Russian soldiers (Image: Getty)
Slain Putin troops killed in the war in Ukraine are being “brought back to life” in an eerie new AI resurrection trend.
Grieving families pay for videos showing final hugs with wives and other relatives, kisses and ascents to heaven for the uniformed fighters.
Dozens of communities on Russian ‘Facebook’ VK — with a combined audience of hundreds of thousands of users — now offer these “farewell videos” or “neuro-portraits” of the Kremlin’s war dead.
The videos follow a strikingly similar script in which a fallen soldier appears, embraces loved ones, and then walks away into the sky, disappears, or is escorted by angels through the Pearly Gates.
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Each clip is paired with an obituary.
The soldiers are shown as if in real life, with no indications of the fatal wounds they have suffered from being participants in Putin’s cannon fodder frontline.
In four years of fighting, the Kremlin is estimated to have sent 350,000 soldiers to their deaths in a war that has led to only minuscule territorial gains for a country that is anyway the largest – geographically – on the planet.
Prices for the AI resurrections start at around 1,500 rubles (£13) for a simple animated hug, rising to 3,500–4,000 rubles (£30–£35) for more elaborate scenes—including a “goodbye kiss” or even a voice simulation of the dead.
There are even waiting lists or extra charges for rush orders.
Families commission videos to recreate a “final meeting” with sons, husbands or fathers killed in combat.
One video shows soldier Alexei, 49, ascending the steps to heaven in his Russian military uniform.
Another depicts Sergei, 40, hugging and kissing his wife, and embracing his brother and parents, before smiling, waving, and then climbing the steps to the Pearly Gates.
Vladimir, 36, kisses his sleeping wife farewell on the pillow before ascending the steps to the afterlife, awaited by two angels.
Another ghostly fighter bids goodbye to his wife in a cornfield before donning the wings of an angel.
One service openly advertises: “Using neural networks… we recreate the moment of reunion and send them off to heaven.”
Psychologists say such videos can act as a coping mechanism for grief, allowing relatives to process loss.
But critics say it has also become a profitable digital industry built around death, where emotion is packaged into algorithm-generated content.
Some online comments call the videos “touching” and “deeply personal.”
But others say they are “creepy” or “disturbing.”
One pro-Ukrainian source called the Russian videos “cringeworthy,” showing “resurrected occupiers” who have died fighting in an illegal war to invade a foreign country.
“To avoid such a loss, you could simply not send your husband or son to a war of conquest,” said the report.
This account admitted that “dozens of people on social media are making such videos to order.…
“The scenario is predictably banal.
“Soldiers often appear as angels or heroes, bidding farewell to their families or ‘returning home.’”
There is also a suspicion of a strong Russian propaganda motive behind the videos – portraying the dead fighters as doing God’s work and being welcomed to heaven after their sacrifices as Putin war dead.
