Directed by Cagan Irmak, Creature is based on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, one of the earliest science fiction novels ever written in the world. The story of Creature follows the quest of a boy named Ziya, who gets obsessed with the concept of bringing a human back to life after he comes across a book that was banned by the authorities, known as the Book of Resurrection. So, let’s find out what Ziya ends up discovering and what fate has in store for him.
Spoiler Alert
What did Ziya find out about Professor Ihsan?
From a very young age, Ziya had a desire to explore the unknown, and his father, Muzaffer, at times got scared seeing his curiosity as it reminded him of an old friend. Muzaffer knew that, just like him, his son was also going to be a great physicist one day, but he also knew that too much skepticism and restlessness to make a discovery could lead him to a dark path. Creature transported us to a day and age where myths were prevalent in society, and people believed in them more than they did in science. Ziya lingered somewhere in between, and he knew that not all myths were mere figments of imagination, but some of them were actually true.
Ziya was very young when he came to know about the Book of Resurrection, and he became obsessed with the entire concept. The fact that a person could be brought back to life was probably the most fascinating theory Ziya had ever come across, and even after being a man of science, his heart was not ready to believe that it was a complete hoax. Around this time, Asiye also came to stay with Ziya’s family, and both the kids shared a very close bond from the very beginning. Asiye understood Ziya’s passion for research and discovery, and she never stopped him from chasing his dreams, but she did remind him at times to not get over his head and forget his morals and principles. Ziya used to help his father in his clinic, so even before being admitted to medical school, he knew a lot about his field.
Ziya went to Istanbul to join the medical school, but it turned out to be not a very nice experience for him overall. He got robbed on his first day in Istanbul, and then at school, one of his teachers, Suleyman, scolded him for speaking out of turn and trying to argue with him. Ziya realized in the first couple of days that the medical school would stunt his growth and not give him the freedom to do his research. Around this same time, Ziya met Professor Ihsan, who didn’t have a good reputation in society. Some called him a madman, and some thought that he was a genius, but the fact was that Ihsan had been fired from the medical school because the authorities didn’t like his way of teaching. Ziya had started working in Hamid’s shop, and after doing his investigation, he realized that Ihsan was up to something. Ziya knew that if his guts were telling him the right thing, then he had to make the professor agree to take him on as his apprentice. Ziya wanted to know what Ihsan was hiding in his house, and so one day, after getting bit by a rat, he went to Ihsan’s doorstep, and he told him that bubonic plague was spreading in the entire area, and he was probably infected too. Ziya spent the night at the professor’s place, and that’s when he got to know that the professor had a copy of the Book of Resurrection and using it, he had constructed the entire machine that brought a person back to life. Ziya knew that now he just had to convince Ihsan to team up with him and conduct the experiment on a human being rather than an animal.
Was Ziya Able To Resurrect Ihsan?
Ihsan told Ziya bluntly that he didn’t want to work with him and be a part of his madness. Ziya’s obsession was pretty evident on his face, and Ihsan didn’t have a good feeling about it. Ziya talked about leaving a mark on the sands of time and being remembered as a great scientist, but that was something that didn’t attract Ihsan anymore. Yes, a part of him was like Ziya, who wanted to explore and discover, but he didn’t have the same fervor as Ziya did, and more importantly, he was not ready to go to any extent to realize his dream. But Ziya forced him and told him that he had buried the Book of Resurrection someplace far away, and if he didn’t work with him, then he would never know where it had gone.
After much convincing, Ihsan finally came on board, as he believed that no harm would come from experimenting once. But things didn’t turn out as Ihsan and Ziya would have expected them to. Ihsan and Ziya had decided to use a fresh corpse for their experiment, and one day, when the latter was off to the village to bring fresh blood, a tragedy happened that changed the entire course of the narrative. Ihsan was inside his house working on the machine when lightning struck, and the house caught fire as there was gunpowder scattered on the floor. Ziya came back to find out that the professor was no longer alive. But surprisingly, not a scratch had come to the machine, and Ziya took it upon himself to bring the professor back to life. Ziya worked like a madman and conducted the experiment, and in the end, he was successful. The unimaginable had happened, and Professor Ihsan came back from the dead.
Why Did Ihsan Leave The Circus Company?
Though Professor Ihsan had come back to life, Ziya realized that there was something really wrong with him. Apart from the fact that he looked terrifying with that burnt face, he couldn’t speak, he didn’t remember anything, and he also couldn’t understand whatever Ziya was telling him. He was like a ghoul, a creature who had risen from his ashes but had no soul in him. Ziya didn’t know what he should do, so, like a selfish person, he ran away from Istanbul, leaving Ihsan to his fate. A man named Vasili came across Ihsan, and he took him to his circus company. Vasili saw how much strength Ihsan had, and he realized that he could make use of him in his circus.
The circus consisted of such misfits and outcasts, and in their performance, they let the people ridicule them because they had realized that belittling others gave the people a lot of sadistic pleasure. Ihsan wasn’t looked upon as an abomination by the group, but they loved him, embraced him, and considered him to be a part of their family. It was love that healed Ihsan, and very soon, he got his voice back and started to remember things. His memory was like bread crumbs scattered over the entire area, but slowly, he collected them and realized who he was. But then, one day, tragedy struck again when the local authorities came to trouble the circus people, as someone from the audience had gone and told them about Ihsan. Ihsan always wore a mask, but one day, a little kid took it out in front of the whole crowd, and the people started running away, calling him a ghoul. In Creature episode 6, the police came, and, unable to find the performers in violation of any law, they went after Marike, who had been a sex worker in the past. One of the police officers was about to shoot her when Huseyin, one of the members of the circus, shot him. Vasili and others told Ihsan to run away, as they knew that if the local authorities conducted a crackdown, they wouldn’t leave him alive. So once again, Ihsan became homeless, though he was grateful for all the love that he had received from the circus members.
Was Ihsan Able To Resurrect Esma And Ziya?
In Creature episode 7, Ihsan met someone very special in his life at a very unexpected moment when he had lost hope in humanity and had no sort of expectation from the world around him. One night, after running from the circus, Ihsan hid in a barn that belonged to a woman named Seher. That old woman was giving shelter to a pregnant woman who had nowhere else to go. Esma was a beautiful human being, and she had faced her share of torture, and that is why probably she understood how it felt to be in pain, to not being able to express yourself and hide from the world around you. Such was the tragedy of her life that she was running away from her own people. Her cousin had impregnated her, and now her people want to kill her because she was branded as a characterless woman. Ihsan fell in love with her, and Esma, too, accepted him in her life. Ihsan believed her to be an angel, as nobody else could have loved a man who looked like him.
Meanwhile, Ziya had reached his home, and after quitting medical school, he decided to marry Asiye and start his new life. But he didn’t know that very soon, a storm was going to come that was going to destroy his castle of dreams. Esma’s family found her, and they shot her dead before Ihsan could stop them. Ihsan knew that he had to find Ziya now, as only he had memorized the Book of Resurrection and had brought a dead man back to life. Ihsan took Ziya with him, and he told Asiye that if he agreed to do whatever he said, then he would leave Ziya alive. On their journey to Ihsan’s house, they had to cross the snowy mountains, and that’s when they bumped into the tribesman, who believed in the myth of a treasure being hidden beyond those mountain peaks.
When Ziya’s health deteriorated because of extreme conditions, Ihsan left him in the camp with those men who were searching for gold. They gave him warmth, and to show them gratitude, Ihsan brought the treasure to them. He asked the leader, Captain Omer, to distribute it among themselves and also requested that he give a small share to the old woman, Seher, and Esma’s newborn son. The captain agreed, but a fight broke out between the members of the group as they didn’t want the captain to have the largest share. Ziya was accidentally shot in the crossfire and died on the spot. Ihsan was never able to resurrect Ziya or Esma, and he surrendered to his circumstances.
During Creature‘s ending, Ihsan sat amidst the snow-covered forest, with Ziya on his lap, and froze to death. Hence, it ended the great quest of both the genius scientists, and it led them nowhere but to their fateful end. Asiye was given the letter that Ziya had written for her, in which he had told him to move on in life and be happy in case he didn’t return. As promised, Captain Omer delivered the gold coins to Seher, and he wrote down the story Ziya had narrated to him. The encounter with Ziya and then Ihsan had left him thinking about what it meant to be alive. He didn’t know if they were both right or wrong, but he knew that they had lost everything while trying to solve the mysteries of this universe. Muzaffer and Asiye’s life was also turned upside down and they would probably live with the regret that they couldn’t save their beloved Ziya. Probably, someone else, at some point in time will once again get to know about that Book of Resurrection and go on a quest to find out if the elixir of immortality exists or not, but the people who witnessed it knew that immortality was nothing but a bane, and no one should destroy their lives by going on a similar quest.
