#the overman

[timeisan1llusion]

I'm not gonna lie, I got baited so hard by that new Overman video I read the title, I registered that it was a conceptulization video, I knew it was going to be fanmade stuff, but all of that pregrathered common sense just straight up flew out the window as soon as he put "Secret Bandia project" and "Maw" in the same sentence while coming into a video about the Wax Bellman I walked into the painted brick wall and I watched it get painted an hour beforehand

[alephskoteinos]

(Quotations from Friedrich Nietzsche's Ecce Homo, from Nietzsche’s Lenzer Heide Notes on European Nihilism by Daniel Fidel Ferrer (2020) p.133)

[martelchapman]

[biggoonie]

THE OVERMAN TP story SCOTT REED art & cover SHANE WHITE APRIL 11 68 PAGES / FC$16.99

The year is 2135. It is the final year. In this futuristic neo-deco world, hired killer Nathan Fisher stumbles upon a secret that will destroy the Human Race. He must risk his sanity, and his life, in a desperate attempt to stop a horrific union between Mankind and machine. He will fail.

Collects issues #1-5

A FINAL VISION OF THE FUTURE, FROM IMAGE COMICS.

[losangeleslovesyou]

LUCIANBLOMKAMP : THE OVERMAN

[calebmichaelm]

Liberalism is the transformation of mankind into cattle

Nietzsche

[thephilosophyofwho]

The Master, The Doctor, The Overman

A lot of The Master’s backstory comes from story lines not in the TV, but Big Finish audio productions or books.  As always (and with the exception of the Eighth Doctor’s adventures) these stories are of questionable canonicity, but we’re just going to roll with that.  References are listed at the end, in case you want to know more about The Master’s earlier history that I refer to.

Last week we took a look at Friedrich Nietzsche’s critique of traditional western morality.  Nietzsche argued that traditional Judeo-Christian morality was a reaction caused by the inferiority felt by the lower classes against their betters (the slave revolution in morality).  The slave morality it created consists of the virtues we favor today, compassion, charity, honesty, and so forth.  It sought to supplant the master morality of the superiors which argued that the acts that made superiors superior, were good.  From the perspective of Nietzsche, The Master wasn’t an evil man, but a good one, and that we’re the bad ones for trying to apply our slave morality to his actions.  The Master has become what Nietzsche called an “Übermensch” or an Overman, who has risen above our day to day values.  He has completed Nietzsche’s three step transformation, but he’s not the only character on the show to become an Overman, The Doctor has as well.

Most people never leave the camel stage of their personal development, but those that do find themselves in the lion stage of personal development.  The lion doesn’t bear burdens, instead he destroys them.  The lion is capable of fighting what Nietzsche called the dragon Thou Shalt, which symbolized the values and obligations society places on individuals.  The Master became a lion before he left Gallifrey.  Under a corrupt Time Lord regime (they seem to have a lot of those), the Master led a revolution.  His first one failed (even if the President did die shortly afterwards), but the second one succeeded after the Master assassinated Lord President Slaan (3).  It was during the events of this revolution that The Master became a lion.  He was tired of living under a set of values that he didn’t agree with, and so he decided to destroy them.

Shortly after assassinating Lord President Slaan, The Master enters the third and final stage of becoming an Overman.  The lion, once he has overthrown his previous moral code has nothing to guide him, and becomes a restless wanderer.  If the lion wishes to progress, he must create a new moral code for himself.  He must become creative, creative like a child.  After fleeing Gallifrey in a stolen TARDIS, the Time Lords plant a spy to travel with him (4).  When the spy’s cover is blown, the Master feels incredibly betrayed and formally adopts his new identity (5).  At this point he has created a set of values, twisted as they are, that he will live by.  He has completed his transformation and risen above slave morality.

The Master isn’t the only Overman in the series though.  The Doctor is also an Overman.  Similar to The Master, the Doctor started out as a camel on Gallifrey, although his rebellious side may have shown up earlier.  When The Master’s student revolution caused repercussions at the Academy, the Doctor flees, becoming an exile with his granddaughter.  It’s at this point he becomes a lion, and overthrows the dragon Thou Shalt.  He still wanders aimlessly though after the theft.  The First Doctor was content to be an observer for many of his adventures, and sometimes was an unscrupulous jerk who had no problems abusing others.  Eventually though The Doctor becomes a child, and adheres more rigorously to his promise “Never cruel nor cowardly.  Never give in; never give up.”  A promise he created himself.  And it’s a good thing The Doctor is an Overman.  Overmen crave rivalry and a challenge.  While he may not appreciate it, The Master certainly enjoys challenging The Doctor as an equal Overman.

But the Universe isn’t populated only by Overmen.  The opposite of an Overman, The Last Man, is far more plentiful.  The Last Man is tired of life, complacent in the face of adversity, and refuses to take risks.  The Doctor frequently runs into Last Men while traveling through the Universe.  Many people whose lives he’s changed were Last Men before they met.  But then they spend a few hours running around in danger or stopping the latest alien menace.  And in the climax of the struggle, The Last Man takes a risk and does something grand.  They’ve started the transformation from Last Man to Overman.  It’ll be a long process, but with a kickstart from The Doctor, it can certainly be done.  Which is good, because a good Overman will want to bring up their friends and companions and show them that they too can be as great as The Doctor if they take a risk and throw off society’s expectations.

The Master and The Doctor have both thrown off their Gallifreyan upbrining to form their own code to follow.  As Overmen the two are engaged in competition, sometimes healthy but often far too dangerous.  We’re going to move away from The Master and Nietzschean ethics next week and onto something a bit cuter, the Adipose from Partners in Crime.  Little blobs of life that fed on human fat before becoming independent.  We don’t like to think about it, but they were feeding on humans.  At least they were feeding politely on humans though, in most cases we didn’t know it.  They are an example of benign carnivorism, but is it possible to be benignly carnivorous?  We’ll examine the ethics of the idea next week.

  (1)  Audio – “Master” (Seventh Doctor)

(2)  Novel – “Deadly Reunion” (Third Doctor)

(3)  Short Story – “Birth of a Renegade” (Fifth Doctor)

(4) Comic – “The Glorious Dead” (Eighth Doctor)

(5) Novel – “The Dark Path (Second Doctor)

[athousandgateaux]

We must reject every interpretation which would have the Overman succeed where the higher man fails. The Overman is not a man who surpasses himself and succeeds in surpassing himself. The Overman and the higher man differ in nature; both in the instances which produce them and in the goals that they attain...And neither can we follow an interpretation such as that of Heidegger who turns the Overman into the realisation and even the determination of the human essence. For the human essence does not wait for the Overman in order to be determined. It is determined as human, all-too-human. Man's essence is the becoming-reactive of forces, this becoming as universal becoming. The essence of man and of the world occupied by man is the becoming reactive of all forces, nihilism and nothing but nihilism. Man and his generic activity -- these are the two skin-diseases of the Earth (Z II "Of Great Events").

Gilles Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy pg. 168-69