Evolving Cybermen

This is a bit of an experiment.   As you know, I like to play around with the more obscure corners of Who-land.   I thought it might be fun to explore the cybermen.

Unlike the Daleks, who have changed very little since their first appearance, the Cybermen have morphed quite a bit over the years.   Broadly speaking, between the old and the new series, there have been four principle varieties of cybermen:

Tenth Planet Cybermen – the originals.  Cloth faces, sing song voices, and death rays mounted on their crotches.   No, that’s not suggestive at all, why do you ask.   The Tenth Planet Cybermen appeared only once, in the serial of the same name, on television.

http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/tenth_cyber_3548.jpg

However, they appeared more regularly in the comics – largely because the comic artists seldom watched the show, and the publicity stills they used for cybermen reference were all tenth planet stuff.

Tomb Cybermen – seen in the Patrick Troughton serials ‘The Moonbase’,  ‘Tomb of the Cybermen’ and ‘Wheel in Space.’  These are leaner than the other varieties, their helmets are narrower, typically, they have lobster hands, with a thumb and grasping pad, their chest units tend to hang freely.  Their suits are somewhat form fitting, with lots of external piping.   There are two varieties of Tomb Cybermen –  the originals from Moonbase and Tomb are identical, and basically the same costumes.  Which is odd, since they were from two different seasons, 67 and 68.  Of course, Tomb was the first story of 68, so they likely just recycled the costumes.

The Wheel in Space variety are slightly different, notably, their eyes have those teardrop slots which were very distinctive, and show up in the modern era cybermen.   Also, you’ll note that they wear the chest unit upside down.

Invasion Cybermen – Appearing in Patrick Troughton’s ‘The Invasion’, close to the end of his tenure.  They bedevilled Tom Baker in Revenge of the Cybermen, harassed Davison in Earthshock, Colin Baker in Attack of the Cybermen, Sylvester McCoy in Silver Nemesis, showed up in the Five Doctors, and had cameo appearances in Carnival of Monsters and Dimensions in Time.   The Invasion Cybermen are slightly different in almost every incarnation – sometimes their head fires a gun, sometimes they have more tubes, sometimes their head-handles are different.   What they all have in common is they’ve got waffle-heads.  Their helmets look like they have waffle irons bolted on each side.  They’re also physically bulky and imposing, their chest-pieces extend over their shoulders, they look solid and dangerous.

 

The design was pretty standardized by then.  Note the waffle heads, teardrop eyes.  The chest plates were still old style.  That was upgraded.  Cybermen were absent from the Pertwee era, except for a quick cameo (blink and you miss it) in Carnival of Monsters.

The Cybermen that confront Tom Baker in Revenge of the Cybermen aren’t too different, they’ve got  the waffle heads and teardrop eyes notably.   They still have external tubes and basically old style chest plates.  That will change…

This is Earthshock’s Cybermen.  Note that they dropped the ‘teardrop eyes’.  The Waffle Head look is still going strong.  But the handlebars are different, they started to play with that.  And the biggest difference:  The chest-plate is redesigned, and goes up and around the shoulders and neck.  That will become the standard chest plate.   This becomes the standard look through the Five Doctors, Attack of the Cybermen and Silver Nemesis, although there are considerable variations – notably in the handlebars, the underlying overalls,  and somewhat in the configuration of the chest units in some.

New Series Cybermen – Beginning with the Rise of Cybermen-Age of Steel, continuing through Army of Ghosts-Doomsday, this established the fully armoured variety.  The bunch in the first four appearances were alternate world cybermen.  But it turns out the Doctor’s main reality had Cybermen that looked almost identical, although their abilities and appearances differed slightly – Nightmare in Silver, and many more appearances.  There’s even been a Cyber-Woman (hot),  a Cyber-King (kaiju!), and Cyber-beasties.  But those will be pictures for another time.

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Now here’s the peculiar thing.   There’s no explanation whatsoever for all the different Cybermen.

In fact, Doctor Who is pretty damned aggressive about not explaining why the Cybermen are different.

For instance, in Revenge of the Cybermen, upon encountering Tom Baker’s Doctor, the Cybermen have a discussion, where they recap their encounters with the previous Doctors – which means their history incorporates all three versions.  They do the same thing in Earthshock.  And we get the same thing in the new series in the Two Doctors.

So…  it’s all the same cybermen….  I guess?

Technically, in Doctor Who-Earth time, the first appearance of the Cybermen is on Earth, Circa 1969-1970 in the Invasion.

The shittiest, most primitive original superman attack Earth in 1986.

But this is also the Time Frame that the WaffleHeads show up in Attack of the Cybermen and Silver Nemesis.

But then we go to the ‘Tomb’ style Cybermen in the near future of Earth in ‘The Wheel in Space and Moonbase.’

Then in Revenge of the Cybermen, its the far future, the Cybermen are on their last legs and they’re waffle heads.

Then even further in the future, we go back to the Tomb style Cybermen, in the Tombs of Telos.

But oddly, in Attack of the Cybermen, its the waffle heads in the Tombs.

Except for Attack of the Cybermen, they don’t get their hands on Time Travel, so that’s not an explanation.  Except in Attack of the Cybermen, where the Waffle Heads seem to be using it to go back to Earth to help out the Mondas Cybermen, while messing about on Telos.

But despite two different brands of Cybermen tombed on Telos…  they never meet.

So what’s the deal, do we have Cyber-Segregation?  Do the Waffle Heads and the  Narrow Heads have some weird Separate But Equal deal going on?


7 comments

  1. Actually, my intent was to explore some of the more interesting Cybermen from fan films.  This was just a starting point.

    For instance, in DoctorWho2012’s ‘Dawn of The Doctor’ they’ve built their reasonably accurate and decent looking cyberman out of corrugated cardboard.  It’s obviously corrugated cardboard.  It’s cute as hell.

    Also in the cute category are the Cybermen from Beeblebrox’s Dark Alliance.  Although suitably rough and tough, they are completely, unspeakably… adorable.

    Not to be confused with the Projection Room’s Deadly Alliance which have gone horribly wrong.

    Fairly imposing are the Cybermen from Flight of the Dalek.  While the Cyberman from Deconstruction 2 is a costume which takes a medieval war helmet as a starting point, and manages to be pretty terrifying.

    But hey, they’re all much better cybermen than I could ever build, they each represent conviction and commitment, and even the tosh looking ones are enjoyable.

    I was going to put up pictures of them, by my screen captures were all png files, so they don’t seem to translate.  So not sure if that particular survey will ever get written.

     

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