Mi-go
Encyclopedia
The Mi-go are a race of extraterrestrial
s in the Cthulhu Mythos
created by H. P. Lovecraft
and others. The name was first applied to the creatures in Lovecraft's short story
"The Whisperer in Darkness
" (1931
), taking up a reference to 'What fungi sprout in Yuggoth
' in his sonnet cycle
Fungi from Yuggoth
(1929
–30
) and there describing the contrasting vegetation on a couple of alien dream-worlds.
-like entities the size of a man with a "convoluted ellipsoid" composed of pyramided, fleshy rings and covered in antennae where a head would normally be. According to two reports in the original short story, their bodies consist of a form of matter that does not occur naturally on Earth. Interestingly, they are capable of going into suspended animation until softened and reheated by the sun or some other source of heat. They are about 5 feet (1.5 m) long, and their crustacean-like bodies bear numerous sets of paired appendages. They also possess a pair of membranous bat-like wings which are used to fly through the "ether" of outer space (a scientific concept
which is now discredited). The wings do not function well on Earth. Several other races in Lovecraft's Mythos have wings like these as well.
The Mi-go can transport humans from Earth to Pluto (and beyond) and back again by removing the subject's brain
and placing it into a "brain cylinder
", which can be attached to external devices to allow it to see, hear, and speak.
In The Whisperer in Darkness
the Mi-go are heard to give praise to Nyarlathotep
and Shub-Niggurath
, suggesting some form of worship, although in newer works by authors other than Lovecraft, the Mi'Go are at war with the Elder Gods. Their moral system is completely alien, making them seem highly malicious from a human perspective.
One of the moons of Yuggoth
holds designs that are sacred to the Mi-go. The symbols inscribed upon the moon are useful in various processes mentioned in the Necronomicon
. It is said that transcriptions of these designs can be sensed by the Mi-go, and those possessing them shall be hunted down by the few remaining on earth.
Hastur
apparently despises the Mi-go. His cult, servants of "Him Who Is Not to be Named", are dedicated to hunting them down and exterminating the fungoid threat. However, in the original story a human ally of the Mi-go mentions "Him Who is not to be Named" in the list of honored entities along with Nyarlathotep
and Shub-Niggurath
. It should be noted, though, that Lovecraft never made a connection between Hastur and "Him Who Is Not To Be Named", and that Derleth was the one to do so.
s was the first three issues of H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu: The Whisperer in Darkness
that featured the Miskatonic Project, created by Mark Ellis
.
The Mi-go are also prominent antagonists in Pagan Publishing
's Delta Green
sourcebook for the Call of Cthulhu
role-playing game
. According to the guide, there are three castes: scientist, soldier, and worker. This raises the possibility that other castes may exist. The book also says that the Mi-go usually have five pairs of appendages though the number can vary up or down from that. Normally, the first pair is designed for grasping and manipulating, but in the scientist caste it is usually the first two pairs. The remaining appendages are used for locomotion. The soldiers may have two or more pairs of wings. Some individuals do not have wings at all if they are deemed unnecessary to their task. The Mi-go apparently can modify their own bodies. It is also suggested that all their external accoutrements are actually extruded at will from the central gelatinous mass similar to the way the Shoggoth
extrude body parts. In the Delta Green setting, the "Greys" are actually puppets remotely-controlled by the Mi-go.
They are distinguished by their mastery in various fields of science
, especially surgery
. Although they originate from beyond our solar system
, they have set up an outpost on Pluto
(known as Yuggoth
in the mythos) and sometimes visit Earth
to mine for mineral
s and other natural resource
s. The Mi-go normally communicate by changing the colors of their orb-like heads or by emitting odd buzzing noises. They can also speak any human language upon receiving the appropriate surgical modification.
The Mi-Go are also one of the main enemies of humanity in the role-playing game CthulhuTech
, a game which combines Lovecraft's fiction with tropes and themes from mecha anime
, in which their name is spelled Migou (see below); however, they are commonly referred to as "bugs" by humans.
Here they are presented much as in the original Lovecraft stories, and somewhat similar to the way they are portrayed in Delta Green; being masters of science and genetics, and in particular human genetics. Their hostility to humanity could be seen as jealousy that humans had created a technology that they had never thought of, combined with a fear of humanity's growing power threatening them. Although it is stated that they have emotions vastly different from our own, their campaign on Earth seems to have developed into genocidal hatred against humans.
In Allan and the Sundered Veil
, Allan Quatermain
, Randolph Carter
, John Carter of Mars, and the Time Traveller encounter Mi-go, which are stated as being the same as Morlock
s.
In "To Mars and Providence
", the Mi-go engage in trade with the Martian
s from The War of the Worlds
.
The Mi-go also appear in the final segment, directed by Brian Yuzna, of the movie Necronomicon
.
A Mi-go is scripted to walk across the stage during the "Tentacles" number of A Shoggoth on the Roof
, prompting Armitage to narrate it as "some horrible creature... I do not even want to know what that is".
The horror themed miniatures game HorrorClix
, which features Cthulu as a colossal figure, has a Mi-Go as a unique figure in its The Lab expansion.
The Mi-Go also appear as sinister brain collectors in the short story "Boojum", written by Sarah Monette
and Elizabeth Bear
.
an equivalent of the yeti
, a semi-mythical humanoid being who lives in the high mountain ranges of that country' While the Mi-go of Lovecraft's mythos is completely unlike the migou of Tibetan stories, Lovecraft seems to equate the two, as can be seen in the following excerpt from "The Whisperer in Darkness":
Extraterrestrial life
Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...
s in the Cthulhu Mythos
Cthulhu Mythos
The Cthulhu Mythos is a shared fictional universe, based on the work of American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft.The term was first coined by August Derleth, a contemporary correspondent of Lovecraft, who used the name of the creature Cthulhu - a central figure in Lovecraft literature and the focus...
created by H. P. Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
and others. The name was first applied to the creatures in Lovecraft's short story
Short story
A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...
"The Whisperer in Darkness
The Whisperer in Darkness
"The Whisperer in Darkness" is a short story by H. P. Lovecraft. Written February–September 1930, it was first published in Weird Tales, August 1931. Similar to "The Colour Out of Space" , it is a blend of horror and science fiction...
" (1931
1931 in literature
The year 1931 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Cherokee playwright Lynn Riggs' play Green Grow the Lilacs premiers. It would later be adapted by Rodgers and Hammerstein as Oklahoma!....
), taking up a reference to 'What fungi sprout in Yuggoth
Yuggoth
Yuggoth is a fictional planet in the Cthulhu Mythos. H. P. Lovecraft himself said that Yuggoth is the then newly-discovered planet Pluto. However, other writers claim that it is actually an enormous, trans-Neptunian world that orbits perpendicular to the ecliptic of the solar system.-In the...
' in his sonnet cycle
Sonnet cycle
A sonnet cycle is a group of sonnets, arranged to address a particular person or theme, and designed to be read both as a collection of fully realized individual poems and as a single poetic work comprising all the individual sonnets....
Fungi from Yuggoth
Fungi from Yuggoth
Fungi from Yuggoth is a sequence of 36 sonnets by cosmic horror writer H. P. Lovecraft. Most of the sonnets were written between 27 December 1929 – 4 January 1930; thereafter individual sonnets appeared in Weird Tales and other genre magazines...
(1929
1929 in literature
The year 1929 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*Candide by Voltaire is declared obscene by the United States Customs and seized in 1930....
–30
1930 in literature
The year 1930 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*January 6 - The first literary character licensing agreement is signed by A. A. Milne, granting Stephen Slesinger U.S...
) and there describing the contrasting vegetation on a couple of alien dream-worlds.
Summary
The Mi-go are large, pinkish, fungoid, crustaceanCrustacean
Crustaceans form a very large group of arthropods, usually treated as a subphylum, which includes such familiar animals as crabs, lobsters, crayfish, shrimp, krill and barnacles. The 50,000 described species range in size from Stygotantulus stocki at , to the Japanese spider crab with a leg span...
-like entities the size of a man with a "convoluted ellipsoid" composed of pyramided, fleshy rings and covered in antennae where a head would normally be. According to two reports in the original short story, their bodies consist of a form of matter that does not occur naturally on Earth. Interestingly, they are capable of going into suspended animation until softened and reheated by the sun or some other source of heat. They are about 5 feet (1.5 m) long, and their crustacean-like bodies bear numerous sets of paired appendages. They also possess a pair of membranous bat-like wings which are used to fly through the "ether" of outer space (a scientific concept
Luminiferous aether
In the late 19th century, luminiferous aether or ether, meaning light-bearing aether, was the term used to describe a medium for the propagation of light....
which is now discredited). The wings do not function well on Earth. Several other races in Lovecraft's Mythos have wings like these as well.
The Mi-go can transport humans from Earth to Pluto (and beyond) and back again by removing the subject's brain
Human brain
The human brain has the same general structure as the brains of other mammals, but is over three times larger than the brain of a typical mammal with an equivalent body size. Estimates for the number of neurons in the human brain range from 80 to 120 billion...
and placing it into a "brain cylinder
Isolated brain
Isolated brain refers to keeping a brain alive in-vitro. This is done either by perfusion by a blood substitute, often an oxygenated solution of various salts, or by submerging the brain in oxygenated artificial cerebrospinal fluid . It is the biological counterpart of brain in a vat...
", which can be attached to external devices to allow it to see, hear, and speak.
In The Whisperer in Darkness
The Whisperer in Darkness
"The Whisperer in Darkness" is a short story by H. P. Lovecraft. Written February–September 1930, it was first published in Weird Tales, August 1931. Similar to "The Colour Out of Space" , it is a blend of horror and science fiction...
the Mi-go are heard to give praise to Nyarlathotep
Nyarlathotep
Nyarlathotep, also known as the Crawling Chaos, is a malign deity in the Cthulhu Mythos fictional universe created by H. P. Lovecraft. First appearing in Lovecraft's 1920 prose poem of the same name, he was later mentioned in other works by Lovecraft and by other writers and in the tabletop...
and Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath, often associated with the phrase “The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young”, is a deity in the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft...
, suggesting some form of worship, although in newer works by authors other than Lovecraft, the Mi'Go are at war with the Elder Gods. Their moral system is completely alien, making them seem highly malicious from a human perspective.
One of the moons of Yuggoth
Yuggoth
Yuggoth is a fictional planet in the Cthulhu Mythos. H. P. Lovecraft himself said that Yuggoth is the then newly-discovered planet Pluto. However, other writers claim that it is actually an enormous, trans-Neptunian world that orbits perpendicular to the ecliptic of the solar system.-In the...
holds designs that are sacred to the Mi-go. The symbols inscribed upon the moon are useful in various processes mentioned in the Necronomicon
Necronomicon
The Necronomicon is a fictional grimoire appearing in the stories by horror writer H. P. Lovecraft and his followers. It was first mentioned in Lovecraft's 1924 short story "The Hound", written in 1922, though its purported author, the "Mad Arab" Abdul Alhazred, had been quoted a year earlier in...
. It is said that transcriptions of these designs can be sensed by the Mi-go, and those possessing them shall be hunted down by the few remaining on earth.
Hastur
Hastur
Hastur is a fictional entity of the Cthulhu Mythos. Hastur first appeared in Ambrose Bierce's short story "Haïta the Shepherd" as a benign god of shepherds. Robert W...
apparently despises the Mi-go. His cult, servants of "Him Who Is Not to be Named", are dedicated to hunting them down and exterminating the fungoid threat. However, in the original story a human ally of the Mi-go mentions "Him Who is not to be Named" in the list of honored entities along with Nyarlathotep
Nyarlathotep
Nyarlathotep, also known as the Crawling Chaos, is a malign deity in the Cthulhu Mythos fictional universe created by H. P. Lovecraft. First appearing in Lovecraft's 1920 prose poem of the same name, he was later mentioned in other works by Lovecraft and by other writers and in the tabletop...
and Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath
Shub-Niggurath, often associated with the phrase “The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young”, is a deity in the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft...
. It should be noted, though, that Lovecraft never made a connection between Hastur and "Him Who Is Not To Be Named", and that Derleth was the one to do so.
Other appearances
The Mi-go's inaugural appearance in comic bookComic book
A comic book or comicbook is a magazine made up of comics, narrative artwork in the form of separate panels that represent individual scenes, often accompanied by dialog as well as including...
s was the first three issues of H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu: The Whisperer in Darkness
H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu: The Whisperer in Darkness
H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu: The Whisperer in Darkness was a three-part comic book mini-series published by Millennium Publications that followed a group of investigators, the Miskatonic Project, as they confronted the Mi-go, the cunning Fungi from Yuggoth....
that featured the Miskatonic Project, created by Mark Ellis
Mark Ellis (writer)
Mark Ellis is an American novelist and comic-book writer who under the pen name James Axler has written scores of books for the Outlanders paperback novel series and other books, as well as numerous independent comics series....
.
The Mi-go are also prominent antagonists in Pagan Publishing
Pagan Publishing
Pagan Publishing is a role-playing game publishing company founded by John Tynes in 1990. It began by publishing a Call of Cthulhu role-playing game fanzine, The Unspeakable Oath. In 1994, the company moved from Columbia, Missouri to Seattle, Washington where it incorporated. The staff at this time...
's Delta Green
Delta Green
Delta Green is a setting for the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game created by Adam Scott Glancy, Dennis Detwiller, and John Tynes, aka the Delta Green Partnership, of the Seattle gaming house Pagan Publishing...
sourcebook for the Call of Cthulhu
Call of Cthulhu (role-playing game)
Call of Cthulhu is a horror fiction role-playing game based on H. P. Lovecraft's story of the same name and the associated Cthulhu Mythos.The game, often abbreviated as CoC, is published by Chaosium.-Setting:...
role-playing game
Role-playing game
A role-playing game is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting, or through a process of structured decision-making or character development...
. According to the guide, there are three castes: scientist, soldier, and worker. This raises the possibility that other castes may exist. The book also says that the Mi-go usually have five pairs of appendages though the number can vary up or down from that. Normally, the first pair is designed for grasping and manipulating, but in the scientist caste it is usually the first two pairs. The remaining appendages are used for locomotion. The soldiers may have two or more pairs of wings. Some individuals do not have wings at all if they are deemed unnecessary to their task. The Mi-go apparently can modify their own bodies. It is also suggested that all their external accoutrements are actually extruded at will from the central gelatinous mass similar to the way the Shoggoth
Shoggoth
A shoggoth is a fictional monster in the Cthulhu Mythos. The being was mentioned in passing in sonnet XX of H.P...
extrude body parts. In the Delta Green setting, the "Greys" are actually puppets remotely-controlled by the Mi-go.
They are distinguished by their mastery in various fields of science
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
, especially surgery
Surgery
Surgery is an ancient medical specialty that uses operative manual and instrumental techniques on a patient to investigate and/or treat a pathological condition such as disease or injury, or to help improve bodily function or appearance.An act of performing surgery may be called a surgical...
. Although they originate from beyond our solar system
Solar System
The Solar System consists of the Sun and the astronomical objects gravitationally bound in orbit around it, all of which formed from the collapse of a giant molecular cloud approximately 4.6 billion years ago. The vast majority of the system's mass is in the Sun...
, they have set up an outpost on Pluto
Pluto
Pluto, formal designation 134340 Pluto, is the second-most-massive known dwarf planet in the Solar System and the tenth-most-massive body observed directly orbiting the Sun...
(known as Yuggoth
Yuggoth
Yuggoth is a fictional planet in the Cthulhu Mythos. H. P. Lovecraft himself said that Yuggoth is the then newly-discovered planet Pluto. However, other writers claim that it is actually an enormous, trans-Neptunian world that orbits perpendicular to the ecliptic of the solar system.-In the...
in the mythos) and sometimes visit Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
to mine for mineral
Mineral
A mineral is a naturally occurring solid chemical substance formed through biogeochemical processes, having characteristic chemical composition, highly ordered atomic structure, and specific physical properties. By comparison, a rock is an aggregate of minerals and/or mineraloids and does not...
s and other natural resource
Natural resource
Natural resources occur naturally within environments that exist relatively undisturbed by mankind, in a natural form. A natural resource is often characterized by amounts of biodiversity and geodiversity existent in various ecosystems....
s. The Mi-go normally communicate by changing the colors of their orb-like heads or by emitting odd buzzing noises. They can also speak any human language upon receiving the appropriate surgical modification.
The Mi-Go are also one of the main enemies of humanity in the role-playing game CthulhuTech
CthulhuTech
CthulhuTech is a science-fiction and horror roleplaying game created by Wildfire LLC and published by Sandstorm that combines elements of the Cthulhu Mythos with anime-style mecha, horror, magic and futuristic action...
, a game which combines Lovecraft's fiction with tropes and themes from mecha anime
Mecha anime
Mecha anime cover all series that revolve around the use of piloted robotic armors in battle, which is broken down into two subcategories of Super Robot and Real Robot. Mecha series cover a wide variety of genres from comedy to drama, though are always fantastical and larger-than-life in nature and...
, in which their name is spelled Migou (see below); however, they are commonly referred to as "bugs" by humans.
Here they are presented much as in the original Lovecraft stories, and somewhat similar to the way they are portrayed in Delta Green; being masters of science and genetics, and in particular human genetics. Their hostility to humanity could be seen as jealousy that humans had created a technology that they had never thought of, combined with a fear of humanity's growing power threatening them. Although it is stated that they have emotions vastly different from our own, their campaign on Earth seems to have developed into genocidal hatred against humans.
In Allan and the Sundered Veil
Allan and the Sundered Veil
Allan and the Sundered Veil was a six-part story written in the style of a boy's periodical by Alan Moore and illustrated by Kevin O'Neill, included at the back of each issue of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Volume I and collected at the back of that volume...
, Allan Quatermain
Allan Quatermain
Allan Quatermain is the protagonist of H. Rider Haggard's 1885 novel King Solomon's Mines and its various prequels and sequels. Allan Quatermain was also the title of a book in this sequence.- History :...
, Randolph Carter
Randolph Carter
Randolph Carter is a recurring protagonist in H. P. Lovecraft'sfiction and a thinly disguised alter ego of Lovecraft himself. The first tale in which Carter appears--"The Statement of Randolph Carter" --is based on one of Lovecraft's dreams....
, John Carter of Mars, and the Time Traveller encounter Mi-go, which are stated as being the same as Morlock
Morlock
Morlocks are a fictional species created by H. G. Wells for his 1895 novel, The Time Machine. They dwell underground in the English countryside of 802,701 AD in a troglodyte civilization, maintaining ancient machines that they may or may not remember how to build...
s.
In "To Mars and Providence
To Mars and Providence
"To Mars and Providence" is a short story by Don Webb, published in War of the Worlds: Global Dispatches. It is a conflation of The War of the Worlds, the Cthulhu Mythos, and the biography of H. P. Lovecraft.-Plot summary:...
", the Mi-go engage in trade with the Martian
Martian (War of the Worlds)
The Martians, also known as the Invaders, are the fictional race of extraterrestrials from the H.G. Wells novel The War of the Worlds. They are the antagonists of the novel, and their efforts to exterminate the populace of Earth and claim the planet for themselves drive the plot and present...
s from The War of the Worlds
The War of the Worlds
The War of the Worlds is an 1898 science fiction novel written by H. G. Wells.The War of the Worlds may also refer to:- Radio broadcasts :* The War of the Worlds , the 1938 radio broadcast by Orson Welles...
.
The Mi-go also appear in the final segment, directed by Brian Yuzna, of the movie Necronomicon
Necronomicon (film)
H.P. Lovecraft's: Necronomicon, original title Necronomicon, also called Necronomicon: Book of the Dead or Necronomicon: To Hell and Back is an American anthology horror film released in 1993. It was directed by Brian Yuzna, Christophe Gans and Shusuke Kaneko and was written by Brent V...
.
A Mi-go is scripted to walk across the stage during the "Tentacles" number of A Shoggoth on the Roof
A Shoggoth on the Roof
A Shoggoth on the Roof is a parody musical of Fiddler on the Roof based on the works of H. P. Lovecraft. Published by the H. P. Lovecraft Historical Society, it is credited to a member of the society who is referred to only as "He Who Must Not Be Named".There have been many legal difficulties in...
, prompting Armitage to narrate it as "some horrible creature... I do not even want to know what that is".
The horror themed miniatures game HorrorClix
HorrorClix
HorrorClix is a collectible miniatures game. Released on August 30, 2006, it uses WizKids' Clix system. The game's tagline is "wicked fun." The product was discontinued in November of 2008 when WizKids' new owner Topps shut down the company...
, which features Cthulu as a colossal figure, has a Mi-Go as a unique figure in its The Lab expansion.
The Mi-Go also appear as sinister brain collectors in the short story "Boojum", written by Sarah Monette
Sarah Monette
Sarah Monette is an American novelist and short story author writing mostly in the genres of fantasy and horror. She was born and raised in Oak Ridge, Tennessee and she began writing at the age of 12. In 2004 she earned a PhD in English literature, specializing in Renaissance Drama and writing her...
and Elizabeth Bear
Elizabeth Bear
Sarah Bear Elizabeth Wishnevsky is an American author. Writing under the name Elizabeth Bear, she works primarily in the genre of speculative fiction, and was a winner of the 2005 John W...
.
Origin of the word
It is possible that Lovecraft encountered the word migou in his readings. "Migou" is the TibetTibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...
an equivalent of the yeti
Yeti
The Yeti or Abominable Snowman is an ape-like cryptid said to inhabit the Himalayan region of Nepal, and Tibet. The names Yeti and Meh-Teh are commonly used by the people indigenous to the region, and are part of their history and mythology...
, a semi-mythical humanoid being who lives in the high mountain ranges of that country' While the Mi-go of Lovecraft's mythos is completely unlike the migou of Tibetan stories, Lovecraft seems to equate the two, as can be seen in the following excerpt from "The Whisperer in Darkness":
It was of no use to demonstrate to such opponents that the Vermont myths differed but little in essence from those universal legends of natural personification which filled the ancient world with fauns and dryads and satyrs, suggested the kallikanzarai of modern Greece, and gave to wild Wales and Ireland their dark hints of strange, small, and terrible hidden races of troglodyteTroglodyteTroglodyte may refer to:* Homo troglodytes, an invalid taxon coined by Carl Linnaeus to refer to a legendary creature* Caveman, a stock character based upon widespread concepts of the way in which early prehistoric humans may have looked and behaved...
s and burrowers. No use, either, to point out the even more startlingly similar belief of the Nepalese hill tribes in the dreaded Mi-Go or "Abominable Snow-Men" who lurk hideously amidst the ice and rock pinnacles of the Himalayan summits. When I brought up this evidence, my opponents turned it against me by claiming that it must imply some actual historicity for the ancient tales; that it must argue the real existence of some queer elder earth-race, driven to hiding after the advent and dominance of mankind, which might very conceivably have survived in reduced numbers to relatively recent times — or even to the present.