I think it’s actually the Nazi eagle symbol. Does look a bit like a face though.
Hister is gonna come along and make them look like a bunch of pussies.
First question: Are you daft? Second question: Have you read The Strain?
Setrakian is a frail old man who previously had his hands crushed by a vampire and never had them set properly. Yet somehow he is able to take on dozens of bloodsuckers (who are faster, stronger and can see in the dark) while barely breaking a sweat.
It does strain credibility and no amount of yelling “old people are people too!” is not going to change that.
I’m pretty sure you totally missed the point of kunilou’s post. I didn’t get the impression that s/he was taking up for old people.
I have seen the future.
How was I supposed to read it?
Old age and treachery will overcome youth and skill? 
I think s/he was commenting on the fact that you’re willing to suspend disbelief enough that an undead creature who sucks people’s blood is a-ok, yet a fighting old man sets you off.
“A thousand years will pass and the guilt of Germany will not be erased.” - Hans Frank, hanged at Nuremburg.
So we’re good for the next 935 years or so.
Well why wouldn’t I? If the vampire universe is described well enough, you’ve got a pretty good idea what the vampires are capable of. assuming creatures that more or less have superstrength and superspeed and outnumber the old man 20-1 would easily kill him is not a leap.
Although, I have my doubts Setrakian is a normal man and I wonder what the sequel will add to his backstory.
The Nazis provide a convienant form of evil in so many ways: They were an evil political party as well as an evil government, so they had resources to pull off Big Evil like doomsday weapons.
Being such a large, well-organized entity lets them fit the role of The Secret Evil Corporation. This also provides convienant backstory for Evil Conspiracies, what with real life conspiracies like the ODESSA organization.
They had cult-like qualities with mythic pretensions, so they fit in with supernatural plots.
So it isn’t just that they’re the standard of evil. It’s that they have so many qualities that make for great villains.
I, for one, predict a Thousand Year Reich of Nazi screen terror. They are the perfect villians and so despicably evil that after the war even the ones put on trial (for the most part) were appalled and shocked at the evil they accomplished.
I also think the Nazis have a lot of longevity left in them as movie or story villains. I would look to other historical examples:
- the Muslim world still sees the Crusades (700-900 years ago) as a very present and relevant event.
- the Vikings were a near-universal bad guy until they started to be romanticized 1,000 years after their well-known raids on Europe
- the word “vandal” entered our language because of the Vandal barbarian tribe’s wars with Rome. That was 1,500 years ago; we’ve forgotten the details, but not the word
- Huns are even older than Vandals. We’ve also forgotten the details, but the word comes back whenever we need to talk about war-mongering Germans
Nazi sorcerers ( since they were into the occult ). One of Mercedes Lackey’s urban fantasies mentioned that a bunch retreated into Underhill and thus survived unaging to the present day.
Descendants of Nazis; one of the major bad guys in Katherine Kurtz’s Adept novels was one.
Reincarnations of Nazis; one of the major bad guys in Katherine Kurtz’s Adept novels was one.
Students of Nazis; one of Stephen King’s bad guys was one.
Demonic/Damned Nazis : Operation : Chaos had the good guys from an alternate universe run into Hitler. They wondered why a Lord of Hell was wearing a good luck symbol like a swastika. One of the Samurai Cat novels had Nazis in Hell, although not played very seriously.
They also played the part of being evil, like others have said. They were so openly nasty, without bothering with rhetoric about how they were oppressing you for your own good. And they even dressed evil. I recall a joke :
SS Officer 1: “Hans ?”
SS Officer 2 : “Yes ?”
SS Officer 1: “I just noticed. We are wearing black uniforms, and our hats have skulls on them. Are . . . are we the bad guys?”
I recently saw some (recently made) movie which sidesteps – or, rather, postpones – the problem by being set in the 1960’s, when many former Nazis, and their victims, were still plentiful and youngish. I can’t recall at the moment what the film was, but I recall thinking how there was no other reason, other than the problem we’re discussing, that the film was set in the 1960’s.
Illinois Nazis?
Surf nazis?
The trailer is great. This picture has all the essential elements - licentious young people (including hot Norwegian babes) out for a good time in the snow, zombie Nazis, chainsaws, and Beethoven.
Heh. Reminds me of how, in the original '60s-era MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE series, the last hope for Nazi Germany rested with the sons of Hitler’s high-ranking officers: four youths, each raised in a separate country but now old enough to meet for the first time and claim all that stolen gold that got hidden away for them in the last days of WWII.
Fast-forward to the '80s, with the new MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE series – and it’s the same plan, but this time for the grandsons of the Third Reich.
No, really.