Putting on the Reich: Difference between revisions

[[File:ImpVeers.jpg|link=Star Wars|frame|Gray uniforms with button panels, the fashion of choice for today's [[Mook]] on the go.]]

 

 

A quick and easy way to suggest a group of people are evil in fiction is to give them uniforms that resemble those worn by the [[Those Wacky Nazis|Third Reich]], the Roman Empire, pseudo-Mongols or the Soviet Union. In a broader sense, this can also refer to using other stylistic elements from the Nazi times (like the "Führer" title, goose-stepping "stormtroopers", or swastikas [[I Thought It Was Forbidden|if the creator]] [[No Swastikas|is more daring]]) to make sure your villains are [[Obviously Evil|visibly evil]].

Incidentally, some of the uniforms for the real SS were manufactured by Hugo Boss (father of the famous one) using slave labor. [[Those Wacky Nazis]] were actually pretty snappy dressers despite being evil, which just furnishes another reason for authors and costume designers to borrow their motifs. Very common when [[State Sec]] is around.

 

 

See also [[A Nazi by Any Other Name]]. May result in [[Commie Nazis]].

* The crew of the ''Silvana'' in ''[[Last Exile]]'' wear black uniforms with silver trim that look vaguely like those of the SS, but more loosely tailored.

* ''[[Bleach]]'': The Vandenreich seems to be closely associated with this trope. It doesn't help that they're quincies and the quincies have been associated with the militant Christian Knights (Teutonic Knights, in particular, but also the Knights Templar and Knights Hospitaller) since the very beginning of the manga. Just like the adoption of certain Teutonic Knight themes and symbols in the Nazi pagentry, the Vandenreich also seem to have evolved from these Teutonic Knight roots into something very reminiscent of the Nazis. They even sent a sub-division called the Jagdarmee (Hunting Unit) to occupy Hueco Mundo and engage in activities that oscillate between assimilation and ethnic cleansing. The Jagdarmee's leader also looks enough like Heinrich Himmler for him to have earned a [[Fan Nickname]] based on this resemblance.

 

== [[Comic Books]] ==

* Carlos Ezquerra says he made an eagle a prominent symbol of the Judges in ''[[Judge Dredd]]'' because it was strongly associated with the Nazis and Spanish fascists, the latter of whom he lived under for many years.

* The Goths in ''[[Asterix]]'' wear helmets that look like the helmets of WWI German soldiers. The Goths are pre-unification Germans as they are shown as bickering and prone to infighting (what quickly becomes an important plot point). Goscinny and Uderzo used a more general stereotype of militaristic, simple-minded and orderly Germans/Prussians. They later [[Old Shame|regretted]] this portrayal and the few Goths appearing later in the series are not putting on the Reich at all.

 

== [[Film]] ==

*** When disguised as Ministry official Albert Runcorn, Harry wears a [[Badass Longcoat]] that is more than a bit reminiscent of the coats worn by SS officers.

* The obscure political-parody film ''Hail'' features a sub-plot where the power-crazed US President creates a national police-force to serve as his personal Brownshirts. He personally designs the uniforms, staging a private fashion-show which displays various authoritarian samples from history. Upon seeing a Gestapo outfit: "I ''like'' those boots!" The disturbing final product is half Nazi, half [[Captain America (comics)]].

* ''[[Equilibrium]]'''s totalitarian government features a flag that is a direct copy-paste of the swastika, only with the crossbars centered on each radial. [http://flagspot.net/flags/fic-nazi.html This website] has a whole list of fictional flags of Nazi inspiration.

* In the [[Dieselpunk|dieselpunkish]] 1995 film version of ''Richard III'' (starring [[Ian McKellen]]), the titular character's outfit is based off of a SS-''Oberstgruppenfuhrer'''s uniform. Additionally, his government's flag is basically the Nazi flag, but with his personal heraldic figure, a boar, in place of the swastika. It's also worth noting that the overall appearance of this Richard is suspiciously similar to Oswald Mosley, the leader of Britain's home grown Fascist movement during the 1930s. Not to mention the many visual [[Shout-Out|ShoutOuts]] to ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]'' present in the film.

* ''[[Super Mario Bros. (film)|Super Mario Bros]]'' provides fascist undertones to Koopa's regime, particularly in regards to the Goombas' "Storm Trooper" inspired uniforms. Additionally, early scripts indicate "lizarddom" and racial superiority as chief motivations for Koopa; he feels that mammals are inferior and need to be kept in check while eating plants (herbivores) is a sign of a race's decline.

* Just barely averted in ''[[Animal House]]''. The Omegas (the "evil" fraternity) are basically styled as "East Coast preppy snobs," but the filmmakers decided to go the extra mile to make them truly despicable by giving them unnecessarily militaristic rituals to practice ("Sergeant" Niedermeyer's drills on horseback come to mind), along with some casual racism and religious intolerance. The head of the costuming department later admitted that she would have dressed the Omega characters in Nazi uniforms if she had thought she could get away with it.

 

== [[Literature]] ==

* In [[David Weber]]'s "Heirs of Empire" series, when the humans from Earth re-establish the empire and incorporate the various national militaries into a new united one, one general, an American, reflects briefly on his discomfort at wearing an Imperial Marine uniform, which is black with silver trim. In the first book of the series it was established that corrupt mutineers from the original Empire had been secretly influencing human society over millennia, including inspiring the SS uniform which was based on the Imperial Marine uniform, as a [[Take That]] to the mutineers who had repented and were secretly fighting them.

* In [[Honor Harrington]] the most Nazi-like are the Mesans which don't control a large nation directly but work underground like the [[Dirty Communists| Commintern.]] Despite that they are definitely wrapped up in a goal of improving the race at the expense of those who do not make the cut and are thus supposedly fit for nothing more then slavery.

** His werewolf organization also has a logo that involves a wolf biting on two lightning bolts. The lightning bolts' position is not described clearly, but considering the Reich motif they are probably meant to refer to the lightning bolt S's on SS officers' uniforms.

* The eponymous student movement in ''[[The Wave]]'' does this deliberately, as it was part of a [[High School]] history teacher's experiment to demonstrate how easily the German people had been led astray by [[Those Wacky Nazis]].

** Note that it's never confirmed that the "wolfwaffen" are constructs, in which case {{spoiler|Evil Bob}} might've recruited ''actual Nazi ghosts'' for his defense force. If so, there [[Subverted Trope|may not have been any "Putting On"]] about it.

 

* The black uniforms of the Psi Cops in ''[[Babylon 5]]''. And the brown shirts of the Nightwatch.

** The Centauri soldiers wore uniforms that evoked the [[wikipedia:French Republican Guard|French Republican Guards]] in some ways.

* Zig-zagged at the end of ''[[The Winds of War and War and Remembrance|The Winds of War/War and Remembrance]]'', maybe even inverted: Navy captain Byron Henry is looking for his son who was saved from a concentration camp and is missing somewhere in Europe. When he goes to one orphanage, the children [[Shell-Shocked Veteran|cringe at the sight]] of his Navy Whites. Finally he is advised to wear civvies. In this case it is not only not putting on the Reich it is taking off the [[Yanks With Tanks|States.]]

 

* The music video for [[Lady Gaga]]'s "Alejandro" shows the male dancers in this, with Gaga herself wearing a bra with AR-15s attached.

* The music video to [[Disturbed]]'s cover of "[[Genesis (band)|Land of Confusion]]" has the oppressive, money-driven soldiers looking like this, going so far as to make their insignia a stylized dollar bill similar to a swastika.

* [[Laibach]]. Seriously.

** That is to say, [[Refuge in Audacity|they have a serious case of this.]] [[Troll|They are not taking it seriously.]]

 

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

* [[Skullgirls]] has the Black Egrets fit the bill... Except they're good guys, since their boss, [[Badass Princess|Parasoul]], actively seeks the destruction of the [[Be Careful What You Wish For|Skull Heart]]. By proxy, this ALSO includes [[Power Fist|Panzerfaust]], who's a Black Egret himself.

* In ''[[World of Warcraft]]'', the goblin "furrier" Commander Schnotz is a direct parody of Hitler, portrayed as [[Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain| woefully incompetent.]] Of course, {{spoiler| The fact that he works for Deathwing}} makes him someone the player can't ignore.

 

== [[Web Original]] ==

* [[The Empire|The Sirenen Reich]] from v2-v4 ''[[Open Blue]]'' was practically [[Nazi Germany]] {{smallcaps|[[Recycled in Space|IN]] [[The Cavalier Years]]}}, complete with a ([[God Save Us From the Queen|female]]) Führer, an SS-ish intelligence agency, a tendency to [[Stupid Jetpack Hitler|research advanced tech]], and a [http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/3272/ser02.jpg flag] that looks eerily like the Nazi battle insignia. The only difference is that they wear red coats like [[The British Empire]]. v5 toned this down by replacing the Führer with a Board of Directors, but it's still pretty heavy.

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

* In the ''[[Veggie Tales]]'' video ''Josh and the Big Wall'', the people of Jericho are all shown wearing Roman Centurion helmets. This is especially humorous given their French accents.

* [[Alfred J Kwak|Alfred Jonathan Quack/Alfred Judocus Kwak]] had the Crow party, led by a crow named ''Dolf'', whose logo was a red flag with a white circle in it, with a crow's foot (most likely a reference to the Germanic "Algiz" rune). Subtle it was not.

** It was nonetheless chilling to watch Dolf grow from a naughty schoolboy into a fascist dictator. Also notable for the little details it threw in: Dolf was actually ''not'' a crow, but the half-breed of a crow and a blackbird, who disguised his origin by darkening his yellow beak - a sly allusion to Hitler failing to live up to the Aryan virtues he espoused.

* [[Ralph Bakshi]]'s movie ''[[Wizards]]'': Black Wolf's troops are explicitly in Nazi uniforms, as his military is a direct copy of the Nazis.

* ''[[Avatar: The Last Airbender]]'' seems to play with this trope in the first season, where the Fire Nation wear mongol-derived armor and designs that even include skulls for face plates. And yet, then, at numerous points after that, we're shown that other cultures can be just as bad, and that the people behind the armor are sympathetic. Bonus points for actually using the (somewhat silly) skull-face masks to further the plot.

* Even though Standards and Practices forbade the writers of ''[[The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes]]'' from showing any Nazis onscreen in [[Captain America (comics)]]'s introductory episode, the [[Red Skull]] wears an SS uniform and an Iron Cross, albeit with the Swastika replaced with a HYDRA emblem.

 

== [[Real Life]] ==

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Villainous Fashion Sense]]

[[Category:Obviously Evil]]

[[Category:Alternate History Tropes]]

[[Category:Costume Tropes]]