Cyclopean Creature



A Cyclopean Creature -- better known just as a "cyclops" -- is a character or creature that naturally only has one eye.

Monocular vision is symbolic of metaphorical narrow vision and lack of depth perception. As such, many human villains have one eye as an indication of their simplistic worldview. This also provides an excuse for an Eyepatch of Power. Characters who lack perspective on a temporary basis might sport Peek-a-Bangs or some other occular obtrusion.

It should be noted that "cyclops" more accurately translates to "circle-eye" or "wheel-eye", referring to its size. Therefore Cyclopean technically means huge, rather than one-eyed (not to mention Cyclops themselves were giants).

For other deviations from normal eye structure, see Eyeless Face, Third Eye, Oculothorax, and Extra Eyes. Compare to the robotic version, the Cyber Cyclops, and Eyepatch of Power. For other uses of the term, see the disambiguation page.

Anime and Manga

 * A lot of Japanese anime and manga feature Cute Monster Characters (usually girls), which are generally known as "monoeyes".
 * Fullmetal Alchemist has the Doll Soldiers, which are one-eyed Zombie Mooks who look at lot like EVAs, except those were Eyeless Face.
 * Also, although his initial One-Winged Angel form is Extra Eyes / Eyes Do Not Belong There, Father takes on a cyclops appearance right before crossing the Bishonen Line.
 * Gold And Silver from Yaiba. In the latter case, it's also his weakpoint. (Gold's eye is just as bouncy as everything else).

Comic Books

 * X-Men member Cyclops, so named because of the large visor spanning his head. Underneath the visor he's got two eyes, of course - but getting a look at them can be rather dangerous, however.
 * In the Age of Apocalypse timeline, he really did only have one eye, since Wolverine gouged out the other one.
 * A couple appear as minor characters in Preacher. They're the kids of an isolated family living in the swamps of Louisiana, after generations of in-breeding.

Film

 * Mike from Monsters, Inc., who is basically a one-eyed Cephalothorax. Mike's girlfriend Celia fits as the bill as well. The logo of the titular company also features a single eye.
 * The cyclopes in The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, which looked like a giant one-eyed satyr with a horn on its head. A second one also in that film is easy to spot—it has two horns.
 * The Golden Voyage of Sinbad had a one-eyed centaur.
 * So does 2007's TMNT.
 * The Cyclopes in The City of Lost Children are a group of religious zealots who are all blind and see through the aid of Borg-like eyepieces called "Optacons" that they emphatically only wear over one eye (their left). Their temple which features huge open furnaces and mountains of coal is also a reference to the cyclopes in Callimachus' hymn in Greek Mythology where they were blacksmiths who assisted Hephaestus.
 * Rell in Krull.
 * B.O.B. in Monsters vs. Aliens.
 * Many of the minions in Despicable Me.
 * There is a giant cyclops in |Hercules as one of the Titans. The series also included smaller cyclopes. The Fates from the same movie also shared one eye between the three of them, with one even having only one eye socket in the middle of her face.
 * Agent Wendy Pleakley from Lilo and Stitch.
 * The Bert I. Gordon film The Cyclops, although there, the titular beast is a normal (albeit giant) man who is just missing his left eye due to half his face having melted off (similar to Gordon's War of the Colossal Beast).
 * The scarred, one-eyed Glenn Manning in that film also probably counts.
 * In The Lord of the Rings adaptations, Sauron is represented as an enormous fiery eyeball. The Great Eye is also his symbol in the book, though he's implied to still have a physical body that presumably has two eyes.

Live-Action TV

 * In Classic Doctor Who the ambassador from Alpha Centauri in the "Peladon" stories is from a Cyclopean species.

Music

 * Long time fans of Dr. Demento will remember the song "Cyclops" by David Little, which received some airplay on his show in the 1980s.

Mythology

 * The trope namer are the cyclopses of Classical Mythology, the most famous of which is Polyphemous from The Odyssey.
 * There were two types—one group were people-eating giants, the others were also giants, but worked in Hephaestus' forges.
 * The other kind of giants were the Hekatonkheires, hundred-armed giants. Now imagine a Hekatonkheir playing tennis against a Cyclops...
 * Sinbad the Sailor has met a Cyclops in the Polyphemous mold before.
 * Japanese Folklore is full of one-eyed creatures, including the Hitotsume Nyuudo (one eyed monk), the Aobozu (Blue Monk) and the Ippondatara (a giant with one eye and one leg).

Newspaper Comics

 * Garfield meets a seeing eye dog.

Tabletop Games

 * The Cyclopean Ghoul in the Earthdawn supplement Scourge Unending.
 * Call of Cthulhu (tabletop game) supplement Pursuit to Kadath, adventure "The All Seeing Eye of the Alskali". The title Alskali monsters, whose single eye can hypnotise their victims.
 * Dungeons & Dragons has had a variety of cyclops:
 * Greek Mythology version in the 1st Edition Deities and Demigods Cyclopedia
 * Cyclopskin (cyclops kin) in the 1E Monster Manual 2.
 * In Changeling: The Lost one of the Ogre kiths is the Cyclopean. They almost always have a missing eye and their mien makes it look like one central eye. They do come in other varieties though.
 * In Warhammer 40,000 the Primarch of the Thousand Sons was Magnus the Red, whose defining features were coppery red skin, being a giant and having just one eye. However, it is no longer known for certain wether he was a Cyclops, had only one orbit or simply lacked one eye. However, now that he is a Demon Prince of Tzeentch, it is probably quite hard to say if this still applies or if it is something special.

Theatre

 * Cyclops, by Euripides, tells the story of the most famous man-eating cyclops - the one who went up against Odysseus in the Odyssey.

Video Games

 * Ogre magi in the Warcraft universe have two heads, one with two eyes and another with one eye. Cyclopean ogres of the single-headed variety also exist in the Warcraft Expanded Universe. The latter category rarely appear in WoW (although ogre magi are common enough), but WoW did introduce their kin the gronn, who bear a resemblance to the cyclopes from The 7th Voyage of Sinbad.
 * God of War, being based on Greek Mythology, has these as recurring enemies in a few varieties. A common method of finishing them off is to rip their eyes out, which you can trade in for goodies.
 * Several Pokémon including Magnemite, Unown, Beldum, Dusclops, Dusknoir, and Sigilyph.
 * Massmouth, from the Doom Game Mod series The Adventures of MassMouth. (He was originally a Quake II skin.) He also appears as a bot in Skulltag, a source port focused on multiplayer, where one of his lines is a complaint about his lack of peripheral vision.
 * Many enemies in The Legend of Zelda, including Tektites, Diababa, and most famously, Gohma.
 * The Cyclops in Castle Crashers, whom you must defeat to rescue the Green Princess..
 * Cyclops appear as Myth Units in Age of Mythology if you progress to Classical Age with Ares. Another Cyclops, Gargarensis, is the main antagonist
 * Cyclopes in Rift seem to be denizens of the Plane of Earth. They're built along the same large and solid lines as bahmi (although they tend to be even taller), but have ivory-yellow skin, vaguely bestial features, and the definitive single, centrally-positioned eye.
 * Polyphemus the Cyclops from the Odyssey appears as a boss in Titan Quest. You also meet some other cyclops while ascending.
 * A Cyclops (which is heavly based on the one from The 7th Voyage of Sinbad) appears as the first boss in Will Rock, capable of hitting you from far away by spitting stones at you. It becomes a Degraded Boss soon enough.
 * The boss enemy Gorpus from Musashi: Samurai Legend is a gigantic scorpion with a single huge eye hidden under his helmet.
 * In the NES game Day Dreamin' Davey, there is a Cyclops that Davey has to destroy by attacking his eye in one Greek mythology stage. Of course, that "Cyclops" in his imagined state turns out to be a girl whom he just hit in the eye in class! Oh Crap!
 * The Inkies and their leader in De Blob have one eye, which also functions as a mouth, or at least it flexes when they talk.
 * In the Xena: Warrior Princess game for the PlayStation, a cyclops guards King Valarian's island stronghold in the Isle of Kronos stage. He tosses rocks at Xena from afar before climbing up to confront her at the top of a cliff. In a Shout-Out to The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, he has one horn on his forehead and if the player uses the "chakram-cam" feature it can be seen he has satyr-like legs similar to Harryhausen's cyclopes.
 * Jackie Chan's Action Kung Fu: Nyudo Monster, the fourth stage boss.
 * Space Harrier had one-eyed woolly mammoths.
 * Fleepa, Optomon and the Final Boss in The Guardian Legend.

Web Comics

 * The Beast Legion has Gorgorath
 * Gastrophobia has a goblin magically transform into a biclops. "Exactly like a cyclops, only with twice as many eyes and therefore twice as dangerous."
 * Order of the Stick, when one character asks what a superhero would be doing on a deserted island, Elan mentions that it's been known to happen, leading to an Imagine Spot of Odysseus and his crew meeting that other Cyclops.
 * The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob has the annually appearing Halloween Monster, who only has one eye.

Western Animation

 * Leela of Futurama, who initially was presented as a member of an unknown alien race, but turned out to be a human mutant.
 * Saffi, Cerbee, and Dorkus on Jimmy Two-Shoes.
 * Biclops on ChalkZone only had one eye before Rudy drew him his second one.
 * Kang and Kodos from The Simpsons Halloween Specials.
 * A Cyclops appears on the Shrek movies as the bouncer on The Poisoned Apple.
 * Iris from Ruby Gloom.
 * On The Powerpuff Girls, Billy from the Gangreen Gang is revealed to be a cyclops under his Blinding Bangs.
 * Plankton on SpongeBob SquarePants.
 * Cherri Bomb and Niffty from Hazbin Hotel, both one-eyed demon-girls.

Real Life

 * Cy, the internet-famous one-eyed noseless kitten, who was born December 2009 and died a day later.
 * A cyclops goat was also born in Nigeria. It caused quite a stir - they even accused the owner of an act of bestiality.
 * A one-eyed piglet with a severely deformed nose was also born in China in 2005.