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Cybermen were a type of cybernetically augmented humanoids. They varied greatly in design, with different offshoots factions throughout time and space. However, the two major groups, from which all other known versions derived, were the Mondasian Cybermen, which originated on the planet Mondas, Earth's twin planet in the Doctor's universe, and the Cybus Cybermen, which originated on Earth in an alternate universe.
- For details on the Mondasian Cybermen, see here. For the Cybermen of Cybus Industries, see here. For other uses see Cyberman (disambiguation).
Despite the different origin and other differences, there were a number of similarities between both groups of Cybermen, and there were groups that share the characteristics of both. For the most part, they both lacked individuality or names. Cybermen no longer possessed emotions and viewed them as a weakness. They frequently attempted to physically and mentally re-engineer humans and other humanoids into Cybermen, via a process called "cyber-conversion" or "upgrade".
Characteristics
Mondasian Cybermen
- Main article: Cyberman (Mondas)
These Cybermen were originally a wholly organic species of Near-Humans who originated on Earth's former twin planet, Mondas. Mondas drifted into the outer solar system and to survive, the natives of that world adapted by turning themselves into cyborgs. (DW: The Tenth Planet) Eventually, all of the Mondasians underwent forced cyber-conversion. (BFA: Spare Parts). Many of them left Mondas and eventually developed into separate groups without connection with one another.
Nearly all were silver in colour, with the exception of a a black variety which also existed in the London sewers (DW: Attack of the Cybermen). They also exhibited exposed circuitry and tubing which may contain hydraulic fluids for motion, covering a rubber or mylar-like outer skin. The CyberMondasians which the Doctor met on Snowcap Base in 1986 had undergone a less radical conversion and still retained biological hands; it is possible these Cybermen were prototypes. (DW: The Tenth Planet) All other Cybermen were entirely covered up in their metallic suits. (DW: The Moonbase onwards)
These Cybermen had a number of major weaknesses, of which the most notable was the element gold. Gold, having a non-corrosive nature, choked their respiratory systems. (DW: Revenge of the Cybermen). 20th century guns barely phased Cybermen, though explosives and bazooka shells were capable of taking them down. (DW: The Invasion, Silver Nemesis) UNIT would develop gold-tipped rounds for Cybermen. (DW: Battlefield) In later centuries, the Cybermen would take hits from laser guns and energy weapons: at close range, this could destroy them. (DW: Earthshock)
Cybus Cybermen
- Main article: Cybermen (Pete's World)
This type of Cyberman originated in another universe, where they were created by John Lumic, the owner of Cybus Industries. His Cybermen believed that all people must be "upgraded" to Cyber-form so that information is never lost and that the Humans physical and emotional weaknesses are abolished.
Cyber-conversion usually involved painfully removing the brain of the subject and placing it within a suit of armour. Once complete, the newly developed Cyberman had a special implant placed within them, which prevented them from feeling their emotions. However, if the implants were disrupted, then the Cybermen entered into a traumatic state as they were overloaded by the pain of the conversion, resulting in them dying in agony or their heads exploding from the overload of emotions. (DW: Rise of the Cybermen / The Age of Steel).
The Cyber-suit was constructed from bulletproof steel. These exo-structures were stauncher and more heavily built than the Cybermen of Mondas. A chest plate with the Cybus Industries logo housed a "heart of steel", the function of which is unclear, and the emotional inhibitor chip. The brain was contained within the head. Artificially grown nervous tissue was threaded throughout the body so the Cyberman responded like a fully biological organism. (DW: The Age of Steel) Without a brain inserted, the Cyber-suit was a robot which apparently had sufficient processing capacity to pursue and attack a human target, even its head alone. (DW: The Age of Steel, The Pandorica Opens) The weakness for gold was not present in these alternate Cybermen.
Unification?
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While no contact between the two major groups of Cybermen was known to have occurred, there existed some Cybermen that shared characteristics of both. While they greatly resembled the Cybus Cybermen and were said to be brains in metal shells like the Cybus creations, their use of Cybermats and their awareness of the fact that the Doctor was a Time Lord, their spacefaring capabilities and his reference to "races" conquered by them further indicated possible Mondasian origin or an alliance between both groups. (VG: Blood of the Cybermen) By the 51st century, such Cybermen were known to be organised into Cyber Legions. (DW: A Good Man Goes to War)
Technology
Technology
The Mondasian Cybermen forces in 2526 employed the use of the Cyberlance, a powerful hand-held cutting weapon. They also made use of the Cyberscope, an observation device that allowed Cyber commanders to both view the battlefield remotely and access a computer database (containing, among other data, information on their race's encounters with the Doctor). (DW: Earthshock)
The Cybus Cybermen were capable of wirelessly communicating with each other, and when a Cyber-Leader was killed, their files were transferred to an appointed Cyberman, who would subsequently be upgraded to a new Cyber-Leader (DW: Doomsday). They were also capable of using infostamps, allowing them to communicate information to other Cybermen when they were low on power. They were also able to steal other technology from the Daleks whilst inside the Void, such as a Dimension Vault. (DW: The Next Doctor)
Weapons (Short Range)
Cybermen have possessed a variety of short range weapons, some in-built.
During their attack on Earth in 1986 the Mondasian Cybermen had large hand-held energy weapons. (DW: The Tenth Planet)
On the Moon in 2070, Cybermen possessed the power to generate arcs of electricity from their hands which had the power to stun and disable. (DW: The Moonbase)
In the 21st century, the Cybermen who attacked Space Station W3 had death rays built into their chest units. (DW: The Wheel in Space)
The Cybermen encountered by UNIT in the late 20th century had displayed these same built-in weapons as well as also carrying large rifles for medium distance combat. (DW: The Invasion)
The Cybermen who attacked the Nerva Beacon had their weapons built into their helmets, activated with a touch of a hand. (DW: Revenge of the Cybermen)
Other appearances have shown them armed almost exclusively with hand-held cyber-guns. (DW: The Invasion onwards)
Originally, the only weapons of the alternate Earth Cybus Cybermen were their electrified hands, (DW: Rise of the Cybermen) but they later gained a small wrist-mounted energy weapon. (DW: Army of Ghosts / Doomsday) At some point the Cybermen gained the abililty to fire a tranquilizer dart from their mouth. (DW: The Pandorica Opens)
Weapons (Other)
In the 20th century, the Cybermen invasion fleet had a megatron bomb that could destroy all life on Earth. (DW: The Invasion)
In 2070, the Cybermen possessed a cannon which could operate in vacuum. (DW: The Moonbase)
Cybermen in 2526 (DW: Earthshock), the invaders of Voga (DW: Revenge of the Cybermen), and the Cybermen removed by Time Scoop to the Death Zone (DW: The Five Doctors) had portable cyber-bombs that could devastate planets.
Neurotrope X has acted as a means to incapacitate Humans before making an overt move. (DW: The Moonbase). On some occasions they have used a Cybermat to spread the virus. (DW: Revenge of the Cybermen)
The Cybermen were strong enough to kill with their hands without any extra weaponry or electric-based attack.
Culture
Cybermen made "survival" their central objective. Since they could not reproduce naturally, they needed to create new members of their population by other means, via cyber-conversion. At times they tended to focus on converting the population of Earth, at other times on simply destroying it. (DW: The Tomb of the Cybermen)
Mondasian Cybermen usually tended toward covert activity, scheming from hiding and using Human or other agents (DW: Revenge of the Cybermen, Earthshock, Attack of the Cybermen), cybermats or androids (DW: Earthshock) to act as their proxies until they appeared.
Throughout their history, groups of Mondasian Cybermen sometimes diverged from one another and migrated through their galaxy, resulting in several factions: (REF: Doctor Who: Cybermen)
- CyberMondasians, the original Cybermen on Mondas. (DW: The Tenth Planet)
- CyberFaction, that split off from the CyberMondasians, making Planet 14 their home. (NA: Iceberg)
- CyberTelosians, originating from the CyberFaction's colonisation of Telos. (REF: Doctor Who: Cybermen)
- CyberNomads, groups of Cybermen that split off from the CyberFaction to explore the galaxy. (REF: Doctor Who: Cybermen)
- CyberNeomorphs, the result of a group of CyberNomads discovering frozen CyberTelosians.
Individuality and emotion
Throughout their history, Cybermen, for the most part, lacked individuality or names.
Some few Cybermen had individual names such as Krang (DW: The Tenth Planet) or Kroton. (DWM: Throwback: The Soul of a Cyberman)
- In the script and cast listings for The Tenth Planet the individual Cybermen had names. They were Krail, Talon, Shav, Krang, Jarl and Gern. (REF: Doctor Who: The Encyclopedia)
Cybermen in positions of authority had included the ground level Cyber-Leader, sometimes aided by a Cyber-Lieutenant. Immobile computer-like Cyber-Planners would sometimes made decisions (DW: The Wheel in Space, The Invasion). The Cyber-Controllers, who possessed enlarged craniums, may have had the position of highest possible authority. (DW: The Tomb of the Cybermen, Attack of the Cybermen)
- Only one Cyber-Controller ever appeared at one time.
Cybermen no longer possessed emotions and viewed them as a weakness. However, several of the Cyber-Leaders sounded angry, amused, and, at times, quite smug. (These could be simulations) (DW: Earthshock)
History
- See: Cyberman (Mondas) and Cyberman (Pete's World) for history of the two main groups
A Cyberman army that shared characteristics of both Cybus and Mondasian Cybermen was buried under the ice in the Arctic Circle and had been for tens of thousands of years after being hit by a temporal storm. An excavation began to awaken the army, commanded by a Cyber-Lord, releasing Cybermats which in turn created Cyberslaves. The Eleventh Doctor arrived on May 4th 2010 and stopped their awakening. He blew up their base and put them back into stasis. (VG: Blood of the Cybermen) The Doctor acquired a chest plate from one of these Cybermen and kept it in the TARDIS drawing room. (VG: TARDIS)
By some point in the 52nd century, possibly the 51st century, such Cybermen were a major power in space, possessing at least twelve fleets. The Cybermen's Twelfth Cyber Legion was well-known to monitor everything within 20,000 light years of the Church's base of Demon's Run. The Eleventh Doctor and Rory Williams invaded the Legion and destroyed part of it in order to blackmail the Cybermen into giving them information on the whereabouts of Amy Pond - and as a message to the abductors. The Church's rank and file were intimidated by the Doctor's action. (DW: A Good Man Goes to War)
Behind the scenes
Inspiration for the Cybermen
The idea from the Cybermen came from Kit Pedler's interest in new medical advances and his fears as to where they might possibly lead. Earlier conceptions of the Cyberman design would have emphasized the "man" part of the equation, but the proposed design would have cost too much money. Indeed, the televised version of The Tenth Planet featured much more human-like Cybermen, who had human hands.
Prologues to certain Target Books novelisations reflect the earlier ideas about the Cybermen, which state that perfected the science of cybernetics as a means to gain immortality. The Cybermen were the result: immortal, but at the cost of losing their humanity.
Development of the characters
The second appearance of the Cybermen in The Moonbase (pre-planned by the production team even before The Tenth Planet had aired), re-designed them rather radically, making them appear much more robot-like in appearance. The Cybermen went through another major re-design in The Invasion, yet another in Earthshock, and one in the comic strips in The Flood. Various minor re-designs would take place as well. As the Cybermen stories do not appear in a chronological order, this makes their evolution rather confusing: more 'advanced' Cybermen are around at the same time as more 'primitive' ones and vice versa.This, however can be explained through time travel, though the Cybermen only captured one time ship. ( DW: Attack of the Cybermen)
Moffat era Cybermen
What relation the Cybermen featured in VG: Blood of the Cybermen and DW: A Good Man Goes to War have to any other Cybermen is unknown, as they have elements of both the Mondas and Pete's World versions. A "Who Fact" about Cybermen in the game, however, refers solely to the Mondasians, whilst another on Cyber conversion refers solely to the Pete's World versions.
Visually, they resemble the Pete's World Cybermen but with a different "logo" on their chests, but have the trappings and fleet of the Mondasian Cybermen. Director Peter Hoar has stated that these are "different Cybermen" in terms of appearance, as they don't have Cybus Industries logos[1], but is currently unknown if they have any relation to the Mondasian and Cybus Cybermen, and whether the Adventure Games Cybermen and the ones in A Good Man Goes to War are of the same faction. It is possible that this race of Cybermen was born from an alliance of Cybus Cybermen and the original Cybermen, wich would explain the Cybus model bodies without the Cybus Industries logo, and the original Cyberman fleet.
Footnotes
See also