Lord of the Flies

Well it’s based off „The Pied Piper (of Hamelin)“ Story.
If you don’t know it short version: Set in the middle ages; a town was plagued by rats, a pied piper came and told the town he‘d rid them of the rats for x amount of gold, town folks agreed; he takes his magic flute and the rats follow, he crosses a river and all the rats drown. But when he asks for his payment they refuse to pay the agreed on amount. So one night he plays his flute and all of the towns children come out and follow him, never to be seen again.

The interesting thing about this is that the town really had a mysterious disappearance of (I think it was)130 children in, don‘t quote me on this but sometime in June 13-7something. The towns ledger started a few years later and laments the loss of 130 children. The town had a window in the church which also talked about the missing children. Even in ledgers of nearby towns it’s written that on x day x amount of children where lost. But nowhere does it say why.
So of course it’s been a source of rumors and speculations. There are some who say that it must have been something the town felt guilty about; there supposedly was a drought during that time so some think that the kids where sacrificed in nearby hills; or drowned in the river; the most accepted answer by historians is that they just left to emigrate to other places;
The rats and piper parts where added sometime in the 1500s.

Today the town fully embraces the Pied Pieper/Rats Version. They have a theater play in the historical center of the town that I believe is every two weeks on the weekends during the summer time - for free, for the tourists. It’s actually really good.

Of course this has nothing to do with the show other than that the show obviously was inspired by this story.
They had a bad smell in town, ‚Mr. Pfeiffer‘ gets rid of it, doesn’t get paid, takes the kids away...
Of course, for the kids, no denying it, it also has Lord of the Flies elements