Hive Mind: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:HiveMind_4915.png|link=X-Men (Comic Book)|frame|"I know, kids! Let me show you [[Tropes Will Ruin Your Life|this one little site.]]"]]

 

{{quote|''"What is a drop of rain, compared to the storm? What is a thought, compared to the mind? Our unity is full of wonder, which your tiny individualism cannot even conceive."''|'''The Many''', ''[[System Shock]] 2''}}

On this wiki, you will often see this term used as a nickname for the TV Tropes community, especially our [[All Your Powers Combined|collective power]] to invoke the [[Wiki Magic]].

 

* [[Bakuman｡]]: Mashiro and Azuki are "on the same wave" as he puts it.

** And Mashiro and Takagi are basically "one soul in two bodies" as they put it.

 

 

* In the classic [[Donald Duck]] and Uncle Scrooge stories of [[Carl Barks]], Huey, Dewey and Louie are virtually indistinguishable in appearance and personality, and almost invariably finish each other's sentences. Their ability to pool their intellects (and tap into the [[Great Big Book of Everything|Junior Woodchuck Guidebook]]) makes them smarter than any of the other characters, including wily, savvy Scrooge himself; they're almost always the ones to solve the mystery/resolve the problem.

* The ''[[Astro City]]'' story "Everyday Life" features the Gorilla Swarm, an army of insect-headed primates with a hive mind. The story even has them being controlled by a villain (The Silver Brain), making this a double instantiation of the trope.

 

 

* ''[[Battle Beyond the Stars]]'' has the Nestors as a hive-mind race.

* "The Octopus" in ''[[The City of Lost Children]]'' is apparently a pair of conjoined twins who act as a single creature. In addition to working in perfect unison and finishing each other's sentences, the twins scratch each other's itches and taste what the other is eating.

 

 

* ''[[Starship Troopers (novel)|Starship Troopers]]'' is quite possibly the [[Trope Maker]] (or at least the [[Trope Codifier]]) for science fiction, featuring a race of intelligent Arachnids divided into different castes and all directed by a central "brain" caste.

* The ghosts or psychic echo which may or may not exist in the Overlook Hotel in ''[[The Shining]]'' are said to have a single, collective group intelligence which functions as the hotel's true "manager".

 

 

* The [[The Colbert Report|Colbert]] [[Studio Audience|Nation]] are [http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/149059/january-31-2008/andrew-napolitano of one mind]. Overlaps with 'Internet' above when they act as [[Internet Counterattack|Colbert's zombie army]] online.

* The group mind soldiers in ''[[Dollhouse]]''. Normally, all have to reach a consensus, but a particularly strong will can overpower the group. Cue Echo.

 

 

* In ''[[Mage: The Awakening]]'' the [[Ancient Conspiracy|Seers of the Throne]] have access to a group of servants referred to as "Hive-Souled"; essentially, a single mind/soul born in multiple bodies (generally twins or triplets, although modern science has allowed them to greatly increase the potential numbers). Each individual body of a Hive-Soul is essentially just a single component of their collective mind, having no individual personality, and being able to share experience and memory instantly (if one becomes aware of something, the rest are also immediately aware of it) and it can be difficult for any of them to act in a non-synchronised manner unless they are skilled at multi-tasking (although magic can help with this). For the purpose of magic, they also count as a single target; any spell cast on one of them affects all of them equally. This also extends to any kind of physical alteration (including, unfortunately for them, injuries).

** In the [[Old World of Darkness]], we had Drones, people possessed by a Weaver spirit. (Compare the monstrous Fomori, possessed by a Wyrm spirit.) Although they possessed functional individuality by themselves, whenever two or more Drones were sufficiently close by, they could share each others' minds and senses. One illustration shows a Drone observing from a high point while one on the ground "sees" an enemy sneaking up behind him.

 

 

* Most Wikis, including this one. "Collectively, we know everything. Individually, we're a bunch of idiots".

** But [http://despair.com/meetings.html be careful] because, [[Just for Fun|"None of us is as dumb as all of us."]]

 

 

* The Delightful Children From Down The Lane in ''[[Kids Next Door]]'' speak and act in perfect synchronicity; this is less because of telepathy than because they personify conformity.

** It's never really explained whether they all think the same, whether they all have a mental connection or whether they are just the same person.

 

 

* We might already be part of a [[wikipedia:Collective unconscious|hive]] [[wikipedia:Noosphere|mind]]

** As Irving Janis said: ''"The more amiability and esprit de corps there is among the members of a policy-making ingroup, the greater the danger that independent critical thinking will be replaced by groupthink, which is likely to result in irrational and dehumanizing actions directed against outgroups."''

 

 

* The Invid of ''[[Robotech]]''. At least, until the Regis decides humanity's individuality is evolutionarily superior, and starts artificially creating her own children as [[Half-Human Hybrid|Half Human Hybrids]].

** The only change with the [[Half-Human Hybrid|Half Human Hybrids]] is that they can shut down the link, and aren't totally ruled by it. By and large, they're still part of it.

 

 

* In the [[Ultimate Marvel]] Universe, one of the variant Skrull races are the Chitauri, who see individuality as a disease, and themselves as the "[[Scary Dogmatic Aliens|immune system of the universe]]". In order to operate among humans, they create an "officer" caste who have a limited degree of individual personality, presumably absorbed (along with physical form) from those they devour.

* The [[The Stepford Wives|Stepford]] [[The Midwich Cuckoos|Cuckoos]] of ''[[X-Men (Comic Book)|X-Men]]''.

 

 

* The alien invaders of the film ''[[Independence Day]]'', so says the theory.

* ''[[Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull]]'' uses this trope to a huge extent, even stating that the aliens in the film are a hivemind.

** "All of you were just like the others. So, I thought I would give you a taste of my world."

* The alien in ''[[Slither]]'' is a parasitic [[Hive Queen]] that [[The Virus|infects]] host bodies to make drones that it inhabits with its own consciousness.

* The Arachnids (or Bugs) from the ''[[Starship Troopers (film)|Starship Troopers]]''. The series expanded on them having a caste system, with each subspecies filling a specific role. The Brain Bugs and Behemacoatyl (from the third film, ''Marauder''; the largest Bug seen so far - its body engulfed almost an entire planet) have extreme psychic abilities that can be used to control all bugs in the colony. In the second movie, ''Hero of the Federation'', the General (who's been infected by a mind-control bug) uses this as a justification for exterminating humanity:

{{quote|'''[[General Ripper|General]] Jack Gordon Shephard:''' "[[Humans Through Alien Eyes|Poor creatures]]. Why must we destroy you? I'll tell you why. Order is the tide of creation. But yours is a species that worships...the one over the many. You ''glorify'' your intelligence... because it allows you to believe '''anything'''. That you have a destiny. That you have a right. That you have a cause. That you are [[Humans Are Special|special]]. That you are [[Humanity Is Superior|great]]. But in truth, you are ''born'' '''[[Humanity Is Insane|insane]]'''. And such ''misery''... cannot be allowed... to spread!"}}

 

 

* The [[Starfish Aliens|Primes]] from [[Peter F. Hamilton]]'s [[Commonwealth Saga]] are a textbook example of a superorganism. They evolved as mindless, animal-like "motiles" that had the ability to merge with each other into a more intelligent, sentient "immotile", which would then spawn and direct other motiles by sharing neural impulses with specialized tentacles. Since each immotile can transfer [[Body Surf|its]] [[Brain Uploading|mind]] from one body to another, they are all essentially immortal (and most immotile collectives are actually clusters of hundreds of linked bodies), and also [[Absolute Xenophobe|insanely hostile]] to any life form that is not under their control, including other immotiles. Once they discover radio, they each become a true [[Hive Mind]], singular consciousnesses inhabiting armies of motile soldiers and immotile clusters. Then they proceed to [[Kill'Em All|kill each-other and everything else]].

** Their xenophobia and expansionist imperative extends to the entire Universe. An immotile ''cannot'' envision a Universe containing anything other than [[It's All About Me|itself]].

 

 

* The Borg in ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]''.

** Another ''[[Star Trek]]'' example from the Original Series: the androids in the episode "I, Mudd" were all psychically connected, communing with a central computer during moments of uncertainty or confusion. Many of the androids had identical forms and even spoke in unison.

 

 

* In the ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade]]'', the Malkavian clan was eventually revealed to be a giant conduit for the mind of their founder, Malkav. He had his childer diablerize him en masse, and now exists in the Madness Network in their heads. It's a relatively neutral arrangement for the most part, because a hive mind of crazy people is ''still'' a large number of crazy people, but when he manages to focus them...

** In ''[[Vampire: The Requiem]]'', the Melissidae bloodline slowly destroy the will of their ghouls, essentially making them into a [[Hive Mind]] with the Melissidae in question as the [[Puppet Master]]. This is obviously a massive [[Masquerade]] breach, as a legion of slack-jawed ghouls walking down the street gets people asking uncomfortable questions. The covenants banded together to eradicate the Melissidae, but they missed three of them. The Melissidae, wisely, have chosen to hide themselves a bit better this time around; they pass themselves off as the ''extremely'' reclusive type of cult, for example.

 

 

* The Bohrok from ''[[Bionicle]]''.

 

 

* The Coremind from ''[[Achron]]'' fits this trope. {{spoiler|Another hive mind emerges in the third campaign as well}}

* The Zerg in ''[[Starcraft]]''. They are led by a mind called the Overmind, "the eternal will of the Swarm". The Overmind is an odd one since, in essence, it is simply the [[Hive Mind]] itself, but it can create intelligent Cerebrates as leaders of individual broods. The Cerebrates have a certain amount of individuality, but they are still incapable of betrayal. If either the Overmind or the Cerebrates are killed, the Overmind can simply resurrect them in a new body (since they are, essentially, simply minds), unless they are killed by a dark templar. In ''that'' case, the individual Cerebrate is [[Killed Off for Real]]. However, the Overmind can create a brand new Cerebrate, and if the Overmind is killed by a dark templar the surviving Cerebrates can fuse together and create a new one.

 

 

* Mars, in the webcomic ''[[A Miracle of Science]]''. One of the few examples of large-scale [[Hive Mind]] that ''aren't evil''. It exists as a superstructure over implanted [[FTL Radio]] network and mostly inobtrusive, "possessing" its members only when it wants to say or do something directly. It also [http://www.project-apollo.net/mos/mos042.html has a good sense of humor].

* The Peteys (and more broadly, the Fleetmind) in ''[[Schlock Mercenary]]''

 

 

* Los Hermanos of the ''[[Global Guardians PBEM Universe]]'' combines this with [[Me's a Crowd]], as not only can he create thousands of copies of himself, he shares his consciousness between them. (He is somehow capable of dealing with all the conflicting sensory input, and is capable of handling multiple tasks at once, multiple conversations at once, and so on). At any given moment, he's likely got a dozen duplicates active around the world working in as many different occupations. Anything one duplicate learns, all the duplicates know how to do. And at least two of his constantly active duplicates are married. But only one is an active superhero.

** Aryan Nation is a controversial white supremacist ''superhero'' (yes, you read that right) who shares Los Hermanos's powers. His powers are so similar to Los Hermanos that the Global Guardian once hypothesized that maybe Aryan Nation was one of his dupes who managed to gain a separate consciousness. (He found out later this wasn't true.)

 

 

* The [[Little Green Men|LGMs]] in ''[[Buzz Lightyear of Star Command]]'' are a rather rare benevolent example; all of them in the universe are connected, and their ability to cooperate makes them excellent at pretty much all the technical work [[Space Police|Star Command]] needs done (think about it; [[Omnidisciplinary Scientist|they share all knowledge]] and can work in perfect synch). In the pilot movie, it's revealed that this is made possible by the 'Unimind' on their home planet, and they go into disarray when Zurg steals it (mostly [[Played for Laughs]], it factors into the origin of one major character).

** They do, however, have the occasional one who isn't part of the LGM collective.

 

 

* Some say that [[The Internet]] might be evolving into this.