The Great Dictator noted Chaplin's use of Wagner's "Lohengrin" prelude when Hynckel dances with the globe-balloon. Chaplin repeated use of the "Lohengrin" prelude near the conclusion, when the exiled Hannah listens to the Jewish barber's speech celebrating democracy and freedom. The music is interrupted during the dictator's dance but it is heard to complete and climax in the barber's pro-democracy speech. Commenting on this, Lutz Peter Koepnick writes in 2002, Chaplin's film was released nine months after Hollywood's first parody of Hitler, the short subject "You Nazty Spy!" by the Three Stooges, which premiered in January 1940. Chaplin had been planning his feature-length
Dictator (novel) becoming a byword for intelligent, topical, articulate action romps that slightly send themselves up.", although he also notes that, given the 1997 setting of the first Samuel Carver novel, his age in this one would be somewhat unrealistic. Rich Westwood, reviewing for "Euro Crime", stated that "Dictator is an ideal holiday novel for a thriller fan, with a hard-as-nails protagonist, satisfyingly gritty action sequences, beautiful women and a collection of very nasty baddies". The novel was also well reviewed by G.S. of "CrimeSquad", who awarded it five out of five and commented that "Dictator is an outstanding novel which has