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In the long history of cinema and television there have been a number of memorable creatures. Some have been friendly and some have been rather nasty. The imminent danger that certain characters pose is often fairly evident. For instance, one look at the creepy acid bleeding xenomorphs from the Aliens series or perhaps the vicious dinosaurs from Jurassic Park and you knew they meant business (as in the eating you alive type of business). A good rule of thumb for most any creature’s appearance is that if its existence in real life would make you s*** your pants then its clearly intended to be deadly.

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This is the last thing you want to see peeking in at you as you’re dozing off to sleep.

However, what about all those film creatures at the other end of the spectrum? You know, the “cute” and “cuddly” kind that one would think couldn’t hurt a fly. Well, we have compiled an interesting collection of four unlikely creatures which were seemingly innocent on the surface but were actually quite deadly.

4.

Mogwai

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If you are reading this and you happen to be in your early to mid-thirties, then chances are you wanted one of these as a kid more than you wanted to breathe. The creature pictured above is named Gizmo and he is a mogwai from the hit 1984 horror / comedy film, Gremlins. One quick recap of the flick and you’ll soon realize why mogwai were actually quite dangerous. Long story short, this 80’s popcorn flick was about a young man who received the strange creature from his father as a pet. If the narrative were to end there you’d think “okay so it was a story about a kid with the most awesome father in the world”. However, owning the Mogwai is actually a massive responsibility which entails a critical set of rules.

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Aww…rules make Gizmo very sad.

The instructions are as follows: Never expose the Mogwai to bright light, never get it wet, and never feed it after midnight. Okay so obviously the rules sound ridiculously lame and thus, by definition, they must be broken in the name of all that is cool.

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By “cool” we mean this.

One midnight snack / gross transformation later, and we’re rewarded with two movies worth of ever multiplying monstrosities known as Gremlins. Just How many are we talking about?

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Enough to fill up your lawn and sing Christmas carols infinitely better than the neighbor’s kids.

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More than enough to fill up your local movie theater.

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Or perhaps even enough to fill up the lobby of a major office building.

Sure the Gremlins may have had a sense of humor (a dark one that is) but that didn’t change the fact that they lived to cause chaos, destruction and massive property damage. Swarms of these little green abominations could (amusingly) obliterate major cities in no time. And to think all of that anarchy can originate from just one single mogwai.

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Aww…he’s doing that sad face thing again. Okay maybe the mayhem is worth it after all.

3.

Tribbles

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The numerous creatures surrounding Captain Kirk in the iconic image above are called Tribbles and they are the fluffy residents of the vast Star Trek Universe. Tribbles are purring little fur-balls who first appeared in the classic Trek episode, “The Trouble With Tribbles”. In the show they were depicted as gentle little creatures similar in appearance to guinea pigs, except without a noticeable face of any sort.

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They could easily be mistaken for giant cat hair-balls.

According to Doctor McCoy’s analysis the Tribbles only two purposes in life were to eat and reproduce.

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Octomom can relate.

Tribbles are known to use over fifty percent of their metabolism for reproductive purposes. Obviously such rapid and uncontrolled breeding can cause quite a dilemma under any circumstances, let alone aboard a starship that could barely contain the ego of its captain. It was also mentioned in the popular episode that the Klingons’ solution to the ecological Tribble menace was to simply obliterate their entire species. Apparently Klingon warriors were dispatched to hunt down and destroy every last Tribble in the galaxy. Talk about overkill. Regardless of the creatures potential for disaster, most folks adored them anyway.

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As Uhura checks out a Tribble, Checkov checks out Uhura.

2.

Fin Raziel

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Fin Raziel is a character featured in the 1988 fantasy flick, Willow. Or as kids today may call it “that old movie that’s kinda like Lord of the Rings”. The film starred Val Kilmer and Warwick Davis and was directed by Ron Howard and produced by George Lucas.

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Here’s the poster for those of you think we’re making this stuff up.

Despite the big names involved, upon its release the movie didn’t fare very well. However over the years it has gained a bit more appreciation, especially in light of the current fantasy craze. The flick is about Willow, a reluctant and unlikely hero who plays an important role in protecting a special infant from the evil Queen Bavmorda (which naturally demands an epic adventure). Fin Raziel comes into the picture when Willow locates her on an island where she was banished and turned into a rodent by the evil queen. Although Fin Raziel spends much of the film as a plucky talking fuzz-ball she’s actually a “powerful sorceress”.

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A powerful sorceress who likely needs her cage cleaned.

As the movie progressed, Fin was transformed into a few other animals before ultimately reverting to her true form. Once again human, Fin proceeded to kick some serious evil queen a**. Although her contribution has been debatable in the past, in this case we’ll give Fin Raziel her “propz” for severely softening up the lead villain and hilariously tossing her around her castle like a ragdoll.

1.

Ewoks

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For the zero people left on the planet who are unaware of what an Ewok is, allow us to waste everyone’s time with a brief review. The Ewoks are a furry teddy-bear species who first appeared in the 1983 Star Wars film, Return of the Jedi. The ultimate Star Wars geek may also quickly whip out his plastic light saber and obnoxiously inform you that they also appeared in two TV movies, 1984’s Caravan of Courage, 1985’s The Battle for Endor as well as a short lived cartoon series.

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Available NOW on Collector Edition DVD and Blu-Ray bi****s!

Despite their cutesy stuffed animal appearance, the Ewoks were quite the little warriors in disguise. Without even delving into the cheesiness of the previously mentioned Ewok TV movies we can gain a clear idea of the Ewoks lethal abilities simply from the Return of the Jedi film alone. So, where to begin?

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Wicket pointing a giant spear at Princess Leia was the first sign that the creatures weren’t all about teddy-bear picnics.

Basically in the film we saw the Ewoks pull off the impossible despite their size and the fact that you could sometimes see the zippers on their costumes. Things went particularly sour when the Ewoks initially took all of the movie heroes captive…

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In doing so they also completely stalled the plot.

A short while later the heroes were bound and readied for devouring by the crowd of hungry (but cuddly) forest creatures.

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We imagine Luke would taste stringy and Chewbacca would taste like horse meat.

Last but not least, after ultimately befriending Skywalker and his rebel pals they proceeded to help bring down “a legion of the Emperor’s finest troops” and thus somehow toppled the entire Galactic Empire. Indeed the saga ended with a bang…

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…By “bang” we mean it ended with Ewoks pouncing Stormtroopers with sticks and rocks.

Thus, you can see why the Ewoks made number one on our list. Although they cannot mutate into more vicious life-forms, endlessly pop out their young or maniacally wave around magic wands they did help save an entire galaxy. Consequently, they also managed to piss off millions of fan-boys simply by existing. That’s our not so secret reason they truly are number one.

Written by Anthony Quaglia – Copyrighted © www.weirdworm.net

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