Franz Wafner

*"A thousand-year Reich needs thousand-year soldiers."* ―Wafner explaining to Ford what he and his unit of SS soldiers mission.

Captain Franz Wafner is the main antagonist of the live action 2018 film Overlord. Wafner is the Nazi officer who is one of General Wilhelm Strasse top officers during World War II and was put in charge of maintaining control in the town of CielBlanc and assisted in providing security for Dr. Schmidt’s experiment. He became infatuated with Chloe Laurent and forced her to sleep with him. When the paratroopers of the 101st Airborne Division arrived in CielBlanc they captured Captain Wafner to prevent him from raping Chloe. Corporal Lewis Ford and Private First Class Lyle Tibbet tortured the captain to gain information about the defenses at the CielBlanc Church. Wafner was later able to engineer his escape shooting photographer Morton Chase in the process. Since he was incredibly injured he decided to take a high dose of the Tar Serum to rejuvenate himself and enhance his fighting abilities.

## Biography

Wafner was born in Berlin, Germany to unknown parents in 1908. During the 1920s-30s, Wafner joined the Nazi Party were he joined Waffen-SS and rose up to the ranks of an officer where he became Wilhelm Strasse's top officers for his SS Paranormal Division. In 1943 during the Invasion of Italy, Wafner and his unit of SS troops captured a small group of American paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne Division (One of the paratroopers was Lewis Ford) were they put the American paratroopers in a Nazi prison camp where they experiment on pows and make them into super soldiers, Ford and others were confronted by the man in charge of the camp, General Wilhelm Strasse and SS troops sadistically made Ford haplessly watch as his squad and men were dissected and brain taken by Deathshead (So he can use them for his Prototype Robot). As it was Ford's turn to be dissected, the Allied Forces successfully raided the camp, leaving the German forces including Wafner and men to retreat.

A year later, Wafner is an SS-Hauptsturmführer and the commander of the Nazi SS Paranormal Division forces who had seized control of the French village of Cielblanc. Led his forces in attacking the French village and abducted their villagers (including American soldiers) into their secret laboratory base to be used as test subjects for experimentation with serums, often leading to grotesque results (and the main reason was to create a serum to make victims into super-soldiers to lead the Reich).

A Nazi patrol led by Wafner visits a young woman named Chloe Laurent, unaware she is hiding a group of American paratroopers. Wafner sends his men away and proceeds to coerce Chloe for sex, threatening to send her brother away. Edward Boyce, a former black smokejumper of the 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion, cannot ignore this and interrupts Wafner before he can rape Chloe. The small group of paratroopers' leader, Corporal Lewis Ford, is forced to follow suit and restrain Wafner. After a visit to the CielBlanc church, Boyce notices the experiments the Nazis have been conducting on the villagers and steals one of the tar serums as evidence. Wafner refuses to explain what the serum does, even as Ford tortures him.

## Escaping

On the early hours of D-Day, as the squad prepares to infiltrate the church, Wafner gets ahold of a gun and attempts to escape custody, shooting and killing photographer Chase in the process before he is subdued. Boyce, having seen a dead man being resurrected with the serum, uses it on Chase. Chase is resurrected, but undergoes a mutation and becomes violent, demonstrating quick recovery from bullets. A scuffle ensues that sees Boyce pulverize Chase's head to kill him. In the confusion, Wafner escapes the house by holding Chloe's brother Paul hostage.

A Nazi patrol arrives to respond to the crisis and finds Wafner, and a shootout erupts. The patrol is killed and Wafner manages to escape with Paul hostage, but not before Ford blows off part of his face with his Thompson submachine gun.

## Being a super soldier

[[File:Wafner (2).webp|thumb|208x208px|Wafner being mutated by the tar serum.
Back at the lab, Wafner injects two doses of the serum into himself to heal his injuries against Schmidt's warnings, causing him to go insane. While planting charges around the lab, Ford and Boyce are attacked by Wafner. Due to him now mutated and possessing superhuman strength and resilience, overpowers Ford and impales him on a meat hook. Wafner explains to Ford and Boyce that the serum was made by using the villagers' bodies to distill the ancient power of the black tar, which had been running under the village for centuries. The aim was to create immortal and invincible soldiers to serve the Reich, as "A thousand-year Reich needs thousand-year soldiers". As Boyce distracts Wafner, Ford pulls the hook out and injects himself with the serum to heal his wounds. He holds off Wafner long enough for Boyce to set off an oxygen tank, which sends Wafner falling into a tar pit.

Ford, feeling that neither side should possess these dangerous weapons, orders Boyce to detonate the charges while he stays to hold off Wafner, who has just emerged from the pit. Boyce escapes just as the charges destroy the lab and the radio tower, killing Ford, Wafner, and the experimented soldiers in the process.

## Personality

Wafner was a ruthless Nazi colonel who genuinely believes that everybody else is lesser than the Germans and exists to be exploited by them and was responsible for invading the French village and abducting (or killing) the villagers, along with American or British allied soldiers, by taking them into their secret laboratory hidden inside a church, which houses the victims being experimented on by the scientists into making them super soldiers, often with gruesome results (and the main reason was to create a serum to make victims into super-soldiers to lead the Third Reich). If being an SS officer wasn't enough of a tip that Wafner is a nasty piece of work, his first real onscreen action is threatening to have Paul sent to the church if Chloe doesn't have sex with him. Boyce stops him, but it's clear by Chloe's revulsion and Wafner's smug confidence that he's been more successful in the past. When Wafner used the serums himself against Schmidt's warnings, which then leads him to being not only more powerful, but completely insane and leading to gradual mutations within his body. He shows no concern for his forces and victims alike whenever they are killed (in this case the victims whether they were dead as a result of the serums), and only cares about himself, and views his forces as expendables.

## Quotes

*"How's it feel to have the blood of eternity inside you?"* ―Wafner to Ford while they are mutating.

*"Thank you for making me the man I now am."* ―Wafner to Ford as he mutates.

*"They have been given a purpose."*―Wafner telling the paratroopers why the people and capture soldiers are taking to the CielBlanc Church.