November is Cybermen Month!

You will become like us....

Hundreds of years ago, Earth was not alone in the sky. Its twin planet, Mondas, contained a race of humans far advanced of their Terran counterparts, and when Mondas was knocked out of its orbit, this race turned to technology in order to survive. They replaced parts of themselves with cybernetic alternatives, until a society arose which enforced their use in the name of survival. The products of this society became known as the Cybermen, beings stripped of all emotions, with only the imperative to survive and proliferate their kind across the galaxy.

      The Cybermen are my favourite Doctor Who villains by a country mile. The first Classic Who episodes I talked about on this blog were Attack of the Cybermen and Earthshock - reviews which I later revisited when my writing style became a little more focused. I've reviewed eight of the ten stories of the original run which feature the Cybermen as one of the main villains, leaving out only their first outing, The Tenth Planet, and 1968's The Wheel In Space. Having recently received the former on DVD, I had the idea to go back to those 60s Cybermen stories and give them another go, this time filling out the gaps.

      Back in the 1970s and 80s, a lot of the black and white episodes were burnt. By the end of the show's run in 1989, the vast majority of the stories I'll be reviewing this November were missing. Thankfully, over time we have recovered lost episodes, and for all but one of these stories, the stories exist in their completion - either in episodes as recorded or in animated reconstructions using the original audio. In four weeks, when I review The Wheel In Space - I'll effectively be attacking my first reconstruction . How exciting!

Thanks.

NEXT WEEK: William Hartnell bows out as the Earth is attacked by mysterious, cloth-faced beings... it's The Tenth Planet.