Stupid Jetpack Hitler: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

With few [[Cloudcuckoolander|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 neighbours, 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 [[Clothes Make the Superman|power]] [[Powered Armor|armor]] and [[Aliens and Monsters|alien allies]], of course!

 

 

Despite this reputation for advanced technology, the reality was that most Nazi super-weapons were no more advanced than comparable allied projects and in some cases were actually behind the research curve. The first operational jet aircraft to see action was indeed flown by the Germans, but by 1945 German jet engines lagged far behind allied designs in power output and reliability. The unorthodox "futuristic" German aircraft designs were largely unworkable exercises in theoretical possibilities while more practical ideas, like long-range strategic bombers and aircraft carriers, never got off the drawing boards. This was largely due to political interference. Members of the Nazi High Command were notorious for [[Executive Meddling|meddling]] with weapons programs in ways that largely reduced or eliminated the potential gains. They also tended to continually support the development of ''offensive'' weapons over ''defensive'' ones, even as their armies were retreating on all fronts, since Nazi Party doctrine didn't allow for "defeatist" thinking. It has been suggested that the real purpose for the so-called Wunderwaffe wasn't to create superweapons at all, but to keep German designers well away from the Russian Front.

 

 

 

 

Contrast [[Nazis With Gnarly Weapons]], which is about the weapons they had in [[Real Life]]. See also [[Ghostapo]], where Nazis uses super-demonry rather than (or ''[[Magitek|combined with]]'') super-science; and [[Soviet Superscience]], when it's the [[Dirty Commies]] showing up with giant robots and spaceships. Compare [[Historical Villain Upgrade]].

 

''Please'' [[I Thought It Meant|do not confuse with]] [[Stupid Sexy Flanders]]. ([[Schmuck Bait|Oops.]])

 

** Not a perfect example, though, as ''Hellsing'' is set in the modern era; Millenium is a splinter faction that survived the war (presumably building all this stuff in the intervening time).

*** There are, however, two examples which go back to the War. {{spoiler|The method for creating vampires involved a kind of surgical procedure to transfer vampiric power to normal humans, somewhat combining [[Magitek|occultism and science]].}} And the final reveal that {{spoiler|the Major was mortally wounded in battle in Russia, and was saved by being converted into a cyborg}}.

* In the manga version of ''[[Space Adventure Cobra]]'', it is eventually revealed that {{spoiler|Salamander, the leader of the Pirate Guild,}} is actually {{spoiler|Hitler.}}

* In ''[[The Legend of Koizumi]]'', it turns out that all the Nazis- including Menegle and Hitler- survived WWII up to the present day, and are now living on a moon base. They travel from Earth to the Moon in classic [[Flying Saucer|UFOs]], and have a gigantic Meteor Cannon that can hit any point on Earth with the strength of a nuke. The only way to stop them? [[What Do You Mean It's Not Awesome?|Mah-Jong]].

 

 

* Trope Namer: As noted in the page quote, this title comes from an issue of [[The Atom|The All-New Atom]] when the eponymous character complains about a sub-microscopic energy life-form masquerading as Hitler [[Rule of Cool|with a jetpack]].

* ''[[Blackhawk]]'' in [[The DCU]] fought a lot of bizarre Nazi superscience (with bizarre Allied superscience). The most famous was the [[Monowheel Mayhem|War-Wheel]], a large spiked wheel with a centre like a tank from the First World War.

* ''[[Hellboy]]'': The eponymous character is the result of [[Ghostapo|an occult version of this]] and he spends most of the comic smashing and/or shooting the results of other Nazi super weapon projects.

** Though that Nazi business got done to death and now he's the rightful king of England (as well as Hell) and stuff, and has been fighting mostly eldritch horrors, cosmic beings, legends, witches, zombie armies, and destiny for a while.

** Parodied in ''Team Triumph,'' with Nazis explaining their plan: [quote] "Zum Teufel, Auf Wiedersehen, giant Nazi robots!" [end quote]

* [[Shazam|Captain Marvel Jr]]'s archenemy Captain Nazi is the most obvious of several DCU supervillains created by Nazi technology. In his more recent appearances, though, he's been given a [[Ghostapo|supernatural origin]].

* An arc in Justice Society Classified involved the disembodied brain of Heinrich Himmler. Who built a giant railgun on THE MOON.

** One storyline in the monthly [[Justice Society of America]] comic is all about a future Nazi Fourth Reich, complete with giant heavily armed war mechs, a means to neutralize all superheroes, and their own supervillains including Captain Nazi.

** ...bees hate fire.

* In the early ''[[Wolverine]]'' comics, you had Geist, a Nazi cyborg.

* The ''Commando'' comic series was chock full of this. There was little common continuity between the stories in each issue, apart from taking place in wartime. In some of them the Nazis among other things had a nuclear bomb, a moonbase, a time machine, and naturally every time the Allied forces managed to overcome them with absolutely no secret weapons of their own.

** And another where they built a time machine as the Allies were just outside Berlin. Hitler and Eva Braun escape using the time machine, but it's not been properly calibrated, so they wind up in Prehistoric times as the first man and woman.

 

 

== Films ==

** An arguably even better Sci-fi Channel (pre-"Syfy") example: ''S.S. Doomtrooper,'' in which Allied forces must confront a huge, radioactive mutant [[Super Soldier]] brought to life and controlled ([[Gone Horribly Right|in a hit-or-miss way]]) by Nazi science.

 

 

== Literature ==

* [[Robert A. Heinlein]] brought this trope into its modern form by creating Nazis with [[Raygun Gothic|atomic spaceships]] on the Moon in ''[[Rocket Ship Galileo]]'', written only a couple of years after WWII ended. For the readers of the time, the Nazis were probably the least fantastic part. Men on the Moon indeed!

* ''Lightning'', by [[Dean Koontz]] has the Nazis in possession of a working {{spoiler|[[Time Machine]]}}, which they intend to use to win WWII by {{spoiler|finding out from our time just what went wrong for them when and changing it}}. Too bad their {{spoiler|chrononaut}} fell in love with a {{spoiler|1980s novelist.....}}

* In the ''[[Axis of Time]]'' [[Alternate History]] trilogy, thanks to Japan sending captured data, such as body armor and jet engines, to Nazi Germany, the Reich is now much more confident in winning the war. However, the Allies and the Soviets also have access to the technology brought from the future {{spoiler|and the initial trilogy ends with Germany and Japan being nuked out of existence, with the Soviet Union in an even stronger position than it was at the end of the War in the real timeline}}.

* Zach Parsons' book ''My Tank is Fight!'' uses and subverts this: it gives detailed statistics on various rejected inventions of WWII (mostly German ones), and then [[Alternate History|imagines what they would have been]] like in the field. Most of them fail spectacularly. With the exception of {{spoiler|the nuclear bombing of New York, though it doesn't avert the defeat of Germany}}.

* [[David Langford]] and John Grant's disaster novel parody ''Earthdoom'' features Adolf Hitler time-travelling to modern-day Britain, and subsequently cloning himself using a farmer's livestock cloning machine. (The multiple Hitlers then end up on board one of the alien spaceships orbiting Earth at the time, where the aliens deal with them by broadcasting the looped message 'Can you trust the person next to you? He looks a bit semitic to me...')

* ''[[Danger Boy]]: Dragon Sword'' subverts this- a Nazi rocket scientist loudly declares "I am not INTERESTED in traveling through time or making contact with space aliens!"

* An illustrated story based on Isaac Asimov's robot concepts involved the Nazis building a terrifying robot nicknamed the Iron Major. Since the robot was possessed by a mad scientist (and it ate human brains), they only succeeded in making one of it.

* The novel ''1945'' tells of an alternate 1945 where the Nazis, unencumbered by American involvement in the European War, now patrol the skies of Fortress Europa with a fleet of stealth jet-bombers and rocket planes.

* J.R. Dunn's short story "Crux Gammata", while mostly focused on the activities of an American rock band in [[The Seventies]] putting on a concert in a Nazis-won Alt!Europe, includes mention of Nazi moonbases and lunar aluminum factories.

* The Faction Paradox novel "Warlords of Utopia" by Lance Parkin has multiple universes worth of allied Nazis working under a Cabal of Hitlers (including, oddly, the only one Hitler child August) who end up in a war against multiple universes of allied Romans (and other semi-mythic empires such as an Amazonian empire). They were all given their parallel universe jumping technology, but the Nazis had supersonic fighters by the end of the wars.

 

 

* In ''[[The New Avengers]]'' episode "The Eagle's Nest", the Avengers prevent an attempt by an enclave of Nazis concealed in a British monastery to revive Hitler's preserved body.

* ''[[The Tomorrow People]]'' storyline "Hitler's Last Secret" is chock full of evil Nazi super-sciencey goodness.

** The Enterprise did fight Stukas with plasma cannons, which would have done very well against contemporary aircraft. However, they weren't much more than an annoyance to the Enterprise.

* ''[[Kamen Rider X]]'' gave us [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3SzmfZ6F24 STARFISH HITLER!]

** A lot of the evil organizations in the early shows are said to base their cyborg surgery on Nazi techniques. Three of the four original Big Bads, Colonel Zol, General Black, and Dr. Shinigami, were all ex-Nazis. Dr. Shinigami perfected the cyborg technology that nearly all following evil organizations would use by experimenting on Jews in concentration camps.

** According the producers, Ishinomori's original idea of Kamen Rider is that the original ''[[Kamen Rider]]'' was supposed to be a jetpack cyborg supersoldier of Shocker. [[Kamen Rider Fourze]] brings the original concept back to life

** The ''[[Time Cop]]'' series has a similar episode with a hipster from the future bringing a laptop back to 1944 with all kinds of technological improvements in it. His first idea is to improve the V2 rocket to destroy Britain. Naturally, the hero stops him (after visiting the [[Bad Future]] where the Nazis won), and Hitler has the guy shot.

* ''[[Tales of the Gold Monkey]]:'' in the episode "Black Pearl" the Germans build an atomic bomb, in 1938.

 

 

== Music ==

 

 

== New Media ==

 

== Tabletop Games ==

* ''Tales from the Floating Vagabond'' has Nazis... [[In Space]]!

 

== Video Games ==

* Dino D-Day is kind of an odd example. Rather than create supertechnology for combat, the created super-advanced cloning technology and resurrected Dinosaurs...then put giant guns on them.

** A good point of differentiation between the two is that the 5th Column plans seem to have much more to do with time travel than the Council's aliens. So it's a difference between Space Nazis and Time Nazis at this point.

* ''[[Persona 2]]: Innocent Sin'' had, among the many things that could possibly have made it unreleasable overseas, Nazi robots. {{spoiler|(And Hitler. He and his robots were hiding in Antarctica. Except it's not really him. It's complicated... or is it?)}}

** Suberted, since Thor's Hammer (or THO) is a neutral power in the war, who's secretly supplying both sides with advanced weapons in order to have them destroy each other.

** It should also be noted that you can play as the Axis as well, in which case it's the ''Allies'' who you first see with the Panzerkleins.

* The second ''[[Freedom Force]]'' game has the [[Evil Gloating|ranting]] Nazi psychic Blitzkrieg go back in time to supply the Third Reich with [[Imported Alien Phlebotinum|Energy]] [[Meta Origin|X]]. The series being [[Affectionate Parody|what it is]], even the non-superpowered Nazis are [[Those Wacky Nazis|very Wacky]].

* Who could forget the bonus levels of ''[[Medal of Honor]]: Underground'' where you fight Nazis in knight armour (resplendent with their swastika shields), Nazi zombies (or aliens; this was the [[PS 1]] so it's hard to tell, although the level title "Rotten to the Corps" in which they reside could point to them being the reanimated dead), and, of course, Nazi Robot [[Super Soldiers]]! You even assemble your own [[Robot Buddy]] called Panzerknacker to help you take out the bad guys.

* The Xbox 360 SRPG title ''[[Operation Darkness]]'' is nothing but this trope.

** With a dose of [[Ghostapo]] for good measure.

* The old Cinemaware title ''Rocket Ranger'' had an unnamed hero, with a jetpack, facing off against Nazis armed with anti-gravity mind-controlling [[Green Rocks]] and a base on the Moon. Eventually, it is revealed that the Nazis {{spoiler|are getting help from an alien "Intergalactic League of Fascists".}}

* This is the entire marketing campaign for obscure but awesome RTS ''[[War Front Turning Point]]''. The three factions, Allies, Nazis and Soviets, each have their different superweapons. The Allies get the short end of the stick with a massive shield generator, the Soviets, in a nod to ''[[Red Alert]]'', have freeze rays and atomic freeze bombs, and the Nazis get the best deal with three radically different superweapons: jetpacks, monstrous jet-powered zeppelins, and robotic exoskeletons.

* The final mission of ''[[Medal of Honor]]: Airborne'', departing from the previously realistic campaigns, has [[More Dakka|heavy machinegun-armed]] [[Gas Mask Mooks|gas-masked]] Nazi [[Super Soldier|super soldiers]].

** Invoked by [[Zero Punctuation]]: "You would think that THE NAZIS were the most evil people ever, but apparently they weren't ''evil'' enough."

 

 

** [[Alt Text|He's also apparently sensible enough to realise that a smoking jacket covered in Swastikas would be tacky.]]

* In ''[[Jesus Christ in The Name of The Gun]]'', Nazis capture {{spoiler|Jesus}} and plan on {{spoiler|using his blood}} to revive Hitler, who was shot in the head by {{spoiler|a time traveling [[Ernest Hemingway]]}}. A chapter later we find out that Hitler was {{spoiler|[[Not Quite Dead]], a werewolf and probably a servant of the Devil, too}} and Nazis had created some kind of {{spoiler|ogre-like beings on which they were going to use the blood to bring them to life}}.

 

 

== Web Original ==

* [http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/3458846/ This] archived [[Image Boards|4chan]] thread. It actually features the phrase "[[Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot|Australian witch doctor special forces]]".

* In [[Black Adventures]], Team Plasma cybernetically modifies Hitler into [[Pokémon Black and White|Genesect]].

 

== Western Animation ==

* An episode of ''[[Justice League]]'' has the [[Big Bad]], Vandal Savage, send a laptop through time to himself in the 40's which contains mechanical schematics and Allied war plans, including the Normandy Invasion. The Nazis actually turn the tide of the war (with the War Wheels from the ''Blackhawk'' example) and very nearly destroy New York City with an atom bomb. Needless to say, the heroes stop him [[Just in Time]]. Oh, and Hitler has been frozen but is thawed out at the end to [[Hitler's Time Travel Exemption Act|carry on to his appointed destiny]].

* An episode of ''[[Captain Planet]]'' played with this. It also revealed that Hitler's stare can kill Captain Planet. Because hate is a type of pollution. Seriously.

** This is kind of like if instead of actual Kryptonite, Superman's kryptonite was people in danger, or people who hated him and wanted him to die. Or Lex Luthor.

** By the end of the series, shouldn't the [[Fridge Logic|general hatred of the viewing audience be enough to kill him through their televisions?]]

 

== [[Real Life]] ==

** The Messerschmitt Me 262, which was barely edged out by the Gloster Meteor in being the first operational jet fighter. It was marginally the highest-performance fighter in the war. It was fast but had very poor acceleration. Its armament was devastating if the guns actually hit anything but they were slow-firing and had poor ballistic performance making aiming difficult. It lacked in maneuverability and, combined with its engine's tendency to flame out and die during tight maneuvers, this made it an easy kill once cornered (reportedly one was even shot down by a Russian P-39 Airacobra). It exceeded early marks of the Meteor in performance although later Meteors reversed the situation and were much faster. Arguably, it could have been in service earlier if the engines hadn't been so appalingly unreliable. The unavailability of suitable engines was the single most important reason why the Me-262 didn't enter full operational service until October 1944. The often-reported suggestion that it was delayed by Hitler wanting it to be used as a bomber has long been discredited. It ended up being too little too late and was usually grounded due to fuel shortages or logistical issues.

** The Type-XXI U-Boat, aka. the Elektroboote was an effort to design a submarine that could survive under attack from the Allies overwhelming air power. Previously, most submarines were surface vessels which were capable of going undersea for short bursts of time to launch an attack before having to surface again. The Type-XXI was capable of remaining under for a significantly longer time, and was stealthier and faster than previous U-boats. The Type XXI paid for this by losing its gun armament and much of its search capability making it a less efficient commerce destroyer. In effect, it traded off effectiveness in its primary role to gain a measure of survivability, Although 118 hulls were completed by the end of the war, only a pathetic 4 vessels made it to operational status - too few to make a difference. However, the allies already had full performance specs on the Type XXI, had reconstructed two diesel-electric submarines to simulate its performance and had evolved the weapons and tactics needed to handle it. Type XXI would have meant the convoy battles would have restarted after a gap of two years but it was far from the war-winner it is usually projected as being. Post-war analysis showed that it was extremely complex and over-engineered and gained performance by using high-discharge, very short-life batteries. Allied submarines were able to get similar performance without the associated drawbacks by modifying existing designs.

*** Although rather inaccurate, quite a number of V-2s missed their target (London) due to British intelligence leaking claims of overshots for the early hits and having successful hits reported as "gas explosions", in response to which the German rocketeers recalibrated their rockets to account for this, though in reality it meant that most now fell short.

** The [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c8/Karl6.jpg Karl Device] was a 24-inch tracked mortar - the largest self-propelled gun ever to see service, each [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/89/Warsaw_Uprising_by_Joachimczyk_-_Dud_in_Adria_-_459.jpg shell] weighed over ''two tonnes''. Each one needed a crane, a heavy transport trailer, and a group of modified tanks to carry the ammo. They were used to shell the Soviet forces holding out in the Brest Fortress - each shot ruptured eardrums and the concussive force could rupture the lungs of people ''sheltering underground''. They were later used to destroy buildings during the Warsaw Uprising, and yes, those two tonne shells did a [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/Warsaw_Uprising_-_Prudential_Hit_-_frame_2a.jpg lot of damage].

** Small cheap wire-controlled vehicles for blowing up paths in minefields. Pretty mundane by modern standards, but cutting edge and brilliant for the time. These were actually pretty good and one of the very few wunderwaffe concepts actually to be worth getting paper dirty over.

** The [[MG 213]]. In [[WW 2]] aircraft guns had three characteristics, shell weight (this destructive power), rate of fire (and thus chance of getting a hit) and muzzle velocity (ease of aiming). Pick two. The Americans with the .50 went for rate of fire and muzzle velocity but sacrificed shell weight, the Germans either went for shell weight and muzzle velocity and sacrificed rate of fire or went for shell weight and rate of fire and sacrificed muzzle velocity. The British with their 20mm went for an average that settled for the best they could get in all three thus producing probably the best aircraft gun in [[WW 2]]. By 1944, the Germans were sick of their pilots complaining about their guns so they wanted a design that gave the best possible result in all three categories. The result was the [[MG 213]] revolver cannon. In a normal cannon, there is one chamber into which the shell is inserted, fired, and withdrawn. That takes time. The Germans built a gun with three chamber that rotated past the barrel. At any one time, one chamber is being loaded, one fired and the third cleared. Result, rate of fire tripled with no scarfice of shell weight or velocity. This was a genuine breakthrough and the design is still used in aircraft guns today (like the British ADEN, the French DEFA and the US Mark 12). The downside is that it was a heavy, complex gun and it burned a lot of ammunition very fast. That made it unsuitable for smaller aircraft and it was the 1950s before it was a really practical weapon. But, all in all, the [[MG 213]] was probably the closest the Germans actually came to a real wunderwaffe.

** The Germans were also working with radio navigation, which worked well for a while until the British worked out how to defeat each system in turn. The allies utilised some similar systems later in the war.

* The Allies had advanced weapons and projects of their own. They simply took the political decision that what they had was good enough and that changing over to the new design would disrupt logistics and make the war last longer than needed.

** The atomic bomb. Unlike all the rest of the weapons, it was actually relevant at the end of World War II, and has remained so through the present day, being the apex of [[More Dakka]]. The Manhattan Project and the V-2 rocket program were roughly equivalent in terms of economic cost devoted to superweapons. The difference being the United States could afford the Manhatten Project and finance a war. Germany couldn't afford to do either. And, of course the Manhattan Engineering District Program produced an exceptionally valuable weapon.

** The British pushed radar development much further much faster than any other power, building an effective detection network by the time of the Battle of Britain. This was a guarded secret; the urban legend that carrots improve night vision was invented by the British government to suggest that their fighter pilots were amazingly observant instead of being vectored into night interceptions by radar.

** Also an effective British secret weapon: signal intelligence (codebreaking). The British codebreaking operation at Bletchley Park was so good that it frequently outstripped its usefulness. Available intelligence on German operations could sometimes not be given to military commanders because the tactical benefit was outweighed by the strategic cost of revealing how good the codebreakers were. Also, the entire shebang was so heavily classified that the codebreakers didn't receive full recognition for their achievements for 50 years after the war.

** '' '''Sonar.''' ''

** Perhaps one of the most important developments of the war was PLUTO, a system that would allow petrol to be pumped directly from refineries in England directly to the beachhead in France, insuring both a secure and continuous source of fuel for the vehicles, and one that didn't require a continuous line of ships, which allowed the ships to be used for other purposes. It also allowed, in the post-war period off-shore refineries to be set up, a feat previously unachievable.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Reichstropen]]

[[Category:Stupid Jetpack Hitler]]