Cyberman
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- This article is about the Doctor Who villains. For the movie about Steve Mann, see Cyberman (movie).
Template:Doctorwhorace The Cybermen are a fictional race of cyborgs who are amongst the most persistent enemies of the Doctor in the British science fiction television series, Doctor Who. They were created by Dr. Kit Pedler, the unofficial scientific advisor to the programme and Gerry Davis in 1966, first appearing in the serial, The Tenth Planet, the last to feature William Hartnell as the Doctor. They have since made numerous reappearances in their bid for world or galactic conquest.
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Physical characteristics
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The Cybermen are humanoid, but have been cybernetically augmented to the point where they have few to no organic parts. In their first appearance in the series, the only portions of their bodies that still seemed human were their hands, but by their next appearance, their bodies were entirely covered up in their metallic suits. It is presumed that underneath their suits there still exist organic components and they are not true robots, but this has not been confirmed.
Early Cybermen had a somewhat sing-song voice constructed by putTING the INflecTION in the wrong PLAces (sic). In their first appearance, the effect of this was augmented by the special effect of having a Cyberman abruptly open his mouth wide and keep it open, without moving his tongue or lips, while the separately recorded voice would be playing, and then shut it quickly when the line was done. Later the BBC used special effects from its Radiophonic Workshop by adding first an electropharynx, then a vocoder, to modify speech to make it sound more alien. In later stories of the original series and in the audio plays, two copies of the voice track were pitch-shifted downwards by differing amounts and layered to produce the effect, sometimes with the addition of a small amount of flanging.
Their major weakness is the element gold. Initially, it was explained that, due to its non-corrodable nature, gold essentially chokes their respiratory systems. For example, the glittergun, a weapon used during the Cyber-Wars in the future, fired gold dust at its targets. However, in later serials, gold appeared to affect them rather like silver affects werewolves, with gold coins or gold-tipped bullets fired at them having the same effect. Other weaknesses include solvents and excessive levels of radiation.
Over the years Cybermen have been shown with various forms of weaponry. When originally seen in The Tenth Planet they had energy weapons built into devices on their chests. Over their next few appearances, these weapons were also mounted on their helmets and some Cybermen could fire electricity from their fingertips. In The Tomb of the Cybermen the first hand-held Cyber-weapon appeared, which was described as an X-ray laser. Subsequent appearances have shown them armed almost exclusively with these cyberguns. The Cybermen also have access to weapons of mass destruction known as cyberbombs, which were banned by the galactic Armageddon Convention.
The Cybermen also use small cybernetic creatures called cybermats as weapons of attack and as carriers of plagues. Cybermats resemble oversized metallic silverfish and have segmented bodies with hair-like tactile sensor probes along the base of their heads. Two models of cybermat are known to exist, the first with crystalline eyes and antennae through which they receive commands. The second have photoreceptors for eyes instead of crystals.
As they are few in number, the Cybermen tend towards covert activity, scheming from hiding and using human pawns or robots to act in their place until they need to appear. Cybermen are typically credited as Cyber Leader, Cyber Lieutenant, and Cyber Scout. However, one Cyberman exists with a name, the Cyber Controller. The Cyber Controller has appeared in multiple forms, both humanoid and as an immobile computer. The Controller seen (and destroyed) in various serials may or may not be the same consciousness in different bodies, as it appears to recognize and remember the Doctor from previous encounters.
The Cybermen can be seen as a slightly more individualistic forerunner of Star Trek's major enemy, the Borg. Similarities include converting their victims into Cybermen (a process known as cyber-conversion, although unlike the Borg there is no way to reverse the conversion) and the use of the catchphrase "Resistance is useless/futile."
Costume design
The design of the Cybermen acted almost as a guide to prevailing fashion at the time of transmission. They were always silver in colour and included material as cloth, rubber diving suits, PVC, chest units, tubing and cricketers' gloves. The 1980s design used converted flight suits painted silver. Unlike the Doctor's other foes, the Cybermen have changed substantially in appearance over the years, looking more and more modern, although retaining certain commonalities of design.
Due to the time-travelling nature of the television series, this can be confusing since Cybermen from earlier periods of "history" look more sophisticated than those from later ones.
History within the show
Origins
Cybermen were originally a wholly organic species of humanoids that began to implant more and more cybernetic parts into their bodies. This led to the race becoming coldly logical and calculating, with emotions usually only shown when naked aggression was called for. Although the Cybermen often claim that they have done away with human emotion, they have exhibited emotions ranging from anger to smug satisfaction in their confrontations with the Doctor.
The race originated on the planet Mondas, Earth's twin planet in prehistoric times, which was knocked out of solar orbit and drifted into deep space. The Mondasians, fearful for their race's survival, sent out spacecraft to colonise other worlds, including Telos, where they pushed the native Cryons aside and used the planet to house vast tombs where they could take refuge in suspended animation when necessary.
On Mondas, the native inhabitants installed a drive propulsion system in place of the planet's core. As the original race was limited in numbers and were continually being depleted, the Cybermen became a race of conquerors who reproduced by taking other organic beings and forcibily changing them into Cybermen. The origins of the Cybermen were further elaborated on in the Big Finish Productions audio play, Spare Parts, starring Peter Davison as the Fifth Doctor, although the canonicity of the audio dramas, like other spin-off media, is unclear.
The Earth invasions
The Cybermen's first attempt at invading Earth, around 1970, was chronicled in the 1968 serial The Invasion. The Cybermen had allied themselves with industrialist Tobias Vaughn, who installed mind control circuits in electrical appliances manufactured by his International Electromatics company, paving the way for a ground invasion. This was uncovered by the newly formed United Nations Intelligence Taskforce, who repelled the invasion with the help of the Second Doctor.
In the 1966 serial The Tenth Planet, the First Doctor met an advance force of Cybermen that landed near an Antarctic space tracking station in the in the year 1986. This advance force was to prepare for the return of Mondas to the solar system and the draining of Earth's energy for the Cybermen's use. In the process, however, Mondas absorbed too much energy and was destroyed, as were the Cybermen on Earth.
In 1988 a fleet of Cyber warships was assembled to turn Earth into New Mondas now that their homeworld had been destroyed. A scouting party was sent to Earth in search of the legendary Nemesis statue, a Time Lord artifact of immense power, made of the "living metal" valadium. Due to the machinations of the Seventh Doctor, however, the Nemesis destroyed the entire Cyber-fleet instead. (Silver Nemesis, 1988).
In 2012, the inert head of a Cyberman was part of the Vault, a collection of alien artefacts belonging to American billionaire Henry van Statten. According to its label, it was recovered from the London sewers in 1975 and presumably came from the 1970 invasion attempt, although it is of a design only seen in the late 29th century (Dalek, 2005).
By the mid-21st century, mankind had reached beyond its planet and set up space stations in deep space. One of these, Space Station W3, known as "The Wheel," was the site of a takeover by Cybermen who wanted to use it as a staging point for yet another invasion of Earth. The Second Doctor and his companions prevented this in The Wheel in Space (1968).
The Cybermen returned in the 1967's The Moonbase. By the year 2070, Earth's weather was bring controlled by the Gravitron installation on the Moon. The Cybermen planned to use the Gravitron to disrupt the planet's weather patterns and destroy all life on it, eliminating a threat to their survival. This attempt was also stopped by the Second Doctor.
The Cyber-Wars
Five centuries after the destruction of Mondas, the Cybermen had all but passed into legend when an archeological expedition to the planet Telos uncovered their resting place in The Tomb of the Cybermen (1967). However, those Cybermen were not dead but merely in hibernation, and were briefly revived before the Second Doctor returned them to their eternal sleep.
This was short-lived, however. By the beginning of the 26th century, the Cybermen were back in force, and the galactic situation was grave enough that Earth hosted a conference in 2526 that would unite the forces of several planets in a war against the Cybermen. A force of Cybermen tried to disrupt this conference, first by trying to infiltrate Earth in a freighter and when that was discovered by the Fifth Doctor, to crash the freighter into Earth and cause an ecological disaster. Although the attempt failed, the freighter was catapulted back in time to become the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs (Earthshock, 1982).
The Cybermen faced complete defeat now that humanity was united against them in the Cyber-Wars. The glittergun had been developed as a weapon against them, and the native Cryons of the planet Telos had also risen up and sabotaged their hibernation tombs. Using a captured time travel machine, a group of Cybermen travelled back to Earth in 1985 to try and prevent the destruction of Mondas, but were stopped by the Sixth Doctor and his companion Peri (Attack of the Cybermen, 1985).
By the late 29th century, the Cybermen had been reduced to small remnant groups wandering around the galaxy. One group tried to take revenge by making a desperate attempt to blow up the remnants of the planet Voga, a planetoid of pure gold that had wandered into the solar system and become a moon of Jupiter. They hoped that this would disrupt their enemy's supply of the metal, but were stopped by the Fourth Doctor. This was their last chronological appearance to date, with the Cybermen seemingly vanishing from history after this point (Revenge of the Cybermen, 1975).
It was confirmed in Doctor Who Magazine #357 that the Cybermen would be returning in the 2006 season of the new series in a two-part story.
Other appearances
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A Cyberman also appeared in the Miniscope in Carnival of Monsters. (see picture on right)
The BBV audios Cyber-Hunt and Cybergeddon and the BBV video Cyberon feature the Cyberons, which are a race of cyborgs not dissimilar to the Cybermen. The Cybermen have also been featured in the Virgin New Adventures novel Iceberg, by actor David Banks, who played the Cyber Leader in the television series from Earthshock on. Banks had previously written, in 1988, Cybermen, a fictional history of the Cybermen which included a "future" version of them.
The Cybermen appeared in the Big Finish plays Sword of Orion, the abovementioned Spare Parts, Real Time (produced as a webcast for BBCi and later released as a CD), and The Harvest.
They have also appeared in the Doctor Who comic strip, most recently in The Flood, published in Doctor Who Magazine #346-#353. A Cyberman named Kroton was briefly a companion of the Eighth Doctor. In The World Shapers (DWM #127-#129), it was revealed that the Voord were the race that evolved into the Cybermen and that Mondas was previously the planet Marinus. The canonicity of the comic strips, like the other Doctor Who spin-off media, is unclear.
Cybermen have also been the subject of parody. Examples include the Dead Ringers comedy series, which featured a suburban Cyberman family struggling to balance galactic domination with everyday domestic crises, and a segment in The Real McCoy which showed a clip from "Earthshock" with the Doctor and the Cyber Leader dubbed in "Jamaican".
Appearances
Television
- The Tenth Planet - October 8 - October 29, 1966
- The Moonbase - February 11 - March 4, 1967
- The Tomb of the Cybermen - September 2 - September 23, 1967
- The Wheel in Space - April 27 - June 1, 1968
- The Invasion - November 2 - December 21, 1968
- Revenge of the Cybermen - April 19 - 10 May, 1975
- Earthshock - March 9 - March 17 1982
- The Five Doctors - November 23 1983
- Attack of the Cybermen - January 5 - January 12, 1985
- Silver Nemesis - November 23 - December 7, 1988
Stage plays
- Doctor Who - The Ultimate Adventure - Wimbledon Theatre, London (premiere March 23 1989)
Audio plays
Novels
- Iceberg by David Banks
- Killing Ground by Steve Lyons
- Illegal Alien by Mike Tucker and Robert Perry
External links
- Cybermen fan page (http://www.geocities.com/joekano/cybermen/index.htm)