Ghostapo: Difference between revisions
m
→Film
m (Mass update links) |
m (→Film) |
||
(13 intermediate revisions by 6 users not shown) | |||
Line 2:
[[File:HitSta000-resized.png|frame|link=http://dsss.be/hitler-vs-stalin/]]
{{quote|''"Zis is vhere mein infamous obzession mit die occult comes in handy!"''|'''[[Adolf Hitler]]'s [[Brain In
[[Draco in Leather Pants|With few exceptions]], pretty much [[Acceptable Targets|everyone agrees]] that the Nazis were very, '''very''' bad, what with the socio-political repression, the institutionalized racialist policies, the wars of aggression against their neighbors, the mass imprisonment and murder of dissidents and undesirables, and [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|forever ruining the reputation of eugenics and social Darwinism as serious academic disciplines]]. So, how do you make [[Those Wacky Nazis]] even more intimidating? Why, by giving them magic power and [[Eldritch Abomination]] allies, of course!
This is actually more plausible than it sounds. Nazism's roots are arguably traceable to an [
One other benefit is that within your fantastical world, the true horrors of the Third Reich can "keep up" with your everyday fantastical horrors, rather than being overshadowed. The downside is that it can be a bit, well, silly, which can diminish the impact of the factual events.
Line 17:
== Anime and Manga ==
* The ''[[Hellsing]]: Ultimate'' [[OVA
* Pretty much the entire plot of Part 2 of ''[[
* The first season of ''[[Weiss Kreuz]]'' has a pack of enemies called the SS whose leaders are obvious Nazi analogues. Their evil plot revolves around the occult powers of black magic and the main character's sister.
* ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist (
* ''[[Urotsukidouji]]'' had a [[Mad Scientist]] working for the [[Those Wacky Nazis|Nazis]] on summoning the [[Naughty Tentacles|tentacled]] demons of Hell with the power of a [[Stupid Jetpack Hitler|high-tech]] rape machine.
* A zombified Hitler and his army appears in the ''[[Dragonball Z]]'' movie ''Fusion Reborn''.
Line 26:
== [[Comic Books]] ==
* ''[[Hellboy (
** Hoo, ''Hellboy'': [[Jet Pack
** In a ''[[The Savage Dragon]]'' crossover with ''Hellboy'', it was discovered that the [[Brain In
** When the brain leaped up and started walking, that's when the heroes called it...
* [[The DCU]] retconned away "[https://web.archive.org/web/20120524202050/http://superdickery.com/index.php?view=article&catid=35
** A [[Post-Crisis]] explanation says the Spear simply turns off super-human powers whenever a superhuman enters territory controlled by the Germans. So the JSA was just a bunch of normal guys if they got 'zapped'.
* In the [[Marvel Universe]], Hitler was [[Cloning Blues|cloned multiple times]] by a geneticist named Arnim Zola and repeatedly [[Body Surf|transferred his mind from body to body]]. In most of these bodies, he called himself the "Hate-Monger", wielded a "hate ray" that could [[Exactly What It Says
* ''[[Danger Girl]]'' has The Hammer, a terrorist group led by a Nazi war criminal, who collect magical artifacts in order to revive an ancient [[Atlantis|Atlantean]] "Aryan superman". Of course, when said being actually appears, he kills most of them.
* In the [[Elseworld
** The comic also offered a similar [[Post-Crisis]] explanation for why none of the heroes tried to kill
* Even ''[[
** Which raises some serious questions about the quality of their [[Masquerade]].
* The article picture comes from a [http://dsss.be/hitler-vs-stalin/ Russian comic] parodying WWII tropes in which Stalin fights Hitler with their respective magical powers.
* Captain Gravity And the Power of Vrill: {{spoiler|The Nazis are looking for Atlantis!}} It was actually pretty awesome.
* ''[[Atomic Robo]]'' fights lots of Nazis with supernatural and/or superscientific powers.
* The ''[[
* The premise of ''[[The Life Eaters]]'' is that human sacrifice can summon ancient deities. The Nazis create their death camps and sacrifice millions of people to build an army of Nordic Gods. By the end of the series, every region on Earth has embraced the practice to summon their culture's ancient deities.
* Irish indie comic ''[[The League Of Volunteers]]'' has a group of Nazis summons an ancient Irish demon to serve them in issue 1. It doesn't go as planned.
* The recent ''Captain America: Hail HYDRA!'' miniseries does this, casting HYDRA as an ancient conspiracy who piggyback on the Nazis' conquests to take advantage of their sweeping across Europe and [[Did Do the Research|Himmler's and to a lesser extent Hitler's historical interest in the occult]] to ransack Europe of occult goodies to {{spoiler|create their own god}} and which uses resurrected dead SS troopers as indestructible immortal mooks.
* In ''[[The Secret History (
== Film ==
* For anyone who's seen ''[[
* ''[[
** One of the comic books features Indy searching for the Spear of Destiny and having to battle both Nazis and druids to get it. Ultimately, of course, it ends up with the US military, and since ''[[Exactly What It Says
* The Norwegian movie ''[[
** ''[[
* ''[[
* And of course, [[The Film of the Book|the movie adaptation of]] ''[[Hellboy (
{{quote|
'''John Myers:''' 1945, you mean.
''(Bruttenholm pauses to stare at him.)''
'''John Myers:''' Hitler died in 1945.
'''Professor Broom:''' ''(chuckles)'' Did he, now? }}
* ''[
* In ''Crimson Rivers II: Angels of the Apocalypse'', there are some French (Neo-)Nazi monks trying to find a medieval artifact to help them build a new, pure France.
* This may fall partially under tech rather than magic, but ''[[
* This is how the HYDRA rises to power in ''[[Captain America: The First Avenger
* Parodied in ''[[
* ''[[Blood Vessel]]'' is a movie set during World War II, where some stranded British soldiers find an abandoned German minesweeper adrift in the middle of the ocean, which of course [[Ghost Ship| is not really abandoned]], as [[Those Wacky Nazis]] had looted a tomb with cursed artifacts that housed a vampire. Interestingly, it seems these Nazis were prepared for vampires, as the supply room has wooden stakes, garlic, holy water, and all that stuff, but it seems they weren't as prepared as they'd hoped.
== Literature ==
* British woriter Dennis Wheatley (The Devil Rides Out, among numerous others) used the Ghostapo trope in at least one of his novels: First, in Strange Conflict, in which the Nazis used the services of a Haitian Witch Doctor to get the routes for Allied convoys from the minds of the people who knew about them. The Duke de Richleau and his companions put a stop to it.
* David Brin's really rather dark [[Alternate History]] short story ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20110605030414/http://www.davidbrin.com/thor1.html Thor Versus Captain America]'', later adapted into comic form as ''The Life-Eaters'', has the Nazis murder almost 17 million people as part of a gigantic Necromantic ritual intended to bring the Norse Gods to life, fighting on the side of Hitler. And it works. The Author has said this was an attempt to make Holocaust have some actual sense for the Nazis.
* [[Charles Stross]]'s ''[[The Laundry Series|The Atrocity Archives]]'' portrays the Holocaust as a gigantic necromantic experiment, ''Operation Jotunheim'', to summon an [[Eldritch Abomination|Infovore]], a being of near-infinite cold that feeds on energy and information; the titular archives store the particular artifacts that the public should never find out about. It also features an [[Alternate Universe]] where the Nazis ''succeeded'' in their goal; unfortunately for them, they weren't in control of it and didn't realize what they'd unleashed until it was much, ''much'' too late. As a result, that universe is nearing its [[Apocalypse How|entropic heat death]] in the present days, and the laws of physics themselves were being distorted.
** A particularly nasty bit involves the description of Nazi necromantic practices, or as Stross dubs it, Algemancy - the magic of pain.
* The [[Alternate History]] novel ''SS-GB'' [[Subverted Trope|subverts]] this when the German officer tells the hero that he had to present atomic bomb research as something occult to get high ranking Nazis to fund it. Only by presenting it as Germany's destiny written in the stars does Himmler agree to it. Note that there is no real occult magic or outlandish technology in this novel; everything is extremely plausible.
* Andrey Lazarchuk and Mikhail Uspensky's [[Crazy Awesome]] cryptohistorical novel ''Look into the Monsters' Eyes'' has Nazis and their occult preoccupation as one of its main subplots, with Annenerbe Institute headed, essentially, by {{spoiler|[[Hollywood Voodoo|Baron Samedi]]}}.
* In the Kaiju Deconstruction novel that is ''[[Shambling Towards Hiroshima]]'', it is mentioned that the Nazis also were trying to breed giant fire-breathing reptiles, but thankfully they were unable to do so.
* [[Michael Moorcock]] has featured Nazis messing with the occult in at least two of his novels, ''The Dragon in the Sword'' and ''The Dreamthief's Daughter''. In the former, the protagonists, while looking for the Holy Grail, meet Hitler, Goering and Goebbels conducting a pagan summoning ceremony. They manage, without really trying, to change the course of the war by giving the trio a "sign" that they should invade Russia before inventing the atomic bomb. In the latter, the Nazis want the protagonist's family sword because they believe {{spoiler|correctly}} that it is a mystic artifact of cosmic significance. The climax of the book features Hitler and his chief stooges, er, conducting a pagan summoning ceremony, where they get the bejeezus scared out of them by [[Heroic Albino|Elric]] [[Badass|of Melnibone]]. Elric and the protagonist then lead an army of dragons to save Britain from the Luftwaffe. Both instances are a massive [[Take That]], with the protagonists dwelling extensively on what sad little men the senior Nazis are.
* In ''[[Illuminatus]]!'', the Holocaust is part of a ritual whose purpose is to cause Hitler and his immediate circle to ascend to [[Physical God
** As part of the same plan, the heroes have to stop a squadron of zombie SS commandos from attacking a Woodstock-like music festival in Germany, which is part of the Illuminati's plan to trigger World War Three.
* The novel/ comic book series ''Fiends of the Western Front'' has Hitler cut a [[Deal
* ''Lammas Night'', by Katherine Kurtz. The book's primary focus is on Britain's heroic Wiccans (and other occultists) and their [[Heroic Sacrifice|Heroic]] [[Human Sacrifice]] that shuts down Operation Sealion, but Hitler is portrayed as a scarily powerful Adept.
* In the [[Harry Potter]] series, the dark wizard Grindelwald is implied to have a connection to the Nazis.
Line 88:
* The Spear by James Herbert is an espionage Thriller about an ex-Mossad agent (though he's neither Israeli nor Jewish) turned Security Consultant who, while investigating the murder of another Mossad agent, uncovers a Neo-NAZI cult who believed Himmler was the real brains behind the NAZI's, and are attempting to bring him back to life using the Lance Of Longinus. It plays it pretty straight throughout. {{spoiler|That is, until the very end, where it's reveled they weren't crazy after all and he has to fight Himmlers re-animated corpse.}}
** It should probably also be noted that he was sued by another writer named Trevor Ravenscroft, claiming he had stolen elements from his earlier novel Spear Of Destiny. Except Ravenscroft's novel was non-fiction.
* Barbara Hambly had two magicians in a medievalish time setting responding to a call for help from beyond the Void from a world without magic, they go through to help those mages ... and land in the Third Reich. Luckily the hero is pretty smart and soon figures out they are the bad guys.
== Live Action TV ==
* ''Reign Of The Gargoyles'' from the [[
* In the live-action adaptation of ''[[Witchblade (TV series)|Witchblade]]'', it is mentioned that not only was Hitler a collector of objects of power, including the titular Witchblade, but he was a wielder of the Lance of Longinus/Spear of Destiny, as well.
* [[The Burning Zone]]: “Midnight of the Carrier”: Neo-Nazis plan to use special lenses that can see energy signatures as a weapon. [http://www.tv.com/shows/burning-zone/midnight-of-the-carrier-713709/\], [
* a Season 5 ''[[
** And as a [[Shout
*** This is because the 'Initiative' was most likely a renamed (Or was just short for) 'Demon Research Initiative', which was the US military group attempting steal the Nazi's research during WWII. They failed in the episode they appeared in, but presumably either succeeded later or just recreated the research.
*** Strangely, in 1940, they have no trouble talking about demons, it's even in their name, but in 2000, the ideas of demons and magic is insane. Either the higher-ups had started lying to the soldiers, or at some point the higher-ups decided all this 'demon' talk was nonsense, in a real-world attempt to [[Doing
* In the Kamen Rider series, particularly in the Showa era, SHOCKER was founded by Nazis who had survived World War II. Among its officer is an ex-Nazi named Colonel Zol.
Line 117:
* In [[Hollow Earth Expedition]] the [[Hollow Earth]] is equated with Thule, so the Thule society, and therefore Nazis, are thoroughly interested in it, and trying to use the orichalcum found there as an energy source and/or extremely powerful explosives.
* The ''[[Stargate SG-1]]'' [[Tabletop RPG]] supplement for the first season established that the Giza Stargate was used during WWII by Hitler, who, intrigued by its "occult possibilities", transported troops through it to literally "conquer Heaven", establishing an off-world Nazi colony that [[Lost Colony|presumably persists to this day]].
* Noticeably averted in the [[
* The [[
** ''[[
* In the ''[[
** ''[[
*** Weird War II is also the name of a setting by Savage Worlds, originally for the D20 rule set, about a world where the mass slaughter and evil of the war had awoken all manner of monsters, old and new. This meant that a player would not only face things like Nazi programs to create zombie or werewolf soldiers, but also haunted tanks and planes, apes with human brain transplants, djinn harassing the troops in Africa, onis fighting on behalf of the Japanese, and more.
* In the setting of ''[[Deadlands]]'', the trope is taken to its logical (?) extreme. One of the [[Ho E]] rulebooks explains (from the future perspective) that the Nazis used their own brand of [[Mad Scientist|Mad Science]], {{spoiler|creating devices powered, among other things, by souls of war prisoners.}} Furthermore, {{spoiler|Hitler actually intends to raise the Fear Level all over Europe to such levels that he can bring [[Big Bad|the Reckoners]] to Earth. And then control them.}}
* The ''[[
* The ''[[
* ''[[Delta Green]]'' features the Karotechia, the bare remnants of Hitler's occult program hiding out in South America. They have a perfect example of the Ubermensch (thanks to his discovery of a cannibal tribe's immortality rituals) and Hitler's third book, ''Mein Triumph''
* In the ''Nephilim'' RPG series, Thule Society still exists and is a prominent faction generally hostile to the eponymous Nephilim. The Society is a mix of real-life Thule Gesselschaft and Ahnenerbe with magicians and alchemists added for a good measure.
* The ''Tannhäuser'' board game has Obscura Korps, basically the SS with psionic / magical / demonic powers. The Reich itself, however, is in fact [[Imperial Germany]], led by the Kaiser, and the war being fought is the [[World War
* In the sixth edition ''[[Champions]] Universe'' source book, it were the mystic energies released by a backfiring ritual attempted by Nazi mystics that ushered in the age of modern superhumans on May
* A throwaway reference in the small-press RPG ''Shattered Dreams'' inverts this trope, suggesting that Hitler's global agenda was foisted on him by the game's nightmare-haunting monsters, the Vacyg, who ''made'' a run-of-the-mill tinpot dictator into a [[Complete Monster]] [[For the Evulz]].
Line 135:
== Video Games ==
* The video game ''[[Return to Castle Wolfenstein]]'' has you trying to prevent the Nazis of the SS Paranormal Division from {{spoiler|resurrecting an ancient Germanic warrior as an [[Super Soldier|invincible superweapon]]}}, while fighting off [[Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot|cybernetic zombie Super-Soldiers animated by dark magic]]. You actually fail. The {{spoiler|supposedly invincible demigod}}, however, reveals himself surprisingly weak to [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|minigun bullets]]...
** In the 2009 sequel ''[[Wolfenstein (
** In 1992's ''[[
*** The "Hitler Ghosts" are puppets that move around on strings, with Hitler's face on them. They're entirely mechanical, so only ''Spear of Destiny'' has the real deal (the suspiciously [[Satan]]-like Angel of Death and ''literal'' ghosts).
* In the iPhone Wolfenstien RPG, the Nazi's attempt to stop BJ's assault by summoning the final boss The Guardian Of Doom. After BJ blows his arm and leg off, the demon vows to get revenge on his descendants. Flash forward a few centuries, and Doomguy is fighting the Cyber Demon!
* ''[[Indiana Jones and
* The first ''[[
* The Fifth Column, one of the original villain groups in ''[[City of Heroes]]'', were Nazis who'd been underground in the US since being sent there to strike from within during World War II. A mid-level story arc had the Fifth Column as modern allies for a Nazi soldier who time-traveled to 21st century [[No Communities Were Harmed|Paragon City]] to learn about Allied plans during World War II and bring the information back to ensure the victory of the Axis. At the higher levels, there were [[Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke|genetically-engineered]] [[Our Vampires Are Different|vampires]] and [[Our Werewolves Are Different|werewolves]] among their ranks, complete with a vampiric archvillain named Nosferatu.
* ''[[
** The remake, ''[[
* In the Japanese only first part of [[Persona 2]], Hitler is somehow still alive, wielding the Spear of Destiny, and attempting to summon [[Cthulhu Mythos|Nyarlathotep]]. {{spoiler|It's actually Nyarlathotep himself, materializing the rumor that Hitler is back and alive.}}
* The [[
* Another little known adventure ''Call of Cthulhu: Prisoner of Ice'' had Nazis attempting to use [[
* In [[Uncharted|Uncharted 2: Among Thieves]] Hitler is on the list of powerful men theorized to have gained their power by holding a tiny fraction of the Cintamani Stone, {{spoiler|and then subverted. Late in the game, it turns out that the stone doesn't exist, it's a metaphor for the unusual but not supernatural sap from the Tree of Life that gives those who drink it [[Nigh Invulnerability]] and, eventually, [[With Great Power Comes Great Insanity|madness]]. Though not stated in-game, one might assume that in this version of events, drinking the sap didn't give Hitler any advantages in World War II because he wasn't a front line soldier, and may have caused his eventual mental collapse.}}
** [[Fridge Brilliance|Although it does provide a sound explanation for why he survived his assassination attempt]].
** In the original, Nathan discovers a German U-Boat and base that discovered El Dorado, only to learn it was cursed. You find a ''lot'' of dead Nazis. {{spoiler|And the things that killed them.}}
* In [[Hellboy (
* Continuing in the films' tradition, ''[[Indiana Jones and
* Japanese [[Turn
* ''[[Call of Duty]]: World at War'' adds a Nazi zombies mode. It is resurrected in ''Black Ops'', but moved to the 1960's.
* In ''[[The Last Resurrection]]'' Hitler is actually the right-hand man to Jesus himself, and teams up with his angels. Could count as a subversion depending on metaphysical semantics.
Line 158:
== Webcomics ==
* ''[[Irregular Webcomic]]'' plays with this trope for all its worth, as indicated by the quote above. In one storyline, Montana Jones and his father try to stop the Nazis from getting their hands on all the world's major occult artifacts. The Nazis, in turn, are being ordered around by Hitler's [[Brain In
** The really strange thing is that the Montana Jones storyline takes place ''before'' World War II.
*** "Nazi science sneers at historical accuracy!"
*** They explained this [http://irregularwebcomic.net/2263.html here]. [[Alternate Universe]], big time.
* The ''[
* In ''[[
* ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20110224182923/http://www.comics.aha.ru/rus/stalin/1.html Stalin vs. Hitler]'' does this a great deal both for both Hitler and Stalin.
* In ''[[
* ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20161117050803/http://strangeaeons.comicdish.com/ Strange Aeons]'' is a [[
* ''[[Spinnerette]]'' has Kugelblitz, a former member of the "Third Reich's Sorcery Batallion" who planned to infuse a [[You Cloned Hitler|Hitler clone]] with the soul of the real deal.
* ''[[The Unspeakable Vault of Doom]]'' had "the Reich's favorite esoteric research institute" trying to find a way of using Necronomicon as their superweapon. Handed to them by Nyarly himself for the lulz. It worked [[I'm a Humanitarian|in a rather predictable way]].
== Web Original ==
* In the ''[[Global Guardians PBEM Universe]]'', Heinrich Himmler (who is still alive and kicking in 2010) is a member of the Thule Society, an [[Ancient Conspiracy]] of sorcerers intent on releasing [[Eldritch Abomination|Cthulhoid horrors]] back into Earth's dimension. World War II, and especially the Holocaust, was just one small part of the plan...
* The notorious Flash adventure game ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20131105130854/http://www.atrianglemorning.com/games/flash.php Which Way Adventure]'' (you know, the one with the manticores) contains a scene where Hitler steals your time-traveling helmet and flamethrower and proceeds to fill the world with zombies. Er.
* In ''[[Marble Witch]]'' the Nazis use warwitches and dragons. Then again, so do most of the belligerents.
* In the [[Whateley Universe]], supervillain The Necromancer has actually reminisced about doing occult evil for the Nazis. Although he didn't get that unstoppable zombie army up and running (shambling?) in time.
* The Ahnenerbe Obskuraorps, named after their founder (loosely based on [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahnenerbe Ahnenerbe], a real life Nazi think tank who had tryied to prove the supremacy of the Germanic race with Pseudoarchaeology and Pseudohistory) was this to the ''[[SCP Foundation]]''. Led by a man named Konrad Weiss, they sought to develop “Aryan magic” in order to truly perfect the “master race”, and sought to rewrite the rules of magic itself, attempting to gather seven magical keys in a project dubbed the Rite of Solomon. After failing to procure the seventh (it was inside a golem, and they proved unable to catch it) Weiss tried to recreate it himself, but when it was clear Germany was losing the war, he wisely decided to stop trying to control “Jewish art” and create his own version of the keys. He managed to do this, but the Foundation stopped the ritual, and Weiss turned states’ evidence.
** OBSKURA is a successor to the original group which is still active in the modern day, made up of Nazi war criminals led by an unknown individual that is supposedly an heir to Hitler himself. Mostly their schemes revolve around finding magical artifacts, and are rumored to possess the Lance of Longinus (the spear that pierced the side of Jesus as he hung on the cross) and Mjölnir (the hammer of the Norse thunder deity Thor).
== Real Life ==
* In [[Real Life]] the Nazi most interested in the occult was Heinrich Himmler, while Hitler personally had very little interest in the subject, only seeing the political implications of secret societies, and banning all that didn't support his reign. While he admired the Teutonic myths, his intention was not to replace Christianity with a dead religion, but to get the state absorb all the properties of a religion, much like the Soviet Union had done, at least for starters - [[Alternate History|one can only speculate]] what would have followed if he had won, or ended in a stalemate.
** And the definition of an "Aryan" is more complicated than you might think. Usually it was a case of [[I Lied]].
** [
{{reflist}}
Line 185 ⟶ 187:
[[Category:Reichstropen]]
[[Category:Ghostapo]]
|