Creator-Owned
Herman von Klempt is a villain created by writer/artist Mike Mignola for the Dark Horse Comics series Hellboy. He first appeared in the Comics Buyer's Guide. A German scientist, von Klempt was a close colleague of Karl Ruprecht Kroenen at university. Although the two men apparently shared similar ideas, Von Klempt was not, like Kroenen, recruited by Rasputin as a disciple. Von Klempt was assigned to other Nazi projects. During the Second World War, and especially during the final years, when Germany faced defeat, Adolf Hitler launched a series of what the Allies called "Doomsday Projects," attempts to combine science with black magic. Among these was Project Vampir Sturm (1944, proposed by Heinrich Himmler); Project Ragna Rok (The Fatal Destiny), which resulted in the appearance of Hellboy in a church in East Bromwich, England (December 23, 1944); and, lastly, the Nazi Space Program. The Nazi Space Program was initiated in or around 1939, when German scientists managed to make contact with non-corporeal beings in outer space (which Hellboy, half-facetiously, nicknamed "space ghosts"). These beings promised that, if a human shell was sent into space to provide a host for them, it would return to Earth powerful enough to destroy the Nazis' enemies. The Nazis prepared to launch into space the remains of Dr. Ernst Oeming, a German physicist often referred to as the "Nazi Einstein," who had been assassinated by a car bomb earlier that year. The launch platform was Hunte Castle in Austria. On the night of March 20, 1939, the date Oeming's body was to be launched, the American hero Lobster Johnson led a group of American troops in an attack on Hunte Castle. In a state of panic, the Nazis launched Oeming's ship before the roof's doors could open. Although the rocket cleared the castle and made it into space, the explosion resulted in the immediate incineration of everyone inside the castle except one man: Herman von Klempt. Although most of his body was destroyed, his head was kept alive in a jar, which was attached to a robotic body. Von Klempt also created what he called a Kriegsaffe (German, "war ape"), a sort of Frankenstein's monster-like ape, to be his henchman. At some point he had a swastika tattooed to his forehead. B.P.R.D : 1946 in 1946 Von Klempt was working for the Vampir Sturm project. He was confronted by Prof. Bruttenholm, who was young at the time, and set two of his Kriegaffen upon him. Von Klepmt's head was attached to a set of mechanical spider legs that allowed him to move about on his own. Bruttenholm defeated the large Apes as they battled in a rocket that had launched from the ground and managed to push Von Klempt out, who then fell to the ground. Comic buyer's guide Von Klempt escaped Europe after the war and retreated to a base in the jungle near Macapá, Brazil, where he began working on other projects. It was there in 1959 that he was confronted by Hellboy, who was investigating the disappearance of peasant girls in the area (von Klempt had been drawing fluid from their spinal columns in order to prolong his life). In the fight that ensued, Hellboy defeated von Klempt and his Kriegsaffe , "Brutus". Von Klempt's inert head would not be seen for decades. Wake the Devil Von Klempt's old friend and colleague, Kroenen, had placed himself in suspended animation with Ilsa Haupstein and Leopold Kurtz, two other members of the Ragna Rok Project. Asleep in a Norwegian castle, they were awoken in 1994 by Roderick Zinco, with the intent of carrying out the deceased Rasputin's agenda. Secretly, Kroenen sent Zinco to Brazil to retrieve von Klempt's head. After being revived, von Klempt tried to convince Kroenen to abandon Rasputin's plan to awaken the Ogdru Jahad, and instead use Zinco's resources to retrieve von Klempt's projects in South America, which he promised could let them rule the world. Overhearing, Kurtz began attacking von Klempt's head, and Kroenen killed Kurtz in a panic. Furious at von Klempt and Kroenen…
| Creators | Mike Mignola |
|---|---|
| Teams | Nazis, Project Ragna Rok |