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"Mature Content Warning!" |
| “ | My poor Dieter. The future is dark. You must try harder to become more like Johan. It's a pity. Why are you such a failure? Why can't you be more like Johan? Tell me why! | ” |
| ~ Hartmann to Dieter. |
Hartmann is a major antagonist of anime/manga series Monster.
He was the director of 511 Kinderheim, a private orphanage created by the East German Health Ministry, being put in charge of creating and overseeing the various experiments conducted on the children brought into the orphanage. He plays a critical role in how Johan became the monster he was in the story's present, as well as the creation of numerous other monsters due to the devastation and psychological torture he propagated throughout the orphanage. He was encountered by Tenma when searching for details on Johan's past, meeting with him in his house and acting as a kind, understanding man. However, when the doors closed, his true nature was revealed as a psychopathic, deranged, sadistic man who relished in the torturous methods of 511 Kinderheim as well as Bonaparta, whose work the orphanage's activities were based off of, wanting to sculpt the next Hitler and recreate the monsters that 511 Kinderheim sought to create. He was threatened by Tenma upon finding his latest victim, Dieter, heavily bruised and beaten, motivating Dieter to leave Hartmann for good, and disproving Hartmann's fervent belief in using torture to turn someone into a monstrous leader.
He is voiced by Masaaki Yajima in Japanese and John Snyder in English.
Actions and Characteristics[]
- While the psychologist and neurosurgeon Franz Bonaparta is more influential than him for his role in producing and indirectly setting of Johan's descent, as well as running experiments in the Red Rose Mansion on numerous children, ultimately 511 Kinderheim is depicted to be the worst atrocity in Monster, spreading this psychological and physical devastation to far more children across the world, and resulting in many of their deaths. Thus, he stands out as the most responsible for the pain and corruption wrought upon and suffered by many characters, such as Johan, Grimmer, Stefan Joos, Roberto, and other minor villains corrupted into evil.
- He is responsible for overseeing and creating experiments conducted on the numerous children in 511 Kinderheim, the private orphanage covertly run by the East German Ministry of Health and Ministry of Foreign Affairs to create the next Hitler, based on the psychologist and neurosurgeon Franz Bonaparta's work.
- He proves to be the most heinous and irredeemably evil villain throughout the story for various reasons:
- Though he states that 511 Kinderheim "could not have possibly created a masterpiece like [Johan]", the cassette tape recordings of the experimentation done on him in 511 Kinderheim prove that they were in fact responsible for making Johan much worse, resulting in him starting a massacre involving at least 50 children, resulting in their deaths, which was mostly due to the corruption induced by Hartmann and the other officers, which he was proud of. This makes him indirectly responsible for the biggest massacre in the story as well as Johan's other actions. It is implied that Hartmann may have even caused other children to commit suicide on his own as well.
- In the present day, he is an established child psychologist who secretly tortures small groups of children the same way they were tortured in 511 Kinderheim, and sends them to high-powered politicians to further mold them into "Hitler" copies and spread as much damage as possible.
- While Franz Bonaparta kidnapped Anna to produce Johan and Anna and first ran reading seminars and experiments of psychological torture on children in the Red Rose Mansion to produce another Hitler in the form of a "superior pupil", he eventually felt remorse and stopped all experiments, destroying all the evidence (including everyone else involved). However, his work was eventually discovered and used by the German Government, using it to establish 511 Kinderheim, which Hartmann likely played a huge role in.
- Peter Capek shares the same crimes as Bonaparta as he assisted him and enabled him in his crimes, and later re-established himself as a child psychologist, taking in new groups of children and running the same Red Rose Mansion experiments on them, resulting in their consecutive suicides, as well as establishing the Neo-Nazi Organization with Professor Goedelitz, The Baby, and General Wolf. However, he was very remorseful for his deeds throughout his life, eventually breaking down and getting killed when he was found out for his role in the Red Rose Mansion and the 511 Kinderheim massacre, while Hartmann never displayed any guilt for his actions and continued to torture students for many more years afterward.
- While the Neo-Nazis tried to corrupt Johan into becoming the next Hitler, masterminding a plan to burn down all of Germany, ultimately their success hinged on their success in corrupting Johan and their ability to overpower him, neither of which they were able to do nor did they have a chance of doing, resulting in the heroes finding out their plan, preventing any damage, and Johan killing them. Hartmann, on the other hand, was much more successful in ruining more lives and spreading more damage even if covertly.
- While Capek and Bonaparta worked with larger groups of children, they at least had each other and mainly focused on book readings and psychological torture. For Hartmann, it is shown that he went with much more brutal forms of torture on individual children, which would damage them more severely as shown with various killers arising from 511 Kinderheim.
- Though Johan was far more powerful in his ability to influence multiple people to become killers and ability to orchestrate large massacres such as the 511 Kinderhim Massacre, the University of Munich fire, and the Ruhenheim massacre, Hartmann stands out for his ability and willingness to irreparably damage children. While Johan is willing to do this, he never quite succeeded, from what is shown with Milosh or any children from the daycare while he was in university.
- While he was arrested for his crimes, it was mainly for child abuse which barely scratches the surface of the true extent of his crimes, and it was never confirmed whether he was truly held accountable for his actions, and the extent behind 511 Kinderheim was never truly revealed to the public.
- Although he only appeared in a couple of episodes in the first quarter of the series, his influence on the children of 511 Kinderheim and his continued torture on others for the rest of his life is felt throughout the rest of the story due to more cases of people corrupted by Johan, and the actions of Johan himself, showing the irreparable damage he caused on those children who would go onto become horrible people or Johan's victims, as well as the countless victims of said 511 Kinderheim criminals. This effectively makes him the true root of all evil in the story.
Stats[]
| Intelligence | 5 / 5 | |
|---|---|---|
| Skills | 5 / 5 | |
| Speed | 3 / 5 | |
| Stamina | 3 / 5 | |
| Strength | 3 / 5 |
For information on stats, review the stats page.