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[Magmacube_tr]

I was watching a children's show that came out in TRT Çocuk some 8 years ago out of nostalgia. I dunno, I just felt a little past timey. It's called Bulmaca Kulesi, or "Tower of Puzzles" in direct translation.

There are three kids. After the blonde genius kid fucks up with his overly complicated, definitely-not safe water purifier, they end up in a whole different dimension, which is a seemingly infinite sky with a large, deserted tower-like construct floating. They solve puzzles (DUH?!) and conundrums on their way with their weird flying creature friends, to climb up this tower, level by level and demonstrate basic scientific facts and thinking exercises for kids along the way.

It is stupid. It is silly. But it is innocent.

And horrifyingly suspenseful.

Look. I know it is silly. And I am overanalysing. But I mean it. This is absolutely, positively %100, pure fridge horror. It is probably my cowardly, certified gamer, very-susceptible-to-existential-dread ass thinking it is, but this show wasn't scary, at all, when I was a 12 year old. It just wasn't. Now, it is.

Is it the crushing liminality of the setting; the apparent reality that the tower is completely empty of people but otherwise perfectly pristine like they all dropped whatever they were doing, got up and left instantly? Is it the simple, cartoonish but rather bland and frozen visuals that is somewhat reminiscent of the SM64 castle, which is the video game liminal space? Is it the default music, which is rather repetitive and spacious and calm? Is it how the characters are designed and animated, which is rather... lanky, clunky and weirdly uneven, and a little similar to the style Coraline and Don't Starve has?

It just... feels like somethings after these kids, hunting them and they have no idea. They just go around solving these simple puzzles and discovering cool stuff with their funky flying friends and it just climbs after them. I feel like something's gonna jump them from the doorways after they pass through or corners they don't look at. And GET them. Any second. And do things. Awful things. Eat them or kill them or make them dissappear or whatever.

I am probably looking into it with a gamers eye, searching for tropes and cliches to determine threat levels in the media I see. It is stupid. But it is also kind of fun to imagine. I guess I now get exactly why cartoon creepypastas are appealing to people.

[Il Palazzo]

It's been 8 years, man. The kids are young adults now, still trapped in that place. Two of them are doggedly clinging to sanity, desperately trying to solve their way out of the tower. The blonde dude succumbed to his inner demons couple years back. He's still alive, but no longer present. He stalks the corridors after dark, howling, scratching, growling. Hunting. The flying creatures scream horribly when they die. If the tower had no monster before, it has one now.