Line #12 Fridge/WolfensteinIITheNewColossus


1	[[WMG:[[center:[-'''VideoGame/{{Wolfenstein}}''' [[Fridge/{{Wolfenstein}} Fridge pages]]\
2	''[[Fridge/Wolfenstein3D Wolf 3D]] - [[Fridge/{{Wolfenstein 2009}} Wolf (2009)]] - [[Fridge/WolfensteinTheNewOrder The New Order]] - [[Fridge/WolfensteinTheOldBlood The Old Blood]] - '''The New Colossus''' - [[Fridge/WolfensteinYoungblood Youngblood]]''-]]]]]
3	!! Fridge pages are Administrivia/SpoilersOff by default, so all spoilers were removed and all examples folderized. Proceed with caution. Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned
4	----
5	[[foldercontrol]]
6
7	[[folder:FridgeBrilliance]]
8	* Liesel looks funny in Wolfenstein's typical NarmCharm way, given that it's [[JustForFun/XMeetsY Lassie with a Panzerhund instead of a collie.]] But, like much of Wolfenstein's typical NarmCharm, it becomes a bit less funny when you think about it. For example, think back to the Nazi treatment of their vast array of war machines back in [[Videogame/WolfensteinTheOldBlood The Old Blood]] and [[Videogame/WolfensteinTheNewOrder The New Order]]. More than half the inventions we saw the Nazis push in The New Order were military or supported the military in some way - the robots were all used to crush civilians into the dirt, the moonbase (which should have by all rights been a symbol of hope) was to support an inescapable labor camp, a proposed artificial intelligence was going to be used to automatize the process of determining what made a good citizen, and so on. Virtually none of the futuristic inventions have been used to benefit society. Consider also: One magazine in The Old Blood features the a Kampfhund chasing a frisbee thrown by some children. Take that, then take Liesel, and consider that the Nazis of this universe had to come up with flimsy, failing civilian uses for their monsters and mechanical horrors rather than invent anything useful. And so, NONE OF THIS benefitted actual people. It only benefitted the system to use people more efficiently. Liesel is an attempt by the Nazis to normalize their military horrors to the people that the Nazis continually fail to help.
9	** It also shows just how completely the Resistance outclasses the Nazis in scientific smarts when they successfully use the Ubersoldat tech to transfer BJ's decapitated head to a new body; not only have they figured it out themselves, they've learned how to use it to ''save'' lives rather than as pure weapons of war.
10	* The uneasy conversation between two Klan members whose DeepSouth accents keep mangling German ("Dankey shaun?") seems a bit odd, but it makes a little more sense when you consider that the Nazis apparently disdained the KKK.
11	** As noted on the main page, it's also somewhat odd that the Nazis and KKK would be on speaking terms, [[EvilVersusEvil since both groups hated each other in Real Life]], [[RightForTheWrongReasons since the white supremacist KKK were mad at the Nazis for supporting the Asian Japanese]]. However, as revealed in The New Order, [[ChronicBackstabbingDisorder the Nazis turned on their "allies" in the Axis, including the Japanese]], so it's likely their invasion and occupation of Japan (along with [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything turning much of the American South into a chattel slavery system ripped from the Confederate States of America]]) that the Klan would decide to try burying the hatchet with the Nazis (although as the "Dankey shaun?" conversation shows, the Nazis are less enthusiastic due to the southerners mangling the German language, and thus making the Klan members less likely to be assimilated before "Transition Day" makes speaking English punishable by execution).
12	*** Neo-Nazis and the KKK are often overlapping groups in present day times so it seems like the situation in Wolfenstein II is they're collaborating with the Nazis but unhappy with the situation.
13	*** Seeing how the Wolfenstein Nazis control most of the world and may well do so at least until the 90s, based on canonical material from ''The New Order'', and how they have ChronicBackstabbingDisorder, it's most likely that they simply see the KKK as useful idiots who will help them gain a proper foothold in the USA, and then throw them into the death camps all the same, not unlike what a certain other heavily racist group in the modern day would do, by being useful idiots to another foreign, right-wing invasive force that hates The West, and America in particular. The similarities are chilling.
14	* B.J. defending Sigrun, as mentioned in the Heartwarming page, actually makes sense: in the previous game, B.J. fought alongside Klaus Kreutz, who force B.J. to confront that the Nazis aren't universally beloved even now and that the German people are as much victims of the reigning political party as everyone else is. That, and he had a similar upbringing under an abusive, racist jackass who punished him for the slightest things. How can he not be sympathetic for a woman who clearly does not fit or even seem to ''want'' to fit into the blood-soaked world of the Nazis?
15	* Max Hass throughout the game displays moments of noticeable intelligence despite his childlike demeanor. Instances of this unexpected intelligence include his art projects around 'Eva's Hammer', beating Set at chess with such ease that Set ragequits, and at a glance analyzing Wyatt's philosophy texts to find the reference he is trying to locate. At first glance this seems a little abnormal given the noticeable dent on one side of Max's head and difficulties with language but follows an established precedent in the real world. Though not common those who experience traumatic brain injury to one hemisphere of the brain and survive occasionally develop prodigious skills or levels of comprehension equivalent to a person born with Savant Syndrome.
16	** It's also a likely factor that in ''New Order'', Max simply stayed at the base and practically got treated like TheBabyOfTheBunch by everyone with pampering and special care like he was a child. The passing of Klaus and the realization that his new family needed every hand they could get likely caused Max to finally gain the incentive to actually ''demonstrate'' his considerable intelligence.
17	* We see B.J. when he was child during flashback sequences, and we might as well be staring at the current-gen rendition of ''[[VideoGame/CommanderKeen William Joseph Blazkowicz II aka Billy Blaze]]'' via IdenticalGrandson.
18	* The fact that BJ runs with the best engineers in the world and gains access to some of the most bleeding-edge tech ever devised by man makes his aforementioned grandson's ability to build weapons, spaceships and intergalactic radios in his backyard out of recycled junk a whole lot less farfetched.
19	* The game's portrayal of the ancient Adolf Hitler as a broken-down, rambling, senile, delusional, psychopathic borderline invalid is not only awesome for continuing the series' philosophy of giving a huge middle finger to the Nazis, it's actually a ''perfectly logical and realistic portrayal''. After all, Hitler '''was''' physically and mentally breaking down towards the end of the war in real life, courtesy of ungraceful aging, stress and the ludicrous cocktail of drugs he took on a daily basis. Even if he won the War, Hitler would still have ended up degenerating into this kind of human wreckage; Nazi super-science might have kept him alive for decades longer than he should have, but it can't undo the damage he's done to himself.
20	** As WebVideo/NoahCaldwellGervais [[https://youtu.be/GGhFBupwfdU?si=qDBh_d64ieja2lUT says]], victory (and getting everything he wanted with no one to set limits or wean him off the drugs) wouldn't make who he was by the time he killed himself any ''better''.
21	* The all-around bizarre decision to hold film auditions on the ultra-secure Nazi base on Venus makes rather more sense considering Hitler's instability. It also means he's more protected against possible assassination attempts; a potential assailant would have to travel to Venus to get to him.
22	** Not to mention the fact that it keeps the aging, insane Fuhrer as far away from the commander's seat as possible.
23	** Also a good way to keep Hitler's condition from becoming public knowledge. If he did need to make a public address, it could be recorded and edited to omit anything the Nazis feel makes him look weak.
24	* This seems to be the first ''Wolfenstein'' entry without a castle level... until you remember that the Ausmerzer is basically a giant floating castle. Or the high castle. And B.J. is [[Literature/TheManInTheHighCastle the man in the high castle]].
25	* In the moonbase level in ''The New Order'', the soldiers stationed there are chiefly armed with energy weapons because bullets can easily damage the hull and cause major problems, such as depressurizing and the removal of oxygen. Which is understandable as the Moon has no atmosphere of its own. In the base on Venus, the soldiers also carry conventional bullet-firing weapons. Because Venus has an atmosphere (although initially uninhabitable; remember that there was a plan mentioned in ''The New Order'' to colonize Venus as to make the planet more inhabitable), there is less risk of those problems should a hull breach occur.
26	* BJ is seriously annoyed throughout his incognito adventure on Venus, and hates his disguise. It's because it makes him look a ''lot'' like Rip.
27	* Frau Engel follows through on her promise in the first game to kill B.J. and burn his corpse in a furnace! Kind of. She didn't ''quite'' accomplish either (unless the rest of the body followed his head off-screen), but props for effort.
28	* B.J.'s hatred for the Nazis takes on a whole new level when you see just how much his dad resembled one of them; Rip was basically a Nazi in all but lineage. The fact that he turned LesCollaborateurs by selling out his ethnic neighbors [[MoralEventHorizon and his own wife]] for money is thus both horrifying and unsurprising.
29	* B.J.'s outburst against J in New Order takes on a whole new meaning when you realized that Rip was basically a Nazi in all but name.
30	* B.J. is able to handle three cups of Ol' Horton's special because of his new, SuperSoldier-based body.
31	* B.J.'s head transplant onto a new body that isn't dying might come off as pure science fiction. However in reality such operations have actually been successfully performed in real life on both laboratory mice and monkeys. In fact the only two really unbelievable parts about the event are the less then sterile conditions of the initial procedure to save B.J.'s brain and the manner in which it was removed. The risk of infection with the former would seriously hamper any chance at recovery especially with people touching the open wound at the bottom of his neck. Furthermore the damage from the repeated unclean hacks with the sword used to behead him would not be conducive to delicate surgery.
32	* Why has B.J. swapped knives for [[AxCrazy axes]]? Remember that [[VideoGame/WolfensteinTheNewOrder the last time he used a knife]], [[TakingYouWithMe it didn't go too well for him]].
33	* New players might wonder how B.J. suddenly functions so well without his armor during his escape from the courtroom. It makes more sense once you learn he's just dreaming.
34	* When you think about it, the [[DegradedBoss degraded bosses]] make sense, considering that Deathshead and most of his staff were wasted by Blazkowicz in the previous game; without their expertise to continually improve upon their designs, the Nazis were forced to figure out improvements themselves, which [[AwesomeButImpractical add flashy new features at the cost of the original designs' functionalities;]] for example, the Ubersoldiers are now easily mass-produced and sport a jetpack, but are noticeably less durable to the point of being able to be knocked down in 1-2 headshots, and the Panzerhund now has a flamethrower, but has lost a significant amount of agility, reduced to lumbering around and slowly advancing instead of dashing and avoiding gunfire, and now has a [[AttackItsWeakPoint convenient weak spot]] on its back in the form of fuel tanks. Those versed in the Nazis' activities in the Second World War would know that they had a penchant for this, often investing money in AwesomeButImpractical designs that more often than not were better for show than useful application.
35	** This is even played straight with the [[HumongousMecha Zitadelles;]] while much tougher and more deadly than the guard robots from the previous game, there are only six encounters with them in the entire game and basically serve as boss fights, which reflects the Nazis' reverting to their older WWII ways: Their heavy tanks like the Tiger and King Tiger were superior to almost anything the Allies could field, but meeting one in battle was rare, and there were so few of them that they could be defeated simply by outnumbering them.
36	* Wyatt's sudden breakdown in New Order and insecurities makes even more sense after it's revealed that he was disowned by his father and his mother committed suicide when he ran off to fight in the war. The first ever choice he made in defiance of an authority figure not only caused his mother to die, but also ultimately accomplished nothing but get a bunch of people killed. The offscreen death of Prendergast just further reinforced in Wyatt that he's just continually making bad decisions and other people are paying for it. It puts a deeper meaning to his hallucinations when he thinks his lizard buddy has died, as it would have been the last straw for him to end it all. Fortunately BJ managed to punch some sense into him. It also makes his ending speech all the more powerful as he finally steps into the role of a leader.
37	* Adolf Hitler describes the play that he's writing to be his "ultimate masterpiece", and that he spent hours making sure "every scene, every line, every single syllable is flawless". And yet, from what little we do get to see from his script, it seems that he's constantly breaking one of the most important rules in media: [[ShowDontTell show, don't tell.]] [[UsefulNotes/AdolfHitler It seems that, even with the war won in his favor, Hitler still isn't that great of an artist.]]
38	* Rip's racism and abusive attitude is sometimes critiqued as being "unrealistic", but, actually, it makes a lot of sense. In the 1920s, [[ValuesDissonance standards for appropriate treatment of wives and children were different]]; slapping your wife for "mouthing off" or beating your child for bad behavior were considered normal -- especially in the rural regions and the South, where the Blazcowicz lived. Make no mistake, Rip is still an ''asshole'', but he's less extreme of one by 1920s standards. As for the racism; the 1920s were a period when the UsefulNotes/KuKluxKlan were experiencing a huge revival in numbers -- there are estimates that, by 1924, there were over '''six million active Klansmen''', and some have suggested as high as '''eight million'''. And where did the Klan originate? Again, the South. There was a ''huge'' well-spring of anti-"colored" sentiment in America in the 1920s, hence the Jim Crow laws, so Rip being so aghast to hear his son was being friends with an African-American is perfectly realistic. If anything, the fact that BJ ''isn't'' a racist himself is probably the more unrealistic aspect of the two!
39	** It probably helped that BJ did have the influence of his mother, who actually cared for him and seemed to be at least comparatively more progressive than her husband. BJ obviously loved his mother, and watching her be abused by his father probably helped fuel resentment towards him.
40	** His brief friendship with Billie likely also helped, since her personality didn't line up with what Rip was claiming.
41	** Given B.J.'s obvious resentment for his father, his more open-minded attitude could have originated as an act of defiance.
42	** Listen to some of Rip's dialogue, especially during the first flashback. Rip's certainly a racist, but what ''really'' makes him a problem is that he's an extreme narcissist. When he's "punishing" BJ for being friends with a black girl, it's not because he thinks what his son did was wrong- it's because he's worried about how it will affect his social status. When he takes B.J. into the basement ostensibly to confront his fears, he outright says that it's because B.J. keeps waking him up with his screams. When B.J. is attacked by bullies, Rip refused to help his own son and instead shifted the blame on him. He's a selfish man who has no respect for others. Is it any wonder that a man like him would sell out his own wife and neighbors for wealth.
43	* Hitler spinning a whole elaborate backstory about how B.J. became such a dangerous killer because he was mentally challenged and his mind never grew past that of a child seems like yet another one of the game's TakeThat moments towards the Nazi regime (the obvious implication being that the Nazis are so desperate to find something bad to say about BJ that they come up with an almost comically terrible backstory). But it also makes a lot more sense when you remember that B.J.'s father was an extreme racist who openly supported the Nazis, enough that they were able to recognize him as a solid ally despite his son being their number one enemy. As far as the Nazis are concerned, Rip Blazkowicz did everything right, so something must have been wrong with his son.
44	** This may be supported by dialogue in the mission to assassinate Erich Eberhardt, which indicates the Nazis' version of B.J.'s childhood instead frames Zofia as the real abuser and Rip as the tragic hero who failed to stop her.
45	* During her self-congratulatory propaganda interview with Jimmy Carver, Engel rejoices in killing Blazkowicz and at one point refers to him as a "demon". At that point, it's just part of the Nazi propaganda campaign against him... but consider that moments later, Blazkowicz will reveal himself to be very much alive. Now just imagine what must be going through her head at that point...[[note]]apart from B.J's axe, that is.[[/note]]
46	[[/folder]]
47
48	[[folder:FridgeHorror]]
49	* During the Roswell parade, you overhear one of the townspeople mentioning how his 'slave' tried to steal some food. Meaning the Nazis reinstated chattel slavery in the United States. Aside from further explaining why Grace is especially hostile towards whites and Nazis, it also makes it clear that when the Nazis are driven off American soil, there will a lot of hostility towards fellow citizens not only collaborating with the Nazis, but also reviving the horrors of the Confederacy.
50	* The ending implies that the U.S is on it's way to overthrow the Nazi occupation, which is already splintering with the loss of most of their senior staff, and will presumably rally the remaining resistance in the former Allied countries. However, this leads to a pretty disturbing AndThenWhat situation. In the real world, the Axis powers losing led to some pretty severe retaliation, but Germany's crimes in this universe far outstrips even what they did in real life. And after suffering 14 years of genocide and brutal oppression, the survivors are going to be howling for blood. What price could possibly be enough?
51	* Sitting between Horror and Brilliance, the Ku Klux Klan being in power because of the Nazis actually makes a lot of sense. As J. pointed out in the prequel game, the Nazis' racist viewpoint was hardly new, and anti-African-Americanism in particular was prominent in America -- J. angrily lambastes white Americans as "Nazis before there were Nazis!" at one point, and notes B.J. is the kind of person they would have expected to lead the lynch-mobs. Of course the racist ideology that promotes "white power" would find compatibility with the Nazis vision of Aryan supremacy.
52	* On the topic of AndThenWhat... after decades of attempted genocide by the white supremacist Nazis, what will relationships between non-German "white" races and "colored" races look like even after the Nazis are stopped?
53	** Even worse, the Nazis and/or the Ku Klux Klan reinstated slavery as evidenced by a side conversation in Roswell. While they don't go into detail on whether it was strictly "colored" or even simply all non-white races on the harsh end of this, the absolute societal turmoil from reopened wounds would make the upheaval and brutal circumstances of the Civil Rights era look downright pleasant by comparison.
54	** After years of listening to propaganda emphasizing the "Aryan" race, it's not inconceivable that people might start to feel distrust towards anyone who happens to be unlucky enough to fit the description of "Aryan," possibly providing grounds for racism and hatred to take root. This would mean that in future generations, anyone who has the genes for blonde hair and blue eyes may find themselves at best marginalized and subjected to racism, and at worst assumed to be Nazis and targeted regardless of their actual political views.
55	* The Nazi regime has demonized B.J. to the point that Hitler himself tries to make a propaganda film about how "evil" he is. He's practically played up as the equivalent of the greatest SerialKiller in human history by the Nazis, and thus outed to be the most twisted, vile individual on the planet [[HeroWithBadPublicity from their point of view.]] Now imagine the utter hell the Resistance would have to go through if the Nazis ever discovered that Anya was carrying twins from what the regime effectively considers the mortal AntiChrist.
56	* This may or may not be fridge, but here's one: in the beginning scene before and after Wyatt is nearly beheaded, he appears to be on the verge of emotionally breaking down; why after maturing over the years is he losing it now? Probably because he just watched Caroline Becker's - a dear friend and possible motherly figure - gruesome execution and desecration of her corpse.
57	** The scene plays out almost identically to the one from 1946 when Fergus was killed: both Wyatt and BJ are being held down as they helplessly watch a friend be brutally murdered and mutilated; poor Wyatt was probably having flashbacks to those terrible memories.
58	** In a related case, for Fergus in his equivalent scenario, he shouts "Don't you fucking touch her!", much like how Deathshead examined Wyatt. Fergus similarly became friends with Becker, and shouts defiantly all the same.
59	* The resistance's... ''liberal'' use of nuclear weapons is somewhat troubling. You will find out on your assassination missions that most places you have visited are now irradiated (namely Roswell and New Orleans).
60	* Near the end of ''VideoGame/WolfensteinTheOldBlood'' B.J. has an inner monologue in which he describes his childhood fear of monsters, how he was told they wouldn't threaten him if he was good, but despite his efforts "the monsters came all the same." This line makes a lot more sense when you consider the flashbacks in ''The New Colossus'' and realize the "monster" he was referring to was probably his own father.
61	* There's some dialogue in the Erich Eberhardt assassination mission that offers some insight into how B.J.'s childhood is framed in the Nazis' film about him that offers some disturbing insight into their perspective. The events of B.J.'s life are distorted to the point where they claim Zofia indoctrinated B.J. from a young age with the sole intention of turning him into a killer, which eventually caused him to kill his own father. In their mind Zofia was the real abuser while Rip was just unlucky and failed to stop her. Considering we see what ''actually'' happened in the flashbacks, it says a lot about the Nazis that when looking back on B.J.'s life, they find the guy who forced B.J. to shoot his own dog just to make a point to be the most ''sympathetic'' person involved.
62	** If they actually ''sympathize'' with Rip Blazkowicz over the people he abused, how do they feel about abusive relationships in general? Do they even have a concept of "abuse?" Part of the reason Zofia stayed with Rip was probably because in 1919 it was ''very'' hard to get a divorce, especially for a woman, and domestic abuse wasn't recognized as a valid reason for doing so. With the Nazis taking over what few legal precedents did exist are gone. If Rip is anything to go on, then just how many people are now trapped in relationships with abusive parents or spouses because of the Nazis ''defending'' the abuser, possibly even enabling or encouraging it. While General Engel's abuse of her daughter and lack of accountability could be attributed to her status, she does seem to treat it as though it's perfectly normal.
63	*** The Nazis put people in camps with the explicit purpose of making Aryan children, had a incredibly reactionary stance towards women, and thought of Women's Sufferage as a Jewish plot to corrupt the West. It'd be weird if they didn't think Rip did nothing wrong, and honestly thought Zofia's heritage corrupted an otherwise Aryan man.
64	** At the beginning of ''The New Colossus'' we see how horribly Engel treats her own daughter, but remember in ''The New Order'' she can be heard claiming to have raised ''six'' children. Based on what we have seen, what did Engel do to Sigrun's other siblings growing up? Even worse, what kind of a relationship did they have with Sigrun, considering they were likely being indoctrinated with Nazi Ideology?
65	** At one point in New Order, Engel mentions that "she did her part" in raising 6 "healthy" aryan children. As we learn in this game, she doesn't consider Sigrun to be "healthy" due to her weight and almost considered euthanizing her. If Sigrun isn't one of the six she mentioned raising, and she just casually considered euthanasia a valid response to "defects", how many of her own children has Engel killed?
66	[[/folder]]

Context Fridge / WolfensteinIITheNewColossus