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If you had the chance to be beautiful, would you take it? We’re not talking about mere attractiveness, but a near-immediate physical metamorphosis into a perfect human specimen. Sounds tempting, but of course there’s a catch. That’s the premise of Ryan Murphy’s new FX show, The Beauty, co-created and co-written by Matt Hodgson. In the show, The Beauty is an STI that transforms a person into someone physically perfect, but with deadly consequences. Except nobody who has The Beauty knows that.
It’s almost impossible not to draw comparisons to The Substance, the 2024 horror movie that became a breakaway box-office smash and multi-Oscar nominee. It also spawned countless reactions (positive and negative) about its depictions of what a woman (played by Demi Moore) will do in the pursuit of a younger, more beautiful version of herself. The Beauty gleefully leans into these comparisons with Coralie Fargeat’s film, even casting Demi Moore’s ex-husband, Ashton Kutcher, in a key role.
But The Beauty is not a rip-off of The Substance. It’s actually based on a comic book of the same name by Image Comics, which ran from 2015-2021. Here’s what to know about the source material for the new series, which has drawn solid reviews since its three-episode premiere.
What happens in “The Beauty” comics?
At the start of the comics, created by Jeremy Haun and Jason A. Hurley, two years have elapsed since The Beauty took over the world. It’s a rampant and sought after sexually transmitted disease, capable of transforming those infected with it into someone conventionally, well, beautiful. As the comic describes, changes to people with The Beauty include “fat melted away, thinning hair returned, skin blemishes faded, and their facial features slimmed.” Unlike other diseases, people covet The Beauty. It’s believed that half the world has the disease, including around 200 million Americans.
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