Watch through The Twilight Zone, and you’ll find yourself spotting no end of familiar faces: Julie Newmar, Burt Reynolds, Robert Redford, Elizabeth Montgomery, William Shatner, even Buster Keaton. The 1963 episode “He’s Alive” is at least doubly notable in that respect, featuring as it does a young (but in acting sensibility, almost fully formed) Dennis Hopper as Peter Vollmer, a ne’er-do-well made into an aspiring dictator by none other than Adolf Hitler. Played by Curt Conway, a specialist in doctors, judges, and other authority figures, the undead Führer offers his young disciple instructions like the above, from an early scene before his identity is revealed.
“How do you move a mob, Mr. Vollmer? How do you excite them? How do you make them feel as one with you?” Hitler asks. The answer, which he then provides, is first to join them: “When you speak to them, speak to them as if you were a member of the mob. Speak to them in their language, on their level. Make their hate your hate. If they are poor, talk to them of poverty. If they are afraid, talk to them of their fears. And if they are angry, Mr. Vollmer… if they are angry, give them objects for their anger. But most of all, the thing that is most of the essence, Mr. Vollmer, is that you make this mob an extension of yourself.”
If accused of scapegoating minorities, he should address the throng thus: “Should I tell you who are the minorities? Should I tell you? We! We are the minorities.” Soon, we see Peter in full neo-Nazi gear delivering just such a harangue, thoroughly Hopper-ized in diction, to a modestly attended rally. How could these ordinary-looking attendees be a minority? “Because patriotism is a minority. Because love of country is the minority. Because to live in a free, white America seems to be of a minority opinion!” Though hardly artful, this rhetoric eventually makes him into a popular figure, albeit one whose rise is cut short when he turns to conspiracy to accelerate his rise to power.
And what of the spirit of Hitler? “Where will he go next, this phantom from another time, this resurrected ghost of a previous nightmare?” Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling asks in his episode-closing monologue. “Any place, every place where there’s hate, where there’s prejudice, where there’s bigotry.” It was against such broad social phenomena that Serling so often used his scripts to argue, and with “He’s Alive,” he made use of an unusually vivid ideological example. A veteran of the Second World War, which had ended less than twenty years earlier, Serling surely had even fresher memories of the threat of Hitler than did the general American public — and understood even more clearly what could happen if those memories were to fade away.
Related content:
When 20,000 Americans Held a Pro-Nazi Rally in Madison Square Garden
Watch The Twilight Zone’s Pilot Episode, Pitched by Rod Serling Himself (1959)
Walter Benjamin Explains How Fascism Uses Mass Media to Turn Politics Into Spectacle (1935)
Based in Seoul, Colin Marshall writes and broadcasts on cities, language, and culture. His projects include the Substack newsletter Books on Cities and the book The Stateless City: a Walk through 21st-Century Los Angeles. Follow him on the social network formerly known as Twitter at @colinmarshall.
Eerily prescient. The USA is permeated by suspicion and abject fear. Pray for our Perishing Republic.…
Where were all these articles the previous four years? And during Obama’s reign, in which there were ubiquitous Stalinesque “HOPE” posters everywhere? Apparently some fascists are more equal than others.…
“Ray Collins” OK, cultist. F‑off back to your neofascist cave.
The media are hard at work again pushing any propaganda that can subvert the people from supporting the Trump Administration. These propagandists obviously have no desire to stop the corruption and deviation from our constitution. We’ve seen this garbage too many times before!
Joseph needs to learn the definition of the names he calls people, because he and his fellow sheep are acting as well as using facist tactics and they do t even realize it.. perfect people to blindly follow into an Orwellian future.
Red-team, Blue-team,
when are people gonna see that it’s all theatric(K)s.
Gangsters all the way, from top to bottom.
Thank you!! I’ve been saying this episode shows he’s following Hitler’s playbook.
A ridiculous post veiled with hatred for Trump.
Agree with previous post.…Barry got a pass
I am baffled by the blind loyalty people have for Trump. I cannot imagine kissing any politicians ass that way. Much less one that so blatantly craps all over the Constitution. Xenophobia is a very powerful political tool. Especially when the masses don’t bother to read and research.
Lol! I love it when the people who insist men get pregnant call others a cult! It’s so much fun watching you self-appointed “intellectuals” cry like the little bitches you are.
Says the people who swore that Joe Biden was mentally competent and that Kamala was intelligent! 😂
Read “The True Believer”,I forget the author’s name off hand but Amazon should have it.
Says the sunny who put an incompetent Alzheimer’s patient into the presidency who wrecked the economy. It’s clear you’re not a bright individual with rational thinking. You f off back to you woke totalitarian regime.
You’re the reason Trump one. Because most people realize that you spew complete BS. I mean, you were native enough to put an incompetent Alzheimer’s patient into the presidency who wrecked the economy. You’re not a very bright person at all.
Typical ad hominem response; could’ve written it myself; thanks for confirming what thinking people already know.
Wow. Ok…
“Trump one”. SERIOUSLY…???
Could it POSSIBLY BE that he actually “WON”…???
CLOWN Constructs his Spelling/Grammar at a Failing Third-Grade Level. Then accuses others of “NOT being very bright”.
STUNNER.
How Typically American of YOU.
I had TDS in 2015. I still think Trump is a$$ clown. It was MSNBC that convinced me I needed to vote for Trump. There’s no debate of the issues with a Leftist. To a leftist you either agree with marxism or you’re h!tler. It’s all character assass!nation. Transgenderism has become the home of closeted Misogynists Where all the best people have pen!ses. And little girls are being convinced to mutilate their bodies. It’s become impossible to even have a debate because of censorship Championed by Leftists. If you’re looking for a fascist look in the mirror. Because at least republicans are still willing to have a conversation without calling you hitler when you disagree.
These are the saddest, most ironic comments I’ve ever seen. Some of people really need to learn self-awareness. Or at least sympathy. Jfc.
Yes Biden and Obama and the far left were following Hitlers playbook sowing fear and distrust between people.
The one with the dark cloud over every city in America was more chilling to me.
You poor thing.
How do you walk and breathe at the same time?
… Sez the dummy who uses ‘one’ when he means ‘won’. Then says his adversary is not too bright. Dumbass.
Socialism.
Explain how Biden and Obama followed Hitler’s playbook. This should be interesting
Really interesting prospective offered by this article. Just sad to see people being antagonised so much on each occasion. Whereas we’re all in the same boat, I am talking about the most majority of us, not the super rich self appointed elite. They’re in a different kind of boat, minding their own interests and amassing power for the sake of it. Meantime, the rest of us are pitted against each other through masterful techniques, making us mentally tired so we cannot formulate a decent opinion or debating with intelligent counterview. And of course, history repeats itself as usual …
R.Bennet, it’s ironic that you would mock someone for misspelling when President Trump spells words wrong all the time. In addition, his writing contains punctuation errors. And when he speaks he is unbelievably inarticulate. In fact he sounds kind of dumb. It makes me wonder about the intelligence of the people who voted for him.
I’m not against all his policies, but I really wish the man sounded as if he’s actually read a book.
Yes we just had 4 years of fascism.. forced vaccinations, forced isolation and a government merged with big business which is the definition of Fascism
The novel by author Sinclair Lewis, IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE, copyright 1935 was one of the first, if not the actual first suggestion that a fascist leader would someday be the head of America’s federal government.
What took place on January Sixth 2021 was an example of something happening which most Americans would never believe could occur in this nation. Except, of course for the person who is responsible for it being a date to be remembered in this country’s history books.
If you want to make the childish example of comparing Barak Obama to Josef Stalin, first try to separate the words fascist and communist. The fact that you find that difficult to do is an can be used as evidence of the poor value of your comment.
By the way, Donald Trump wasn’t even born yet in 1935, in case anyone wants to claim IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE is just an author using a novel to express his opinion of Trump.
Some felt Sinclair Lewis’s book was a clear prediction of what would take place when Trump won the first time.
I am amazed at what I have read in these comments. What this country lacks is an educated population. Trumps election proves it, an ignorant man elected by unthinking people. This has come about by way of pre-occupation with small men’s perception of wealth, desires of money, possessions and the religion of consumerism. And this is what Trump proliferates, masking his desire to be an autocrat, dictator, king.
LOL at cultist. Its always strikes me as funny when you want to call a majority of people the cultists. Make no mistake you are reffering to the majority. Spin it however you want it to convince yourself youre in the right. Nah youre the one that should F‑off and go back to youre moms basement. Better luck in 4 years.
Ok Linda let me ask you this? You just said youre not against all of his policies. What policies are you not against? Are they policies that different people may prioritize differently than you? Maybe thats why the voted for the man. Not that they agree with everything he does or says but he aligns with the certain policies that they hold important. That may be what you need to ask instead of questioning someones intelligence (or calling them racist or fascist) because they may have voted different than you? Not saying you called anyone fascist or racist but thats what its came down to nowadays. A person cant vote for different policies without being pigeonholed.
The Twilight Zone was very topical, and many of its more political episodes were motivated by then current events. “He’s Alive” is no exception. Hopper’s character was inspired by George Lincoln Rockwell, the leader of the American Nazi Party, which was quite active at the time this episode aired. Rockwell a
and his followers appeared in full Nazi regalia, waving swastika flags and carrying portraits of Hitler. Rockwell was often a featured guest speaker at “Black Muslim” (Nation of Islam) rallies, because both groups advocated racial separation.
Wow, the Idiocracy reeks in the comments here. I guess this post touched a nerve with a certain segment, the “doth protest too muchers”. Self reflection seems to be one of those things Nazis can NOT SEE. Just like vampires.