This article contains spoilers.
Yesterday we took a look at the five scariest moments in Netflix’s “The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance,” a prequel series that certainly doesn’t shy away from the darkest and scariest aspects of Jim Henson and Frank Oz’s 1982 film. In fact, “Age of Resistance” is significantly darker than the film, sure to give a whole new generation of kids terrifying nightmares.
It’s not until the final episode of the first season that the series introduces the Garthim, the most terrifying monster from The Dark Crystal. In the film, the crab-like creatures help turn the tides in the Skeksis’ war with the Gelflings, ultimately being used to wipe out nearly the entire species. But some time before that, “Age of Resistance” gives us their origin story.
And it’s far more horrifying and disturbing than we ever could’ve expected.
You probably always assumed that the Garthim was an existing creature on Thra that the Skeksis put under their control, but “Age of Resistance” reveals that to be quite untrue. In the final moments of the final episode of season one, it’s revealed that the Skeksis actually created the Garthim from scratch, an existentially terrifying hybrid of two different species.
“Age of Resistance,” which opens up the world of Thra in many magical and darkly sinister ways, introduces the spider creatures known as the Arathim and also another new species called the Gruenak. We meet two Gruenak in the prequel series, diminutive little creatures who are held captive by the Skeksis. The Skeksis literally sew their mouths shut and turn them into slaves, and watching them bumble around and attempt to speak is one of the most genuinely upsetting aspects of the show. But it’s what they’re ultimately used for that’s most disturbing.
When they attempt to revolt, the Skeksis Scientist throws one down into the fiery pit beneath the Dark Crystal and beats the other to death with a hunk of metal. Blood sprays all over the face of a nearby creature, looking on in horror. At this point in time, the Scientist has a dead Arathim lying on a table, determined to bring it back to life as a slave soldier. And it’s after he kills the Gruenak that he comes up with the twisted idea of fusing the two carcasses together – Arathim and Gruenak – to form his true masterpiece: a brand new creature he calls Garthim.
Yes, the Garthim is a monster made up of the combined corpses of the Arathim and Gruenak. “Age of Resistance” conjures up a body-horror nightmare with the origin story of the movie’s most destructive monsters, which we’ll certainly never be able to look at the same way again. It’s easily the most disturbing new wrinkle that the Netflix prequel adds to the mythology of The Dark Crystal, retroactively working to make the 1982 film more terrifying than we ever realized. Those aren’t crab monsters. They’re dead slaves grafted onto spider bodies.
There was always great darkness in the world of Thra. But “The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance” brings it to the forefront and pulls no punches staying true to Jim Henson’s vision.
Henson always felt, we must remind, that fear was a healthy thing for children to experience.
