History Main / TheMorlocks

* Deep below the Martian city of Y'therthl in ''TabletopGame/RocketAge'' is a network of tunnels full of the mutants occasionally created by the ritual use of genetic engineering technology. Generally hideous and broken parodies of those above, they can still seek love and acceptance.

* Deep below the Martian city of Y'therthl in ''TabletopGame/RocketAge'' is a network of tunnels full of the mutants occasionally created by the ritual use of genetic engineering technology. Generally hideous and broken parodies of those above, they still seek love and acceptance.

* In one episode of the SuperFriends, "The Conquerors of the Future" they meet expys of Morlocks, called Barlocks. They are otherwise identical and trying to break in and attack the [[DomedHometown domed cities]] of the normal-looking people of the year 3000.

** Orcs are [[FlipFlopOfGod sometimes identified]] as originally Elves who were subverted by the will of Morgoth, Sauron's master from ''TheSilmarillion''. Other times they're the result of Morgoth trying to create his own version of the children of Ilúvatar (elves and men). Tolkien went back and forth on the matter repeatedly, and hadn't settled on a definitive version even when he died, mainly due to trying to reconcile his dislike of AlwaysChaoticEvil with his belief in Evil as inherently incapable of creativity.

* The thematic play {{Brand}} by {{Henrik Ibsen}} has a vision how of regular humans will evolve. It starts out with an idea of "eartbound thralls", gradually devolving into something similar to Morlocks (Brand actually uses the term Dwarfs, but the description fits), all in the mind of the titular character, who has a really grim view of where history is leading mankind.

* In the Star Trek: TOS episode "The Cloud Minders", the world of Ardana seems to be headed this way. The Troglodites are still recognizably the same species as the inhabitants of Stratos, but constant exposure to Zenite gas is gradually destroying their higher mental functions.

%% Image removed per Image Pickin' thread: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=1438631157029622700

[[quoteright:350:[[Franchise/TheElderScrolls http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/morlock_1765.jpg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:350: Neat fan art.]]

* In the anime of ''Literature/ShinSekaiYori'' the Bakenezumi are anthropomorphic rodent beings which live in servitude to the psychically powered humans, [[spoiler: then it is revealed that they've been aiming to overthrow humans all along, and furthermore it's revealed that they are the mutated descendants of the percentage of humans who didn't have psychic abilities.]]

* And, of course, ''ComicBook/{{X-Men}}'' supporting characters the Morlocks, mutants whose mutations are physically disfiguring and who live underground with others of their kind. Of course, even among the Morlocks, there are hierarchies, and the Tunnellers look down on the Drain Dwellers (and vice versa). Only one Morlock, Marrow, has ever been a member of the X-Men proper, reflecting the bad blood between the two groups.

-> ''"The Proles will never awake until they are free and the Proles will never be free until they awaken."''
-->-- ''[[Literature/NineteenEightyFour 1984]]''

[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/morlock_1765.jpg]]

* An issue of [[TheLeagueOfExtraordinaryGentlemen Allan and the Sundered Veil]] deals with Morlocks [[spoiler: where they revealed to be aliens.]]

* The Hunters in ''Film/{{Pandorum}}'' are very similar to the Morlocks but their evolution was accelerated and they are cannibals for cultural reasons. [[http://www.icollector.com/Three-Morlock-articulated-heads-created-for-The-Time-Machine-and-Pandorum_i10031270 They even used the heads of the Morlock costumes from the 2002 adaptation.]]

Common in science fiction and fantasy, TheMorlocks usually represent everything that science and art cannot redeem in the working class. This is a somewhat insidious remnant of Victorian phrenology and its ideas of EvolutionaryLevels, and has left a huge impact in genre fiction.

TheMorlocks as a trope are almost AlwaysChaoticEvil. They are often the byproduct of a SufficientlyAdvanced Society.

* The Hunters in ''Film/{{Pandorum}}'' are very similar to the Morlocks but their evolution was accelerated and they are cannibals by choice. [[http://www.icollector.com/Three-Morlock-articulated-heads-created-for-The-Time-Machine-and-Pandorum_i10031270 They even used the heads of the Morlock costumes from the 2002 adaptation.]]

* Spoofed as the Dumblocks on the ''{{Futurama}}'' episode "The Late Philip J. Fry". The gang is on a forward-only time machine looking for a backwards time machine, and the Eloi-like race they encounter say they could have one ready in five years. They return five years later to find that the Dumblocks have taken over.

-> ''The Proles will never awake until they are free and the Proles will never be free until they awaken.''

--> ''The Proles will never awake until they are free and the Proles will never be free until they awaken.''

[[caption-width-right:275: Neat fan art.]]

The name of this trope stems from ''TheTimeMachine'' by H.G. Wells. The Morlocks are hideous troll-like beings that haunt the night while the innocent Eloi culture sleeps.
--Except that the book implies that it is kind of a BlueAndOrangeMorality: the Eloi have no conception of altruism, art, love or even the future tense. They don't actually have a culture. The Morlocks, on the other hand, are actually productive society members: they just breed the Eloi like cattle, [[ToServeMan and for the same purpose]]. The narrator speculates that, as the upper class constantly pushed the lower class below ground, the upper class lost the ability to think and work for itself, leaving the lower class adapted to operating heavy machinery and thinking logically. The entire thing is commonly interpreted as a critique on Victorian society.

* In UsefulNotes/NewYorkCity there are many UrbanLegends of "Mole People" living BeneathTheEarth in [[SinisterSubway abandoned tunnels]]. These legends have some basis in fact, due to the many railroad tunnels under Midtown Manhattan (not the NewYorkSubway, however) which were poorly patrolled prior to the TurnOfTheMillennium. This allowed a RagtagBunchOfMisfits to dwell there, some of whom never left.

* In NewYorkCity there are many UrbanLegends of "Mole People" living BeneathTheEarth in [[SinisterSubway abandoned tunnels]]. These legends have some basis in fact, due to the many railroad tunnels under Midtown Manhattan (not the NewYorkSubway, however) which were poorly patrolled prior to the TurnOfTheMillennium. This allowed [[RagTagBunchOfMisfits a variety of eccentrics]] to dwell there, some of whom never left.

* The Orcs of ''LordOfTheRings'' are [[FlipFlopOfGod sometimes identified]] as originally Elves who were subverted by the will of Morgoth, Sauron's master from ''TheSilmarillion''. Other times they're the result of Morgoth trying to create his own version of the children of Ilúvatar (elves and men). Tolkien went back and forth on the matter repeatedly, and hadn't settled on a definitive version even when he died, mainly due to trying to reconcile his dislike of AlwaysChaoticEvil with his belief in Evil as inherently incapable of creativity.
** Gollum, to an extent. Born a perfectly normal [[{{hobbits}} hobbit]] (or else, something very much like a hobbit), but centuries of living under the Misty Mountains under the corrupting influence of the One Ring gradually turned him into a degenerate nocturnal creeper.