As the sun rose over Moscow, the polar bear finally let out a long sigh of relief.
Nothing had really improved but at least nothing had fallen apart either. Everything was still where it belonged.
Andrei dropped himself onto the centuries-old Tsarist throne, far too lazy to care what anyone else might think.
I have to admit, he thought, this thing is comfortable.
No wonder it made people feel powerful.
But now what?
Andrei muttered to himself.
For a country this big, real governance was never done by the people at the very top, nor by the shadowy figures behind the curtain. It was done by countless bureaucrats, each with a little power, but together holding everything in place.
Andrei now stood at the very top. If he wanted, he could be almost omnipotent.
Almost.
In the "future history books," he technically hadn't done anything yet. And still, he had already achieved results that attracted global attention.
But none of that mattered if his orders vanished into paperwork hell. He still had to rely on bureaucrats to execute everything and how those instructions were interpreted was something only God could predict.
All he really wanted was to blend in with the system and build a base of his own.
To secure that base, bribing interests wasn't enough. He needed an image. A story. Something propaganda could sell.
For an evil empire, the ideal image was obviously the "strict father of all nations," the one Stalin had perfected. Unfortunately, that image couldn't be copied.
The later "reviver" image used by Putin belonged to a very specific historical moment. Trying to imitate it now would just look fake.
For now, Andrei decided to settle for something simpler: the successor a leader with a strong body and a stronger will. It wasn't brilliant, but it would probably satisfy the people.
As for showing strength… riding a black bear did the job, right?
In this era, image mattered more than ideology. This wasn't a consumption era, it was an entertainment era. Image helped to keep the entire nations stable.
Speaking of entertainment… Andrei needed to give the people in Moscow and beyond something to do. Keep them from dwelling on serious politics or yearning too much freedom.
"Hm…" he murmured. "How do you make people give up their own interests?"
His lips curled slightly.
"Looks like I'll have to copy the Americans again."
"General Secretary," Putin said, entering with a polite smile. "I've brought Merlin Sronovich Belkov."
"Yes! General Secretary!" Belkov nearly jumped out of his skin.
He was nobody, just a minor bureaucrat in the Propaganda Department. He had no idea why he'd been summoned.
"I've read the novels you published," Andrei said calmly. "Very good work. The people don't just need bread , they need culture."
Belkov hurried to express modesty, but Putin gently cut him off.
"Comrade Belkov, as a propaganda official, you're well aware of our recent failures in this field."
And what failures they were. From the beginning, the Evil Empire had been utterly defeated by the Free World in the contest of narratives.
All they did was censor, pretend not to see, and hypnotize themselves.
I didn't see it. You didn't see it. If we censor it, nobody sees it.
Catastrophic.
Even as sworn enemies of the West, Soviet citizens secretly admired Western ideas and products. It was a bitter joke.
If Gorbachev were here, he'd probably applaud this situation embrace "openness," invite the godfathers of liberalism, and stomp what little ideological defense remained.
Fortunately, Gorbachev was now just a traitor with a legacy problem.
"Our methods haven't kept up with the times," Andrei said. "We must learn from the West."
We must show the people the great history of the Soviet Motherland to arouse their patriotism."
Belkov nodded repeatedly, though puzzled. A war film? About WW2? The Propaganda Department had done plenty of those, with only modest effect.
"We have produced many fine works, but too few to satisfy demand. The people need more."
"Therefore, the Party has entrusted you with a glorious task."
Belkov straightened.
"One hundred World War II movies In six months."
Belkov suddenly become small and said while averting his eyes,
"General Secretary, I thank you and the Politburo for your trust. But I must emphasize, historical scripts require far more time than other works. To avoid distorting the history of our Motherland, we must work carefully…" Meaning: I can't possibly do this so quickly.
"Comrade Belkov, the Soviet Motherland needs talented people to proclaim her greatness. As for how to complete the task… I've prepared an outline for you."
Andrei handed over the guidelines he'd drafted in an hour ago.
"Just follow this framework. I believe you can fulfill the duty given to you by the Party and the state."
Belkov swallowed and looked down.
Guiding Principles
1. Our troops must look good (handsome men, beautiful women).
2. The fascist enemy must be ugly (as ugly as possible, with negative IQ).
3. Our army is invincible—> One soldier can defeat a hundred (e.g., a Red Army man kills over a thousand fascists with a shovel).
4. Fascists are inhuman (fat, pedophilic). Americans and Allies are cuckolds and cowards, hiding behind women or busy raping German women. Poles fight with medieval weapons; the British secretly help the Germans and false flag the Pearl harbor attack.
5. Our technology is supreme. (A single T-34 can destroy a thousand Tiger tanks.)
6. Don't sweat the details, just make it look like WWII.
7. Feel free to add mystical elements (kung fu, yoga, secret techniques) used to wipe out entire tank formations.
8. The people must be left satisfied and happy.
_____________________________________________________________________
Belkov's hands were shaking. Even the corners of his mouth twitched uncontrollably.
He understood immediately why Andrei had given him such an enormous task.
Writing this kind of work required no intelligence at all.
If he accepted, his reputation among writers would be ruined beyond repair. Infamous would be a generous word.
But compared to a bad reputation and whatever conscience a writer was supposed to have, rejecting the General Secretary's offer meant something far worse.
It meant his future would end here.
Belkov made his choice quickly.
"Since this task concerns the spiritual and cultural needs of the people," he said stiffly, "even though I am not fully familiar with this field,
I am willing to create the cultural products our nation requires."
Andrei regarded him seriously.
"Then it is all entrusted to you, Comrade Belkov. I wish you every success."
And just like that, the infamous "Anti-German Series" which would later keep countless German fans awake at night grinding their teeth, was pushed into full production under Belkov's leadership.
When the films finally aired, the people of the Soviet Empire were struck dumb by the sheer scale.
In the now-notorious drama Forward, Steel Tank!, a KV‑1 heavy tank (actually a T‑10 standing in) blessed by the spirit of Stalin crushed a hundred Tiger tanks single-handedly. The most spectacular scene showed a single shell wiping out hundreds of thousands of fascists across dozens of miles.
Viewers laughed and joked that the Soviet Union apparently had nuclear weapons decades ahead of schedule.
Then there was Battle! Ivan.
The protagonist inherited a hoe from his father, mastered meditation and martial arts, and used this mystical power to slaughter fascists by the thousands, while also foiling a secret German plot to assassinate Lenin.
Feeling emboldened, Belkov decided to try his hand at foreign cinema.
The results were… memorable.
In Titanic 2.0, the adulterous lovers were further cucked by a Soviet agent who looked suspiciously like Comrade Andrei. He boarded the ship midway through the voyage, exposed their bourgeois decadence, and converted them to cummunism before the iceberg even showed up.
In The Last Samurai: Origins, Rasputin suddenly woke up in Meiji-era Japan. Within two hours of screen time, he had corrupted the court, replaced the Emperor's advisors, and taken over the country by helping Meiji produce an heir and shooting that dumb 18th century American weaboo.
In Gandhi, the Mahatma awakened from a prophetic dream personally delivered by Lenin himself and concluded that nuclear weapons were, in fact, the highest form of nonviolent resistance. Peace through megatons.
As for Queen Victoria—
Andrei declined to interfere personally.
Instead, he generously handed the task to one of his good Irish friends.
No one was spared. Not even communist allies escaped unscathed: Castro was rewritten as the biological father of a Canadian president, while Mao Zedong was revealed to be Stalin's illegitimate child. There truly was no sky above Belkov.
The films were universally condemned abroad and quietly adored at home.
Belkov called it a success.
Faced with this relentless thunder-drama insanity, professors, university students, and film critics across the globe declared intellectual crusade. Articles appeared
10, 20... 100 page articles meticulously breaking down each scene, each line, each unforgivable creative decision.
Foreign observers were baffled. Intelligence briefings warned governments of Soviet revanchism through cinema.
Media outlets began criticizing the films openly. With overseas outrage boiling over, even Pravda couldn't resist joining the dogpile.
The Soviet Union had one of the highest proportions of highly educated citizens in the world. It produced an overwhelming surplus of intellectuals and if you didn't give them something outrageous to complain about, they would simply invent something worse.
Belkov was soon nicknamed "the Great Evil" in film and media circles. Many free countries attempted to censor his work outright.
And so, no one could shake Comrade Belkov's standing in film and television .
According to unreliable sources, Comrade Belkov never watched or reread the scripts he wrote.
He was rumored to say:
"After writing these scripts, my IQ turned negative."