Crypt TV Monster Universe: Continuity and Theories 2/4

 This is ENTIRELY SPOILERS!!! 

There are depictions of GORE and MONSTERS!!!

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!!

Crypt Fables

    The Crypt Fables is their own mini-series, with only a few of the stories having connecting plots but all are a part of the Monster Universe.

The Little Mermaid

There are some minor similarities between her as a mermaid and the fish creature from Marco Polo. Also, in Sunny Family Cult S1, there is a vague homage to Marco Polo with the pool scene. Between the two it introduces fish/aquatic monsters into the Monster Universe. 

Left: Little Mermaid. Right: Marco Polo.

Rapunzel

Rapunzel and her zombie boyfriend.

    She gets her own Black Arts symbol, and her creation of a zombie is very similar to how Shelley and Oliver became zombies. 

Left: A Brief History of Black Arts book. Right: symbol on the book.

Mira Mira

Left: Mira Mira. Right: Mira with her face mouth open. 

 

   Of course this is a play on words "Mirror Mirror" or "Magic Mirror". The original short film kept the creature looking the same once she escaped and also depicted other creatures left in the darkness behind the mirror. Though the lore slightly changed for the Facebook series, it is close enough. The appearance could also be dismissed as the woman seeing Mira Mira’s true form because she is in the mirror, since we never see Lizzie’s perspective looking out from inside the mirror world in the series. 

Sandra trapped inside the mirror with other creatures.

    In the series it is a very specific mirror that Mira Mira is cursed or bound to. 

Mira's mirror in the series.

    Yet in Camp Monster the monster camp counselor drops lore papers about Mira Mira being turned into a monster because of the torment fragments. So it is possible that like the torment fragment glows in the water that creates the Woe Bones from Water’s Edge, a torment fragment might be affecting the mirror, making those who get trapped there for too long become Mira Mira. 

Mira lore page from Camp Monster

Kinderfanger

    Kinderfanger is German for "child snatcher" and is based on the Pied Piper. This is another short film that spawned a FB series that created slightly different lore. In the original, being deaf meant that you couldn’t hear the Kinderfanger’s song, but in the series it was magical enough that deaf people could hear it. Additionally, the original seemed to have ALL of the kids flock to the Kinderfanger, while the series focuses on the neglected, abused, or unwanted ones. It is also given its own symbol. 

Left: Kinderfanger symbol in a journal.
Right: Kinderfanger symbol drawn on a wall.

    The Kinderfanger is a skeletal piper who controls children and hypnotizes them through music and black smoke. I’m assuming that whatever the Kinderfanger’s origin is, it resulted in the torment fragment becoming the bones of the Kinderfanger’s pipe flute which it stores as its sternum. It seems to be only killed by its own bones or its flute and makes Olivia become the new Kinderfanger by stabbing it with its sternum bone flute. It appears that some of the Kinderfangers host’s ideals remain as Marcus who the old Kinderfanger had disposed of was brought back to life by Olivafanger. 

Kinderfanger playing its flute

    The sunny family cult symbol, the brute and birch symbols can all be seen multiple times. 

Left: SFC symbol. Center: Brute symbol. Right: Birch symbol.

    My theory: I theorize that all or mostly all of the Crypt TV monsters want to multiply and spread, but they are limited in how they are able to. For the Kinderfanger, I think it feeds on the children’s pain and suffering existing in the children like a hive mind with the possibility of turning any one of them into a new Kinderfanger. 

Geppetto

    Fairly straight forward reference to Pinocchio, a wood carver made a puppet to house the soul of his deceased son Silas. But it is evil and demands a life for a life.

Silas the wooden boy

Cheshire

Cheshire

    This is a reference to the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland, though it has an evil clown color scheme. Not much connection besides Cheshire being included in Carrie’s journal in Water’s Edge, and a reference to a mind control monster on the Monster Fight club wall, though that could also be a hypothesis that Micah has about the leader of the Sunny Family Cult. Though the list of Monsino locations that Carrie found had a clown symbol in the same area as Micah's "Mind Manipulator?" note. 

Left: Cheshire in Carrie's journal.
Center: Mind Manipulator from Micah's wall.
Right: Clown symbol on Monsino map.

Knave

    Also known as the Queen of Hearts, basically a boy that becomes so obsessed over a woman that he becomes a knight in blood splattered armor. He does use the symbol of the heart, which he smears in blood on his victims before killing them. This could also be a reference to Cupid from Valentine’s Die (NOT part of the Monster Universe) who kills people with heart shaped arrows, though unlikely. 

Left: boy marked with blood heart on forehead.
Right: Cupid's warning in closing credits of Valentine's Die.

Jacquelyn Torne

    The Terrible Tale of Jacquelyn Torne is not quite a fable and therefore isn't part of the Crypt Fables series, but is part of the Monster Universe and is more of a nursery rhyme:

Peter, Peter pumpkin eater,

Had a wife but couldn't keep her;

He put her in a pumpkin shell

And there he kept her very well.

Left: Jacquelyn Torne pumpkin monster.
Right: Jacquelyn possessing a girl who summoned her using a Jack o'lantern. 

    Since Jacquelyn is considered part of the Monster Universe, I would say that the Jack o’lantern is her symbol since it is used in the ritual to summon her. Also, the name Jacquelyn Torne is a parallel to Jack o'lantern. 

Jack O’Lantern

    This short (NOT part of the Monster Universe) starts off with a kid smashing a jack o’lantern for there to turn out to be a spiral carved on the back. This could be an alternate symbol for Jacquelyn.

The spiral carve into the back of jack

     Fun fact, Uzumaki means spiral in Japanese, which is why the spiral is on the back of Naruto's jacket. It came to mind because he always wears orange and the pumpkins are orange.

Naruto Uzumaki clan symbol.

Jack Attack

This is another pumpkin related short NOT part of the Monster Universe but I wanted to include. Basically, eating pumpkin seed causes pumpkins to sprout inside of a boy, his babysitter and the dog. The pumpkins swell and tear their way out of their bodies. 

Pumpkins spilling out of the babysitter

Camp Monster

    In Camp Monster it introduces the torment shard, which is used to turn a boy into a pig monster called The Mauler. Transformation type is likely due to the psychology of the person infected, as the boy was called “piggy” before turning. It is also implied by the plot of trying to locate the used torment fragment, that the same fragment used to turn someone into a monster can be used to turn them back human again.

The Mauler

    Eva from camp grows up to be the same Eva from Troubled Youth and uses the torment shard in some manner to turn her friend Katie, who was the girl picked on while holding a green monster or cactus stuffed animal into Fluffy.

Left: Young Eva holding a torment shard.
Right: Katie holding her stuffed animal.

    Mira Mira is seen on a document in Camp Monster, and is implied to have been a human transformed by the torment crystals. Additionally, there are other papers of a deer skull with the Birch symbol, possibly a reference to the Mordeo/Elkridge Falls forest. 

Left: Mira Mira. Right: elk skull + Birch symbol above skull.

    The camp itself is called Camp Willowdale, like the Willowdale school for slashers from My First Day and Willowdale Elite from Shelley. Suggesting not only that the camp is used for training to fight monsters, but that the councilors likely have or have had access to the crypt tome. Not to mention that Eva, Katie, and everyone else at the camp might already have a disposition toward murder and killing. Though difficult to verify which councilor, the actress who played Shelley is listed as an extra and the wiki claims she had a cameo appearance as one of the councilors. This could mean that Shelley was also part of Willowdale before she was murdered and brought back as a zombie.

Camp Willowdale sign

Troubled Youth

Fluffy’s official symbol for the canceled Monster Fight Club NFT game.

“The sheep becomes the wolf. The meek turning to madness. A crimson maw stretched wide ready to rend flesh from bone.”

    Note that the background of the symbol image is a chalk equation on a blackboard, indicating its attacks happened at school. Also how the symbol itself looks like a frown turned upside down.

    Fluffy’s appearance is similar to the green stuffed animal Katie held in Camp Monster. Even the name “Fluffy” could be a reference to the fluffy stuffed animal and not simply because of the dog-like nature. 

Left: Fluffy the monster. Right: Katie holding her stuffed animal.

    The crypt tome makes an appearance on the library shelves. This is possibly how Eva learned how to turn the torment fragment into some kind of elixir to transform and control Katie/Fluffy.

Left: Crypt Tome. Right: Teenage Eva holding elixir.

    There is also a posting of the newspaper article about the 13 poisoned in Harbor in the library from Look-see S1. 

Thirteen Poisoned newspaper clipping

Friendship Bracelet

Besides being another slasher, Julie and her “friends” seem to attend Journey High, the same high school and color scheme as Eva's cheerleader uniform in Troubled Youth. The events in this movie likely occurred before Fluffy’s rampage in Troubled Youth. 

Left: Friendship bracelet. Right: Journey High yearbook.

Stoneheart  

    Aponi’s spirit is bonded to a person or the Stoneheart statue, later on only the head of the statue or a mask remains. Both the statue’s face and broken sword are referenced in the crypt tome. I find it interesting that the Stoneheart statue carries some similarities to Blind Justice, with a sword in one hand. Aponi seeks vengeance or justice for those who are wronged and abused. Yet, the statue is broken and deformed, just like Aponi’s sense of justice.

Left: Stoneheart. Right: Stoneheart broken sword.

Blind Justice statue

    Also, Aponi herself doesn’t use a sword like her statue, but instead uses a staff. There are depictions in the crypt tome of a silhouette with similar horns and someone being burned alive at the stake, possibly portraying that Aponi was burned alive for witchcraft, and that is how she became a monster.

Left: Aponi. Right: Page from the Crypt Tome

    Aponi’s symbol isn’t as obvious as others since it takes the form of a ritual diamond shape that is then surrounded by rocks.

Left: Aponi symbol before rocks are added. Right: My recreation of the symbol.

    A news report about Fluffy’s attack on the school in Troubled Youth is shown on TV in Stoneheart S2. It is said of a “local” highschool, Journey High, meaning that Stoneheart might be in the same town as Fluffy.

Fluffy's news report.

    The counselor from S2 has a Sunny Family Cult tattoo on his wrist likely indicating that Roger has sent members of his branch of the Sunny Family Cult to collect or create the monsters found in the book needed for his ascension ritual found in the crypt tome. He appeared to be trying to help transfer Aponi from Rebecca into Abigail or Jessica. It seems like the reason Abigail and Jessica couldn’t receive Aponi directly from the Stoneheart statue head was because it was awakened with Inessa’s blood in the original short video, who is Rebecca’s sister. So it needed similar blood for Aponi to transfer into her as an initial host instead of the statue. 

Councilor's SFC tattoo

    The final monster from Stereoscope (original short film) is drawn on a page in Stoneheart S2. Implying that it is possible that the boy, Troy Nowak, can see between the barrier of worlds, and thus might see Aponi when she attacks. Alternatively, it is possible that Troy is Angela's baby grown into a teenager from Stereoscope. 

Troy's drawing of Stereoscope man

Witchcraft

    Though this was a super short video and NOT part of the Monster Universe, I decided to include it because of how different rituals are performed in the Monster Universe. It also brings up its own symbol of unity, though yet unknown if it also represents a monster. 

    Here is a fun bit of extra trivia for you. This symbol was also used as the mark of the witnesses in Supernatural S4 E2 (Are You There, God? It's Me, Dean Winchester) where ghosts were branded with this and forced to appear and exact revenge as part of breaking the seals to release Lucifer from his cage in hell. 

Left: Dean Winchester's drawing of the Witnesses brand.
Right: The Witnesses brand.

Left: The Witnesses brand as shown in Bobby's book of Revelations.
Right: The Witnesses brand as drawn by Anna the fallen angel. 

Learned that this symbol is called Funtumfunefu Denkyemfunefu from the Akan African Religion meaning "Conjoined Crocodiles" and is indeed a symbol of "Unity in Diversity".

Funtumfunefu Denkyemfunefu

Morgu

Morgu demon above the girl that summoned it.

    There is a doll that looks like Giggle the Clown, but she hasn’t been in any shows yet and has only been confirmed to exist in the monster universe. Giggle the Clown also appears in several of the closing rundowns of various Crypt TV videos.  

Left: Giggle the Clown doll. Right: Giggle the Clown.

    Not much connection other than the ritual is a little witchy like Stoneheart/Aponi. Morgu is also summoned using a ritual, however, hers uses five other yet undetermined symbols. Surprisingly, those symbols and the pentagram itself bear striking resemblance to Tim Burton’s 1999 Sleepy Hollow in which the pentagram was used as a protection symbol, hinting that the girl wants Morgu to protect her. 

Left: Morgu ritual. Right: Book of witchcraft from Sleepy Hollow.

Left: Protection circle from Sleepy Hollow.
 Right: Artist recreation of the protection circle. 

    Another random Supernatural symbol connection. The bottom cross bears striking resemblance to the hook man’s (S1 E7: Hook Man) cross symbol he carved in the wall and was on his hook. Additionally, it was in Elisa Ivanov's notes from the Puppet Master movie series. 

Left: Drawing of Hook Man's hook with the strange cross.
Right: Hook Man's blood carving on wall.

Strange cross in Elisa's notes from Puppet Master: Axis Termination or Blade: The Iron Cross 

Update: I finally discovered the name for this cross symbol, it is the Jerusalem Cross and is often depicted with smaller crosses or +'s as the dots between branches. 

The Chosen

    This short film brings in a new creature called Riju that is summoned using severed body parts like building blocks to construct her new body. However, she demanded the blood to be spilt to be that of family members, and only one of her cultists fulfilled that requirement and got to survive her rebirth/birth. Since the survivor's name is Velma, and she looks a little like Velma from Scooby Doo, this could be an alternate Velma Dinkley in the Monster Universe.

Riju

Riju ritual corpse pieces.

Left: Velma from The Chosen
Right: Velma from the live action Scooby-Doo movie

Neighbors

    Neighbors is about a couple who are serial killers, inspired by a book they might have been reading as part of the Willowdale school curriculum. However, they turned out to be demons. This might mean that they WERE the deadly duo back in 1983. 

Left: The 1983 Midnight Moon Massacre book.
Right: The couple in their demon forms.

    They turned their peeping tom neighbor into a fortune telling machine called: The Tempted. It reminds me a bit of Silas from Geppetto.  

Top: Corpse puppet.
Bottom: The Tempted label.

Three
    This is just an honorable mention. Three is NOT technically part of the Monster Universe, however, since Satan or Lucifer or whatever demon that is being called on in this Crypt TV short film has its own symbol, I want to include it here as part of the witchcraft section. 

symbol used to talk with Satan

Soot

    Soot is another monster with a fairly basic symbol, though in this case, it is a symbol that changes from a half circle representing the fated death being broken, into a full circle and the end of the circle of life. When marked with the symbol, death occurs when it is a full circle. The deaths are reminiscent of how the injury was obtained.

Left: Half circle wound.
Right: Full circle closes upon death.

    Drawings of this creature have been seen randomly including: in the crypt tome, as a tattoo on Roger, and as doodles of paper in Action Academy's principal's office in Shelley S2, Carrie's journal in Woe Bones, and Kane hospital closet in Hospice.

Soot

    Theory: Here is a really random theory that occurred to me while trying to count Soot’s horns. Most representations of him have seven horns, 4 on one side and 3 on the other. So if, by some weird coincidence, he were to represent 7, are there other numbers? 1/0 for the Brute because his symbol looks like a 1 inside of a 0 like he is the first and the last, the monster to beat all monsters and first through the door in the woods. 2 might be Mordeo for its two horns. 3 Kinderfanger for the three marks on its symbol. 4 for Aponi for her 4 horns. 5 for the Morgu’s pentagram. 6 for Cakeman with his 6 finger candlesticks, 8 for Miss Annity’s legs. 12 for the time on Look-see’s locket. 

Splintered

    This monster seems to have splintered off from a boy’s psyche after his mother was killed. Though his father seems to blame himself for the monster's appearance. However, it more likely was feeding off of the family’s trauma and father’s PTSD from his time in the military. 

Splintered poking his head through a door and standing at the top of the stairs.

Milk and Cookies

Walter’s official symbol for the canceled Monster Fight Club NFT game. 

“Naughty or nice, youth is the most delectable spice. He’ll swallow you whole and spit you up as a lump of coal.”

    Note that the background of the symbol image has snowflakes for Christmas. Also the symbol is basically the same as the one used to summon Azazel in Supernatural S2 E1: In My Time of Dying. Fun tidbit, Azazel means Scapegoat (the one blamed for everything). 

John Winchester summoning Azazel to make a deal.

    Walter is an interesting Krampus like monster where it is unknown why he is wearing such an obvious fake nose. It is also apparent there was a change of lore between the first and second short films. In the first one, the girl was naughty or behaving badly and was going to receive the piece of coal, while in the sequel it changed so that he turns the kids into the piece of coal by eating them.

Walter

Left: Coal is labeled "For Cristal"
Right: Coal is marked with a "K" for Kenley

Birch symbol on Christmas Ornament.

Alice from Hospice is the contact on the business card in Walter’s Revenge.

    On Delaney’s "Operation: Milk & Cookies" plan board there is a clipping from The Daily (the news paper from Harbor where Look-see takes place) about 4 missing children, and a clipping from The News News where it says in the corner “Sexy Tree Monster Fights Off Bullies” a reference to Birch and “school for serial killer children” half covered along the top as a reference to Willowdale the school for slashers in My First Day. 

Left: The Daily with 4 missing children and a picture of Harbor High's gymnasium.
Right: The News News Monster Santa article. 

The Birch

The Birch’s official symbol for the canceled Monster Fight Club NFT game.

“Roots run deep. Protector. Predator. The Twisted Mother who kills to keep. All she asks is everything.”

    Note that the background of the symbol image is a birch wood bark.

Left: Birch symbol. Right: The Birch

    The Birch is also known as the Silver Lady in the FB series. In the series they keep the summoning montra, “For he who makes me, I shall come. He who breaks me, shall come undone.”

Birch totem and instruction book

    I do like how the series created lore of how Lanie became the birch, having natural druidic powers she passed on to her daughter, but also how she was burned, scarring her skin to look more like bark. The dynamic of feeding on blood to both keep Birch and her daughter alive reminds me of a mix between vampirism and the movie The Ruins, where the plants infect and parasite off people. 

    Theory: I theorize that The Birch is an entity or type of monster that spreads only to specific people, possibly in a druidic bloodline, as Laniebirch gets killed and her daughter essentially becomes or forces Evie to become the next Birch.

Evie bound in wood, cradling baby Laura (Lanie's daughter)

The Thicket

Left: Thicket man. Right: Thicket totem + symbol.

    The Thicket is NOT technically part of the Monster Universe. This creature isn’t directly connected, but it does bear many similarities with The Birch where there are wooden totems hanging from trees used to summon a monster to make a deal or sacrifice. In this case, the sacrifice of the girl's sister so that she can walk again. 

Mister Sandman

Left: Mister Sandman in a child's diary. Right: Mister Sandman

    Even though Mister Sandman isn’t listed as part of the Monster Universe, it seems to fit in just fine, especially since it is a 2 episode series. This creature even gets its own symbol. 

Mister Sandman sleep pentagram

    The symbol is a pentagram, much like Morgu, but with swirls, bringing to mind falling or blowing sand, but also the old nightcaps like Scrooge would wear in A Christmas Carol. This is also reminiscent of the Mimic which has a nightcap like floppy head.

Crypt TV Mimic with its head silhouette.

    I mostly decided to include the Sandman because it makes an appearance at a “Flamingo” cabin or camp in 1989 and could possibly be at the same Willowdale Camp from Camp Monster.

Flamingo Cabin

Dream Screechers

Dream Screecher

    Dream Screechers can only be seen with the use of a drug called somnidyne made by Monsino which was previously seen in Girl in the Woods, Fight Night, and Taste: Feed Freaks. They use a happy green monster inside a triangle for their logo. If a triangle is indeed a symbol of The Reek or the barrier between worlds, then this could be a reference to how the monsters and Monsino supplies are collected from other worlds. 

Somnidyne with a close-up of the Monsino logo from Taste

    It is possible that the drug acts as a temporary partial door to the plane of torment, and that the Dream Screechers are the only ones that can be seen with use of the drug, much like how the Stereoscope allows viewing into alternate coloured worlds, this drug allows access to a purple world. The purple crystals also imply that these creatures might grow torment fragments on their bodies, or that they were once human before torment fragments transformed them into Dream Screechers. 

Stereoscope purple world.

    Theory: I personally like the idea that the drug creates a shared dream state and the monster is a living nightmare that only exists in their dreams. 

Dread

    Dread is controlled by a key with torment fragments embedded in it. The possessor says  “Cross the Dread, Bleed the Red” to command Dread to kill their target. The woman who possessed the key threatened Dread with it, likely how torment fragments can be used to kill monsters. However, there is still the question, if this is a key, what does the key open?

Dread's Key

Mohawk

     Mohawk or Estelle is a ghost-like monster that manipulates chains to kill. 

Estelle

    In Fight Night she teleports leaving purple dust behind, possibly indicating that she was turned into a monster using torment fragments. 

Estelle teleporting in Fight Night

    The residents of the town of Mohawk have these devices almost like pagers. My theory is that they emit some kind of frequency that prevents Estelle from appearing within their proximity. Since Estelle was captured for Fight Night, it also seems like these residents work for Micah.

Mohawk resident device

Town of Mohawk

    The residents also seem to purposefully sacrifice people to Estelle, either as a cult to monitor her, employees of Monsino investigating how Estelle became Mohawk, or possibly working for Micah explaining how Estelle was captured for the Fight Club. Though it is likely the children of the town don’t fully understand, it does imply that the Mohawk Scouts from Mordeo might have known about the existence of monsters before their encounter with the Mordeo. 

    Theory: It would be an interesting twist to the Sunny Family Cult plot if Estelle was the one who was prophesied in the ritual not Taylor, and that Estelle had already performed it to become the Mohawk. However, I like a Monster Universe with more monsters and not less, so I do prefer the idea that Taylor and Roger both become monsters. A good middle ground for this would be if Estelle failed or possibly blinded herself to keep from completing the ritual for her “Roger” equivalent. Or, alternatively, like how the Mordeo ritual can be completed multiple times, maybe Estelle completed the ritual before, and Taylor is completing it again to become a similar monster. If so, I wonder what monster Estelle's "Roger" became.

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