Doctor Who has repeatedly changed the origin story for the Cybermen. As the longest-running science fiction series in TV history, it’s hardly surprising that Doctor Who’s continuity has a few wrinkles. From the Doctor claiming to be half-human to the amount of times a Time Lord can regenerate, the sheer amount of creative minds working on Doctor Who over the past 56 years has resulted in some inconsistencies where certain elements have been rewritten either to serve a more recent narrative, or to undo a particularly restrictive piece of canon.
A prime example of this phenomenon is the Cybermen. One of Doctor Who’s “big three” villains alongside the Master and the Daleks, the Cybermen have become iconic sci-fi villains and are immediately recognizable, even to those who don’t know their sonic screwdriver from their Sontaran stratagem. The Cybermen are essentially biological lifeforms that have replaced their flesh with metal and their emotions with cold, hard logic. Believing their existence to be superior, the goal of the Cybermen is usually to turn others to their cause or to destroy a lesser race for their own ends.
Debuting in “The Tenth Planet,” the Cybermen are said to have originated on Mondas, the titular “tenth planet” of Earth’s solar system. Mondas was a twin to Earth, but fell out of orbit long before mankind came into existence, leaving its inhabitants floating aimlessly through space. In order to survive, the Mondasians used their advanced technology to transition into Cybermen, assimilating other species as they plowed through the blackness of space. Upon meeting the First Doctor, Mondas and the Cybermen are both destroyed.
Owing to their popularity, the Cybermen returned for the Second Doctor classic, “Tomb of the Cybermen,” and although this episode is widely regarded as one of Doctor Who’s best, it completely altered the Cybermen’s background. The adventure takes place on the planet Telos, where the Doctor and a group of explorers uncover (as one might expect) tombs full of Cybermen. Doctor Who tries to explain that Telos is the home planet of the Cybermen, but fans were only introduced to Mondas the season before, creating a contradiction in the lore that isn’t addressed and marking the first retcon of the Cybermen.
After a string of regular appearances over the years, fans continued to debate whether Mondas or Telos was the true home of the Cybermen, and an attempt to correct this issue was made in 1985’s “Attack of the Cybermen.” Here, the Cyber-origin was remolded once again so that Mondas regained its title as the real home planet of the metallic race, but Telos had been their adopted home as part of a grand plan to restore Mondas. The Doctor thwarted this scheme, of course, and freed Telos, simultaneously clearing up a decades-long plot hole.
This backstory remained in place until the launch of the modern Doctor Who series and the arrival of David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor. Seeking to start the Cyberman story afresh, these latest creations hailed from a parallel world and had been designed by British inventor and businessman, John Lumic. Although born in an alternate universe, these villains soon found a way to invade Doctor Who’s prime world, effectively making them the default Cybermen of the modern series. Since these monsters are technically separate to the ones hailing from Mondas/Telos, some fans might not consider this rewrite a proper retcon, but since the Lumic Cybermen turn up in both universes on multiple occasions, this is a rewriting of their origin in almost every respect, and represents the third retcon.
Realizing that Cybermen history had devolved into a bit of a mess, Steven Moffat sought to correct things before he stepped down as showrunner. In “The Doctor Falls,” the Mondasian Cybermen return and are said to have been given a new genesis by the team-up of Missy and the Master. Instead of acknowledging yet another Cyberman origin, the Doctor theorizes that the creatures are actually a product of parallel evolution - Cybermen will inevitably come into existence wherever there is life. Capaldi’s Doctor namechecks Mondas, Telos, Earth and other locations from non-TV Doctor Who stories as examples of differing Cybermen locations, although the result in each case proved the same. In a parting gift to the Doctor Who universe, this explanation not only solves past irregularities, but also accounts for any new incarnation of the Cybermen in future seasons.
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Doctor Who season 12 premieres in 2020 on BBC and BBC America.
