Mustang! Spitfire! Zero! World War Two produced some great aircraft....these are not those.  Observe, for example, the Blohm and Voss BV-141 observation plane.  The pilot, observer and gunner all sat in a gondela on the wing, while the main fuselage was all engine.

The Blohm and Voss BV-141flew better than one would expect, however the Focke-Wulf Fw 189 Uhu proved to be the observation plane of choice for the Luftwaffe.

A flying tank?  Sounds like a great idea, so thought the Soviets. The Antonov A-40 was a glider that was built around a T-60 tank that, not surprisingly, did not work well, and crashed on its one test flight. 

The Antonov A-40 coming in for a....crash landing.

The Bell YFM-1 Airacuda looked fierce, with a 37 mm canon (and gunner) on the front of each engine.  However, the Airacuda was plagued by too many design problems to ever come close to being effective. 

The Bell YFM-1Airacuda, good idea, bad execution.

The Curtiss-Wright XP-55 Ascender looked like the next great thing in fighter development.  It was not, and performed worse than its contemporaries. 

 Curtiss-Wright XP-55 Ascender...or Ass-ender as some called it because of its rear facing propeller. 

Would you like syrup with that?  The Vought V-173 was known as the "Flying Pancake" for obvious reasons. Although it was not successful, tests did provide insight for future flying wing programs. 

Reports of UFOs often accompanied test flights of the Flying Pancake.  

The Vickers Wellington was a successful airplane from World War Two, with over 11,500 of the type built. However, a modification on the Wellington made it look very weird...the DWI (Directional Wireless Installation) was a large ring that circuled most of the airplane.  The purpose of the ring was to emite a magnetic field that would detonate mines in the water. 

In order for Wellington to detonate the mines, it had to fly very near the water's surface, and sometimes the exploding mine would damage the airplane.

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