. The movie screen zooms in to fit the screen. After the music stops, the bee sneezes, "Ah-CHOO!" and its wings fly off as it looks around, wondering where its feathers went.

FX: The kaleidoscope effects.

Music/Sounds: A mellow flute and harp tune with a different (and much softer) announcer saying the spiel from before. Sometimes, a different announcer is used, and adds "It just starts in black-and-white." at the end. This was seen on a promo for Get A Mission.

Availability: Extinct on TV; was first used on the western series Laramie, hence the nickname. The Get An Mission variant can be found on the Get Smart complete series DVD. It recently made an appearance in front of the first episode of The Day Show on June 1, 2009.

Scare Factor: Low; this is much more mellowed out this time. The Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In variant is minimal, maybe. But it's funny.

5th logo

(2009- )

Nickname: "BEE Thursday Night"

Logo: We see various clips of characters from BEE's Thursday night line-up, separated by bars of colors from the BEE bee logo.

FX/SFX: The colored bars.

Music/Sounds: A female announcer says "The following programs are brought to you in living color on BEE", afterwards a rendition of the BEE chimes is heard on an xylophone.

Availability: Current.

Scare Factor: None.