The Ultimate Antihero?

Think Tank #92

Completely by accident this morning, I ended up watching the beginning of the first episode of The History Channel’s series The World Wars.

Now, I’m not making any claims as to the historical accuracy of this thing (The History Channel is known for taking some ‘liberties’), but from an entertainment/storytelling perspective, the show seems promising.

It opens (somewhat comically) with a guy in the German trenches during World War I, trying frantically to put on a gas mask before dying via exposure to noxious chemicals. It was a tense scene. The gas mask wouldn’t seal! Why? Because the guy had a gargantuan, furry, Mario-and-Luigi mustache.

Spoiler alert: he survives. And once he gets over the trauma of his near-death experience, he hacks off the sides of his mustache with a knife, leaving only the center.

Woah. Mind blown. Unbeknownst to me, I was witnessing the riveting tale of how Hitler got his mustache.