Years later, Hans Werner (Robert Morris) is working as an assistant to Baron Victor Frankenstein (Peter Cushing), helped by Dr Hertz (Thorley Walters) who is in the process of discovering a way of trapping the soul of a recently deceased person. Frankenstein believes he can transfer that soul into another recently deceased body to restore it to life.
Hans is now also the lover of Christina (Susan Denberg), daughter of innkeeper Herr Kleve. Christina's entire left side is disfigured and partly paralysed. Young dandies Anton (Peter Blythe), Johann (Derek Fowlds) and Karl (Barry Warren) frequent Kleve's inn where they taunt Christina and refuse to pay. Johann threatens to have his father revoke Kleve's license if he complains. The three insist that they be served by Christina and mock her for her deformities. The taunting angers Hans, who gets in a fight with the three of them and cuts Anton's face with a knife.
Eventually Kleve throws the dandies out for non-payment. They return in the night to steal wine from his inn. Kleve catches them and they beat him to death. Hans, the son of a murderer known for his short temper, is convicted. Despite the Baron and Hertz's defences against the accusations, Hans is executed by the guillotine, much to Anton, Johann and Karl's delight. Seeing this as an opportunity, Frankenstein gets hold of Hans' fresh corpse and traps his soul.
Distraught over Hans's death and feeling the guilt for not defending him, Christina drowns herself by jumping off a bridge. The peasants bring her body to Dr Hertz to see if he can do anything. Frankenstein and Hertz transfer Hans' soul into her body. Over months of complex and intensive treatment, they completely cure her physical deformities. The result is a physically healthy female with no memory. She keeps asking who she is. Frankenstein insists on telling her nothing but her name and keeping her in Hertz's house. Though she comes to her senses of who she is, Christine is taken over by the spirit of the vengeful Hans.
She kills Anton, Karl and Johann, driven mostly by the ghostly insistence of Hans. Frankenstein and Dr. Hertz become rather suspicious of her behaviour surrounding the killings and take her to where Hans was executed. However, they believe she subconsciously retains her memories of her father's death rather than Hans. By the time they realise the truth, they find her already murdering Johann. Upon holding the severed head of Hans, the ghostly voice tells Christina she's avenged his death; though before either one can talk to her, she runs to the edge of a waterfall. Despite the Baron's pleas of telling her identity, Christina's mind has already been made. She has no one left to live for and then drowns herself again. Saddened by her loss and for not telling her who she really was, Frankenstein walks silently away...
Who is Hans' lover?
Christina