OVERLAY REPORT

In the 1981 film *Das Boot*, the majority of the characters die in the film's final moments. This ending is famously ironic: after surviving months of harrowing depth-charge attacks, extreme pressure at the bottom of the ocean, and near-starvation, the crew is destroyed in a matter of minutes just as they reach the safety of their home port. Below are the specific characters who die and the circumstances of their deaths. ### The Final Air Raid (La Rochelle) The U-96 returns to the submarine pens at La Rochelle, France, on Christmas Eve. As the crew disembarks to a hero's welcome and a brass band, a sudden Allied (RAF) air raid begins. Most of the deaths occur during this strafing and bombing run. * **The Captain (Kapitänleutnant / "Der Alte"):** Played by Jürgen Prochnow. He is the last to die. After the bombing stops, he is seen standing on the pier, severely wounded by shrapnel (indicated by blood soaking through his coat over his chest/stomach). He refuses to seek cover, instead watching in silence as the U-96—the boat he spent the entire movie trying to save—sinks into the harbor. Once the boat disappears beneath the water, he collapses and dies on the dock. * **The Second Watch Officer (2WO):** Played by Martin Semmelrogge. He is killed during the strafing of the pier. He is known throughout the film for his crude humor and cynical attitude. * **Johann (the "Ghost"):** The engine room mechanic who suffered a psychological breakdown earlier in the film. He is among those killed during the air raid on the docks. * **Ullmann:** The young ensign who was frequently seen writing letters to his pregnant French fiancée. His death underscores the tragedy of the young men serving on the boats. * **The "Preacher" (Bibelforscher):** The crew member often seen reading the Bible. He is killed during the final chaos at the port. * **Unidentified Crew Members:** While the film focuses on the officers, the visual narrative shows dozens of crew members being mown down by machine-gun fire from the planes or caught in the explosions on the pier. ### Survivors and Wounded * **Leutnant Werner (The Correspondent):** Werner survives the raid by taking cover in the submarine bunker. He is the POV character who wanders out after the attack to find the bodies of the men he had grown to respect. * **The Chief Engineer (Der Leitende / Fritz Grade):** He is generally portrayed as surviving the raid, as he is not among the bodies Werner identifies, though his ultimate fate is left somewhat ambiguous in the film's immediate aftermath. * **The First Watch Officer (1WO):** The rigid, pro-Nazi officer also survives the initial chaos, though the film focuses on Werner's perspective of the dead. * **Kriechbaum (The Navigator):** Shortly before the final raid, during the failed attempt to cross the Strait of Gibraltar, Kriechbaum is seriously wounded by strafing from a British plane. He is carried off the boat on a stretcher just as they arrive at La Rochelle, narrowly avoiding the worst of the final bombing, though his long-term survival is not explicitly confirmed. ### The "Irony of Death" in the Film The deaths in *Das Boot* are designed to highlight the futility of the U-boat war. The crew survives: 1. **A massive storm** in the North Atlantic. 2. **A terrifying depth-charge pursuit** by a British destroyer. 3. **A "death trap" at the bottom of the Strait of Gibraltar**, where they are stuck at a depth of 280 meters (far beyond the boat's design limit) and nearly run out of oxygen. Because they survive all of these "heroic" or "soldierly" challenges only to be killed by a random, sudden air raid at home, the film provides a stark anti-war message: their struggle and survival meant nothing in the face of the industrial scale of the war.