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Miscellaneous
Landstriders
Performed by: Hugh Spight, Swee Lim, Robbie Barnett (1982)
Appear in: The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance | The Dark Crystal
Tall and long-legged forest creatures who can run pretty fast. Gelflings used them as mounts, and the Podlings of Kira's clan taught her how to communicate with them.
- Artistic Licence – Biology: It's rather difficult to think of a reason evolution would select for such large, heavy creatures to walk on such long, spindly, pointed legs. Subverted when you realize this could easily be the result of gelfling domestication, like all the problems with fragile horse legs.
- Faster Than They Look: Kira warns Jen to hang on when riding them, because they're really fast.
- Fragile Speedster: While less powerful than the Garthim and unarmored, Landstriders compensate with speed and intelligence. Their slashing blows can cripple a Garthim before said Garthim realizes that it has been attacked.
- Gentle Giants: They're not aggressive by nature, although they have a strong protective streak.
- Horse of a Different Color:
- Kira summons them to get her and Jen faster to the Crystal's castle.
- The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance shows them as the standard mounts for Gelflings of the Vapra clan and Gelfling guards of the Crystal's castle, possibly for ages.
- Mix-and-Match Critters: They have strange projections that resemble rabbit ears that appear to be extensions of the scapula, four long legs, catfish-like barbels and a proboscis-like organ (possibly a stinger) that unfurls when in battle. They also squeal like zebras.
- La Résistance: According to canon, Landstriders were among the first beings to turn against the Garthim after they began terrorizing Thra and seem to be the only creatures of Thra who can hold their own against the Garthim for any length of time.
- Sacrificial Lions: The two Landstriders who carried Kira and Jen to the castle perish in the fight against the Garthim.
Nebries
Appear in: The Dark Crystal
Nebries are large amphibious creatures that inhabit the swampy regions of Thra.
- Fantastic Livestock: Nebries are large, tame animals farmed for their meat, skin and milk in a manner similar to cows.
- Gentle Giant: Adult Nebries might look big and intimidating for someone the size of a Gelfling, but they're actually peaceful creatures.
- Mix-and-Match Critters: They appear to be a mix of toad and slug.
- Monster Is a Mommy: Inverted in that, while intimidating, Nebries are not aggressive and, after the Nebrie that lifted Jen out of the mud scares Fizzgig away, her two infants surface on either side of her and begin to feed with her on plants. Heartbreaking because the scene then fades straight to the Skeksis feast, where a roast baby Nebrie is served.
Nurlocs
Appear in: The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
Giant worms who live in the caves of Grot.
- Artistic Licence – Biology: It's very difficult to think of a real reason why a creature would need this many eyes (especially considering that the majority of them are obstructing each other's vision most of the time), even a Starfish Alien. And even if there was a reason for them to line the creature's body instead of being bunched up on the head like normal, making them all point forwards anyway would defeat the purpose.
- Bizarre Alien Biology: They have several eyes, all at the end of tentacle-like limbs.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: The Darkening makes the normally friendly nurlocs aggressive and voracious toward anything that moves nearby. It gets so bad that they start eating the Sanctuary Tree.
- Horror Hunger: For some reason, the Darkening seems to affect nurlocs differently from other creatures of Thra, acting not just as a Hate Plague but also as a massive appetite stimulant.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Deet knows them well enough to find their aggressiveness unusual. It turns out it's because of the Darkening.
- Red Eyes, Take Warning: The Darkening renders them Brainwashed and Crazy, and turns their eyes purple.
- Sand Worm: More like giant alien earthworms.
- Sensory Tentacles: They appear to have eyes at the end of tentacle-like limbs.
Peeper Beetles
Appear in: The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
Eye-eating bugs the Skeksis use as punishment for their own kind. One of them is used on skekTek the Scientist for letting Rian escape the Crystal's castle.
- Being Tortured Makes You Evil: Eats the eyes of living things at the first opportunity mostly because the Skeksis deliberately keep it starved so as to make it ravenously hungry.
- Big Creepy-Crawlies: Big enough to be scary when crawling on a Skeksis' head.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: What they're used for to punish Skeksis who have (as the Chamberlain puts it) "misbehave". He makes it quite adamant to Gurjin that they're a Skeksis-only punishment, never to be used on Gelfling...but that at the same time, that if this is what Skeksis reserve for their own, Gurjin should really consider what they'll do to him.
- The Dreaded: Just mentioning them is enough to make the Skeksis gasp, and skekTek in particular to start whimpering and pleading for "anything but that!" When we finally see one, it doesn't disappoint.
- Eye Scream: They're particularly fond of eating eyes. It explains why skekTek had to get a mechanical eye.
- Fluffy the Terrible: Goofy googly eyes aside, what they do is absolutely terrifying, and yet they have such a goofy name as "peeper beetle."
- Meaningful Name: Named after what it eats.
Armaligs
Appear in: The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
Pillbug-like creatures the Skeksis use as the wheels of their carriages.
- Artistic License – Engineering: They don't seem to be provided with axles to rotate around, which not only means that they are being squeezed under the full weight of the carriage, but also that they should be producing an unworkably massive amount of friction with the covers they rest under. One might wonder why the Skekses didn't just use ordinary wheels and then have it pulled by some harnessed landstriders.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: The Skeksis send electric shocks from the carriage to make the poor armaligs roll.
- Be the Ball: They curl up to form a ball then roll, allowing the Skeksis' carriages to move.
Fizzgigs
In General
Appear in: The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance | The Dark Crystal
The Fizzgigs are small furry creatures who live in the forests of Thra.
- All Animals Are Dogs: They're pets to Gelflings very much the same way dogs are to humans. Deet even befriends and pets one shortly after she ventures out of the Caves of Grot, although its friend calls it away from Deet.
- Be the Ball: They can form a ball with their body and roll around to move faster.
- Cute, but Cacophonic: They bark in loud bass shrieks.
- Cute Creature, Creepy Mouth: They look like balls of fur with a mouth full of sharp teeth.
- More Teeth than the Osmond Family: We get a full view of all a Fizzgig's teeth when the one from the 1982 film roars in anger.
- Nested Mouths: They have extra rows of teeth at the back of their mouth.
Fizzgig
Performed by: Dave Goelz
Voiced by: Percy Edwards
Appears in: The Dark Crystal
Kira's pet.
- Canine Companion: He is Kira's "dog" basically, following her everywhere she goes.
- Disney Death: Upon heroically biting the hand of skekUng the Garthim-Master when the latter tries to grab the shard of the Crystal, he gets thrown in the pit beneath the Crystal by skekUng and seems done for... Fortunately, he fell on the armature of the reflector that skekTek used to drain Gefling and Podling essence with the Crystal and holds onto it. Aughra then spots him and saves his life with a pitchfork.
- A Dog Named "Dog": Retroactively. As of The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, the whole species is now named "Fizzgig", which makes the trope apply to the 1982 film's creature since Kira simply named him "Fizzgig".
- Hair-Trigger Temper: He's quick to get angry over the slightest things and he's prone to throw temper tantrums.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He may act like a jerk towards those he's not familiar with and throw tantrums, but he does deeply care for his owner Kira and later Jen.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: His excitement at being reunited with Kira causes her and Jen to be spotted by the Skeksis in the Crystal Chamber.
- Undying Loyalty: Even performs a Heroic Sacrifice to try to save Jen.
- Volumetric Mouth: Opens his mouth as big as his body when roaring out of frustration after Kira tells him he can't come with her on the journey to the castle.
Baffi
Performed by: Dave Goelz
Voiced by: Dave Goelz
Appears in: The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
An eyepatch-wearing Fizzgig, and the companion of Maudra Fara of Stone-in-the-Wood.
- Big Damn Heroes: He jumps on skekOk during the second battle of Stone-in-the-Wood, bites the Skeksis' hand and harrasses him for daring to attack Maudra Fara. Sadly, Fara had already been mortally wounded and dies shortly afterward, but at least he spared her the indignity of going out like that.
- Canine Companion: Maudra Fara's "dog", basically.
- Eyepatch of Power: Wears one.
- Volumetric Mouth: By no mean Played for Laughs unlike the 1982 film's Fizzgig. He roars in grief after the death of Maudra Fara, opening his mouth the largest he can doing so.
