BJ Blazkowicz's Entire Story Explained

Before Nazis were a thing, little William Joseph Blazkowicz had other nightmares to contend with, as we learn through flashbacks in Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus. He grew up in Mesquite, Texas on an estate just about as dusty and unforgiving as his father. Rip Blazkowicz wasn't exactly father of the year, abusive toward both his son and wife Zofia. He also wasn't a great businessman and took out his frustrations on his family. BJ's lone respite was loyal family dog Bessie. Yes, that's some serious foreshadowing. 

BJ was plagued with nightmares, so good old Rip would lock his young son in the basement with weapons to ostensibly fight the nightmares. This actually managed to cure BJ of his night terrors, not that it improved his relationship with Rip. But the worst trial of his childhood was when he developed a crush on his friend Billie. She was a nice girl, but Rip was a huge racist and was enraged by BJ's relationship with the African American girl. He locked BJ in a closet and beat Zofia; when BJ tried to step in, he was strangled unconscious. He woke in the basement, tied to sawhorses, where a sadistic Rip forced his son to shoot his beloved Bessie.

In the long-anticipated sequel to the classic series, Wolfenstein 2009, BJ discovers that he has superpowers. Well, he discovers that a Thule Medallion recovered from a German battleship has superpowers. It uses crystals to access the power of the Veil or "Black Sun," another dimension populated by ghostly energy beings that usually will leave interlopers alone. Usually. BJ is sent to Isenstadt, where the Nazis are mining these so-called Nachtsonne crystals. 

In Isenstadt, the Kreisau Circle, led by Caroline Becker, are working to free the city from Nazi control. BJ uses the Medallion to power some of his good old-fashioned Nazi-killing before Becker is captured by Wilhelm "Deathshead" Strasse. His right hand man, Hans Grosse, shoots Becker, but BJ will get revenge. He uncovers a plan to use the Black Sun dimension to make a superweapon that will destroy the whole of the city. One mech battle later and Grosse is dead, the portal to the Black Sun Dimension is destroyed, and BJ has effectively made a mortal enemy out of Deathshead.

Wolfenstein: The Old Blood sees BJ and his OSA buddy Wesley disguise themselves as SS officers, sent to the titular Castle Wolfenstein in order to snatch a secret folder belonging to one Helga von Schabbs. Inside the folder is the location of the Deathshead Compound, where the Nazis have been creating their ultra-advanced technology. What they find instead is an empty safe and Rudi "The Warden"Jager, the Ramsey Bolton-esque second-in-command of the castle. He and his mutated mutt Greta doggedly pursue BJ and torture and kill Wesley. 

Escaping the castle and Jager's clutches, BJ goes to Paderborn Village to meet up with allies. In the final showdown with Jager, who is naturally strapped into a mech suit, the team heads to Wulfburg to meet with Agent Two. Back in disguise once more, BJ must pose as a mild-mannered waiter to attempt to purloin the secret folder from Helga von Schabbs herself.

In Wolfenstein: The New Order, armed with the location of the Deathshead Compound, BJ, Fergus Reid, and Private Probst Wyatt III take part in an Allied raid on the sea fortress. The OSA officers are quickly cornered by Deathshead himself and BJ must choose to sacrifice Fergus or Wyatt. Deathshead leaves them all to die in a fiery explosion, but they manage to escape just as the room blows up. Shrapnel strikes BJ, giving him a powerful case of amnesia. When he is fished from the ocean, he is sent to a Polish psychiatric asylum where he sits blank-faced for fourteen years, cared for by Anya Oliwa. 

BJ becomes BJ again only after the Nazis come to kill everyone in the asylum, including Anya's parents. He exterminates the extermination squad and is horrified to discover that the Nazis won the war. All his resistance buddies are locked up in Berlin, so he and Anya plan a good old-fashioned prison break. This is slightly waylaid by the smiling Frau Engel, who compliments BJ for his Aryan looks on the train to Berlin. She's in charge of the forced labor camps. This encounter certainly won't be the last with her and her empty-headed lover Bubi.

The gang hijacks a U-boat, which just so happens to be Eva's Hammer, the flagship of the Nazi Navy laden with nuclear warheads. They take this precious cargo to the undersea cache of Da'at Yichud tech where they recover the Spindly Torque, a strange little sphere that is much more useful than it looks. It can bring down anything, even Uber Concrete. But nukes are useful too, so the resistance decides to recover the codes needed to launch the nukes from the Nazi lunar base. It's the '60s and there are Nazis on the Moon. 

After retrieving the codes and more or less safely returning to earth, BJ is ready for part two of the raid on the Deathshead Compound. This time it's personal: Frau Engel captured Set and Anya while BJ was away. Using the Spindly Torque, BJ takes down a wall of the fortress and goes after Deathshead himself, who sics BJ's sacrificed friend (in new robot form, of course) on him. When BJ gets ahold of Deathshead himself after — you guessed it — a mech fight, Strasse detonates a grenade, killing himself and maiming BJ. Barely conscious, BJ confirms the order to nuke the Deathshead Compound before blacking out.

Grace Walker, one of the architects of this new American Revolution, wants to destroy the German High Command, the Oberkommando, with one of the nuclear warheads from the U-boat. The Oberkommando is right beside Area 52, where one of the largest caches of Da'at Yichud tech was stored rather than space aliens, as lawyer/conspiracy theorist Super Spesh believes. 

BJ heads to New Mexico disguised as a firefighter and uses a tunnel under Super Spesh's old fashioned diner to blow the Oberkommando to smithereens. With that nasty business taken care of, BJ goes home to Mesquite. There he finds his old house and his mother's heirloom ring, but no Zofia. BJ's old man Rip shows up, saying that he was doing just fine as a white man in the Nazi's new order, thank you very much. He sold out Zofia for being Jewish, and he's ready and willing to do the same to BJ. Even as BJ commits a well-deserved patricide, the Ausmerzer picks up the old Blazkowicz Estate. Frau Engel comes for revenge. Again.

Guess who gets to go to space again? It's BJ. This time he is assuming the identity of actor Jules Redfield to audition for the role of ... BJ Blazkowicz. Hitler wrote and plans on directing his very own film about his heroic battle and defeat of the Terror-Billy himself. Hitler has gone senile and kills young actor Ronald Reagan for not addressing him properly and another actor for an underwhelming performance. BJ ultimately gets the part because of his dedication to the role (read: killing a volunteer guard). But he's not there to act. He's there for the codes. 

Back on Earth with codes in hand, the resistance is officially ready to launch the assault on the Ausmerzer. But first, there's a birthday that needs celebrating. It's BJ's 50th birthday, even though he doesn't look it, especially with his Bio-Engineered Super Soldier Body. The following day, maybe a little hungover, the Kreisau Circle disables the defense system of the Ausmerzer and effectively takes over the flying fortress.

As we know, BJ Blazkowicz is tougher than nails and twice as stubborn. Being 20 years older, grey, and creaky-jointed isn't about to stop him from killing Nazis. Unfortunately, 19 years after the events of Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus, there are still Nazis in the world. Though America is the land of the free thanks to BJ's good work, France is still occupied by the Greater Reich. This is where BJ disappeared, leaving behind his worried family. His girls, Jess and Soph, have his determination, grit, and sewer mouth. They're not about to let their dear old dad do all the Nazi killing all by himself. 

In Wolfenstein: Youngblood, the aptly named "Terror Twins" go in search of their missing dad. The girls discover BJ in the mysterious Nazi Lab X, where he tells them that when he killed Hitler, he accidentally set off a doomsday device that has slowly made the earth uninhabitable. Good thing there's a convenient alternate dimension on hand via Da'at Yichud tech. Before abandoning their doomed world, the Blazkowicz family first has to take down the rising rebel Fourth Reich.