A staple of '80s adventure cartoon shows, the Small Annoying Creature is a type of Sidekick. The Small Annoying Creature is there to be cute, provide comic asides and occasionally get into trouble and need rescuing. Often a "merchandising critter" . Sometimes it's crossed with the Non-Human Sidekick. It frequently has a Verbal Tic - and truly obnoxious nails-on-blackboard voice talent. There was a time when even the most straight-faced of animated adventure serials had a Small Annoying Creature to provide a bit of slapstick in the background. Examples of Small Annoying Creature include: