| NOTE: This article is about the Indiana Jones version of Adolf Hitler. You can find information on other version in the disambiguation page. |
| “ | The guy is like a hypnotist — a madman who can make a whole country nuts. | „ |
| ~ Indiana Jones on Adolf Hitler. |
Adolf Hitler is the overarching antagonist of the Indiana Jones franchise.
He is, much like his real-life counterpart, the leader of Nazi Germany responsible for causing World War II in hopes of establishing his Third Reich. Described by Colonel Musgrove as "obsessed with the occult", Hitler's world domination goals involved seeking powerful artifacts like the Ark of the Covenant and the Holy Grail to defeat his enemies and conquer the world, being the catalyst for the plans of most villains in the franchise.
He was portrayed by the late Michael Sheard.
His Evil Ranking[]
What Makes Him Close to Being Pure Evil?[]
- He is much like his real-life counterpart in several aspects that shape history for the first half of the 20th century's (confirmed in-universe by supplementary material), among them:
- Expressing his racism and hatred towards Jews and Communists respectively by blaming them for Germany's defeat in World War I.
- Taking over the National Socialist German Workers' Party, reorganizing it into the Nazi Party, and trying to take over the Weimar Republic.
- Authoring the book Mein Kampf to explain his radical views on his concept of the Aryan race, swaying several Germans to his side.
- Causing street violence in Germany to install himself as the country's Chancellor following President Paul von Hindenburg's death.
- Having the Brownshirts, his earliest Nazis, killed to consolidate his power over Germany in what became the Night of the Long Knives.
- Promoting his Aryan ideology by starting the Holocaust to eradicate Europe's Jewish population, which claims the lives of eleven million people.
- Assisting General Francisco Franco in the Spanish Civil War by sending his forces to bomb Guernica, Spain just to show off his Luftwaffe, gaining Italy as an ally.
- Annexing Germany to Austria and Czechoslovakia against the will of their populations.
- Starting World War II by invading Poland in order to expand Germany, triggering the second worldwide armed conflict that kills millions of people.
- Looks at an unknown archaeologist's research in hopes of finding artifacts described by him such as Aladdin's Lamp, Mjolnir, and the Silver Hand of Nuada for his own goals.
- Allows Colonel Albrecht Von Beck to team up with Kai Ti Chang in order to find the Heart of Darkness from Emperor Qin Shi Huang's tomb and bring it to him so he may use it to conquer the world, providing some of his weaponry to Chang's criminal syndicate the Black Dragon Triad.
- Possibly orders the Thule Society to send Rudolf Reingold to find the Ultima Thule in hopes of proving his so-called Aryan race originates from there to convince the world that his racist ideology is true.
- Becomes influential enough that he has spies on all over the world, allowing his Nazis to have such agents report before them wherever they wish.
- Hires René Emile Belloq to retrieve the Ark of the Covenant for the Third Reich, providing Belloq with the assistance of Colonel Herman Dietrich and Major Arnold Ernst Toht. This leads to the deaths of several Nazis, who are killed by Indiana Jones while trying to save the prized artifact from falling into the wrong hands and then are all wiped out, along with Belloq, Toht and Dietrich, when they dare to open the Ark.
- Sends the Nazi assassin Hans Degen to personally kill Indiana Jones after Indy ruins his attempts to get the Crystal Cyllinder of Stonehenge to summon otherworldly monsters, the Shintay crystal shard to power up his military or acquiring the healing powers of the Ra-Lundi to become invulnerable. Indy only survives as Degen ultimately spares Indy due to how he saves his life twice.
- Recruits Walter Donovan to lead an expedition to the Holy Grail so he can achieve eternal life and rule the Third Reich for eternity.
- Assigns Ernst Vogel to personally kill Indiana Jones and his father Henry Walton Jones, Sr. for interfering in his operations.
- Organizes a book burning rally in which he happily sees books that disagree with his views destroyed, and proceeds to share autographs with his supporters to sway them further to his side, regardless of their ages.
- Brings heavy machinery for war enough to intimidate some of his rivals, to the point Joseph Stalin allows the Nazis to do whatever they want in the Soviet Union.
- Dispatches his forces to raid other countries like Greece.
- Sends Doctor Edwin Gruber against his will to investigate how people from Haiti are invulnerable to bullets, leading to Gruber and his men's deaths when they get involved with Haitian witch doctor Boukman's plans.
- Orders Colonel Weber to loot artifacts and art from Nazi-occupied territories and ship them back to Germany by train while he cowardly hides inside a bunker.
- Perhaps due to the tension he feels over losing the conflict, however, Hitler becomes an even worse boss than before, as when Weber is mortified that the Spear of Longinus he has is a fake, he bitterly resigns himself to notify Hitler in a way that heavily implies that Hitler would kill him for failing him.
- Possibly plans to get hold of the real Spear of Longinus out of desperation to win the war.
- Though he commits suicide much like in real-life, this is not played for sympathy, with everyone glad that a dictator like Hitler is finally gone, proving how much everyone hates him.
- Even after dying, Hitler's actions continue to inspire some of his followers to carry on his legacy, giving Matthias Jäger the idea of using the Philosopher's Stone to bring several dead Nazis back to life and create an undead army to start another world war and provoking Jurgen Völler to get the Dial of Destiny to correct "his" mistakes committed during the war, actually planning to time travel back to 1939 and kill Hitler before he could star World War II due to deeming him as the one who brought the Nazi Germany to its defeat.
What Prevents Him from Being Pure Evil?[]
- Suffers from insufficient characterization, as the only time he physically appears in the franchise is in the third film for a silent cameo; he mostly has a behind-the-scenes role in the plans of Indiana's foes, often being merely mentioned as the employer of his enemies. That said, tie-in content explore his actions and how dangerous he is, making this a minor prevention.
- He is rather polite to Indy in the third film upon meeting him in person, even signing his autograph, though only because Hitler did not recognize him.
Trivia[]
- Although his Near Pure Evil status comes mainly from most Indiana Jones supplementary material, with him barely having a role to play in the movies, there were plans for adventures that could have affected Adolf Hitler's Near Pure Evil status.
- Originally, LucasArts planned to bring Hitler back in the planned Indiana Jones and the Iron Phoenix video game before it was cancelled out of fear of losing Germany customers. In the game, Hitler would have been revived by Dr. Matthias Jäger only to kill him for not bringing him a military to reclaim his power and fighting Indy before exploding. Had Hitler been kept in the finished story once the script was adapted into a comic book miniseries, it's possible that his characterization could have been fleshed out enough to stand out as Pure Evil.
- Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny director James Mangold considered setting the film's climax in 1939's Nazi Germany by having Indiana Jones and Jurgen Völler time-traveling there with the Antikythera mechanism, forcing Indy to save Hitler from Voller, but Mangold ultimately desisted due to his feelings that it felt more like a "spy movie" without any emotional connection to Indy.
External Links[]
- Adolf Hitler on the Villains Wiki
- Adolf Hitler on the Indiana Jones Wiki
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 Near Pure Evils
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Chief Guard |
Adolf Hitler |
Klaus Kerner |
Hans Ubermann |
Kai Ti Chang | ||
 Near Pure Evils
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Live-Action Features Live-Action Television Animated Television Video Games See Also | ||
 Near Pure Evils
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Animated Features Live-Action Features Animated Television Fanon See Also | ||