Sinlak Beetles

The Sinlak beetles are a tough, non-sapient species best recognized by the hard shells encasing their bodies. Each one runs about the size of a large dog, moving on six legs and topped by a pair of small antennae, its green armor plating broken only by two golden eyes. For all their fearsome reputation, the creatures behave gently and simply, unbothered by strangers, to the point that Allen the Alien can scoop one up and carry it around without trouble.

The beetles crossed paths with the Viltrum Empire during one of its conquest campaigns. Because a compound locked inside their shells posed a rare biological hazard to Viltrumites, the Empire branded them a threat and ordered their extermination. Nolan drew the grim assignment but spared a number of them, and those survivors later fell under the wing of the Coalition of Planets. Coalition scientists harvest and refine the substance from the shells to forge darts, handing their forces a genuine edge in combat against the otherwise near-unstoppable Viltrumites.

No single beetle is named, the species standing instead as an endangered collective valued for its biology. The key trait is the shell compound itself, which strips away Viltrumite durability and leaves even the mightiest of them open to injury once exposed. The source comics handle the idea differently, casting the beetles as ravenous agents of ecological collapse deployed to spread the spores of the invasive Klaxus plant, whereas the show simply builds the lethal compound into the creatures' own bodies.