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"Whatever he was once like, Anu likes destruction now. It's almost as if it relieves his frustration, and it's probably part of his whole addiction to power, as well. But whatever causes it, it's real enough. He and his people certainly proved that a hundred years ago."
Colin nodded again, understanding completely. He'd occasionally wondered why Hitler had proved so resistant to assassination[...]. No wonder the bomb plot had failed; a man with full enhancement would hardly even have noticed it. And if anyone had ever shown a maniacal glee in taking others down with them, it had been the Nazi elite.
— Empire from the Ashes: Mutineers' Moon
A specific type of Historical Villain Upgrade and Beethoven Was an Alien Spy focused on Adolf Hitler.
It is revealed that Hitler was not just a (particularly disturbed) human being, but was supernaturally evil, and existed with the primary purpose of deliberately going about causing large-scale misery, or was himself either possessed or being directly manipulated by otherworldly forces (of evil). Aliens may also stand in for supernatural beings. Either way, the core concept is that Hitler was so inhumanly evil precisely because he wasn't human.
As befits a trope that's more about the legacy and legend of the War than its actuality, it's often done as backstory for the villain (à la, "How evil is he? Well, you remember Hitler...?"), rather than directly in a World War II setting.
Like Hitler's Time Travel Exemption Act, it could easily be done with other famous warmongers, but in practice almost never is, except as part of a Julius Beethoven da Vinci where Hitler was also several other famously evil people (in which case, there's a good chance he was also Genghis Khan and Jack the Ripper). At least, this is the case in Western media. Japanese media have something similar going on with Oda Nobunaga; see Demon King Nobunaga for this trope's Jidaigeki counterpart.
The trope can obviously overlap with Stupid Jetpack Hitler and/or Ghostapo. Expect this to happen in a Weird Historical War set in WWII. If the villain was The Dragon for Hitler, but Hitler himself remains more or less the same as the historical one, see Piggybacking on Hitler.
Examples:
Twists:
Examples not involving Hitler:
Let's Play[]
- The Hohenzollern Empire: Part 2. Humans weren't the cause of Fake Martin Luther. It was Demons masquerading as Martin Luther to damn people to hell. We don't know is Calvin was a demon or not however...