
Nazi zombies are a
horror
Horror may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
Genres
*Horror fiction, a genre of fiction
**Japanese horror, Japanese horror fiction
** Korean horror, Korean horror fiction
*Horror film, a film genre
*Horror comics, comic books focusing on ...
trope
Trope or tropes may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Trope (cinema), a cinematic convention for conveying a concept
* Trope (literature), a figure of speech or common literary device
* Trope (music), any of a variety of different things ...
found in
films,
video games
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedb ...
, and
comic books
A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are of ...
. Nazi
zombie
A zombie ( Haitian French: , ht, zonbi) is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse. Zombies are most commonly found in horror and fantasy genre works. The term comes from Haitian folklore, in wh ...
narratives usually feature undead
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hit ...
soldiers resurrected to fight for the
Third Reich
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
. The book ''Nazisploitation!: The Nazi Image in Low-Brow Cinema and Culture'' described the
genre
Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other ...
as a small theme of horror films.
The first Nazi zombies films ''
King of the Zombies
''King of the Zombies'' is a 1941 American zombie comedy film directed by Jean Yarbrough and starring Dick Purcell, Joan Woodbury, and Mantan Moreland. The film was produced by Monogram Pictures, and was typical of its B films produced by the ...
'' and ''
Revenge of the Zombies
''Revenge of the Zombies'' is a 1943 horror film directed by Steve Sekely, starring John Carradine and Gale Storm. Dr. Max Heinrich von Altermann (John Carradine), is a mad scientist working to create a race of living dead warriors for the Third ...
'' were produced during World War II.
Nazisploitation began to appear concurrently in other film subgenres. These include a mini-invasion of Nazi zombie films such as ''
Shock Waves
In physics, a shock wave (also spelled shockwave), or shock, is a type of propagating disturbance that moves faster than the local speed of sound in the medium. Like an ordinary wave, a shock wave carries energy and can propagate through a med ...
'', ''
Night of the Zombies'', ''
Zombie Lake
''Zombie Lake'' (french: Le lac des morts vivants) is a 1981 Spanish-French horror film directed by Jean Rollin and Julian de Laserna. The film starred Howard Vernon as the mayor of a small French town that is plagued by Nazi zombies who were kille ...
'' and ''
Oasis of the Zombies
''Oasis of the Zombies'' (originally called ''L'Abîme des Morts-Vivants'' / ''The Abyss of the Living Dead'') is a 1982 film directed by Jesús Franco for French producer Marius Lesoeur. Two different versions of the film were made, each featurin ...
''.
The increased popularity of the zombie film in the 2000s increased interest in the Nazi zombie subgenre, with films such as ''
Horrors of War'', ''
Dead Snow
''Dead Snow'' ( no, Død snø) is a 2009 Norwegian comedy horror film directed by Tommy Wirkola, starring Charlotte Frogner, Stig Frode Henriksen, Vegar Hoel, Jeppe Laursen, Evy Kasseth Røsten, Jenny Skavlan, and Lasse Valdal. The film center ...
'', and ''
Frankenstein's Army
''Frankenstein's Army'' is a 2013 found footage horror film directed by Richard Raaphorst, written by Chris W. Mitchell and Miguel Tejada-Flores, and starring Karel Roden, Joshua Sasse, Luke Newberry, Alexander Mercury, Robert Gwilym, Andrei ...
''. More modern films such as ''
Overlord
An overlord in the English feudal system was a lord of a manor who had subinfeudated a particular manor, estate or fee, to a tenant. The tenant thenceforth owed to the overlord one of a variety of services, usually military service or s ...
'', continue the Nazi zombie
film genre
A film genre is a stylistic or thematic category for motion pictures based on similarities either in the narrative elements, aesthetic approach, or the emotional response to the film.
Drawing heavily from the theories of literary-genre cri ...
. Nazi Zombies also feature in the ''
Wolfenstein
''Wolfenstein'' is a series of World War II video games originally developed by Muse Software. The majority of the games follow William "B.J." Blazkowicz, an American Army captain and his fight against the Axis powers. Earlier titles are center ...
'' series, ''
Call of Duty
''Call of Duty'' is a first-person shooter video game franchise published by Activision. Starting out in 2003, it first focused on games set in World War II. Over time, the series has seen games set in the midst of the Cold War, futuristic ...
'' series, and ''
Sniper Elite'' series of video games.
Feature films
See also
*
Exploitation films
An exploitation film is a film that tries to succeed financially by exploiting current trends, niche genres, or lurid content. Exploitation films are generally low-quality "B movies", though some set trends, attract critical attention, become h ...
*
List of zombie short films and undead-related projects
References
{{reflist
Nazis in fiction
Zombies and revenants in popular culture
*