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I feel I saw these creatures somewhere (in a movies or a TV series...) but I can't remember a single detail. Can anyone identify what they are?

Here's a drawing representation.

Sketch of eyeballs on vein/branch-like structures at the end; they are surrounded by eyelids, one is on the left looking up to the right top corner of a dark circular pattern; one on the bottom right is looking at the one on the left

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This is the 'Garden of Eyes' scene from Kubo and the Two Strings.

A character in armour wielding a bow and arrow floats underwater, 4 orange/yellow eyeballs on stalks rise from the and approach him; he looks worried

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  • So @omgtheykilledkenny the tick means that it was the eyes from Kubo that you were thinking of?
    – lly
    Jul 23, 2018 at 10:03
  • @lly - I would assume so. They created an account specifically to accept this answer
    – Valorum
    Jul 23, 2018 at 16:20
  • I never saw the movie but I somehow "recognized" the music... where else is it or s.th. similar used? I think it was also underwater...
    – Albin
    Jul 23, 2018 at 18:36
  • @Albin - ask that as a new question, perhaps
    – Valorum
    Jul 23, 2018 at 18:50
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    @Valorum just remembered: Star Wars: when they dive to the Gungan city... amazing how the mind works! :D
    – Albin
    Jul 23, 2018 at 18:53
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The classic form of this monster is D&D's

Beholder,

Dungeons and Dragons book cover featuring a character wielding a sword in the direction of a floating spherical character with a single eyeball int he centre
“The body of these creatures is a great globe about 3′ in diameter. Atop it are ten eye stalks, while in the center of the spherical body is a great eleventh eye. The body can sustain 40 points of damage, each eye stalk 10 points, and the central eye can withstand up to 20 points...”

which is so important to its mythos that it's one of the few baddies specifically claimed by Wizards of the Coast as their IP. That obviously hasn't stopped imitators like this guy:

A humanoid green figure stands wearing white and blue robes with a red cape; it's hands are held together in front of its chest; it has long thin neck leading up to a "head" which is just a big singular eyeball
“Greet with warm compassion; they will embrace our generosity. Revisit with stern warning; they will heed our genuine concern. Annihilate with great prejudice; they will serve as an example for others.”

They were presumably inspired, however, by monstrosities like H.P. Lovecraft's

Old Ones,

£ sketches of some eyeballs on stalks; the first shows the eyelid completely closed; the second open with a darker iris and the third open open and more human looking
“Those in shallow water had continued the fullest use of the eyes at the ends of their five main head tentacles, and had practiced the arts of sculpture and of writing in quite the usual way—the writing accomplished with a stylus on waterproof waxen surfaces.”

described in At the Mountains of Madness.

Apparently, long before that, Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay "Nature" included a section about a

"transparent eyeball"

that caused Christopher Pearse Cranch to draw this

A creature walks along a barren landscape; the creature has two long longs leading up to a small body on which sits a singular large eyeball roughly the same size as the body; it wears a suit and top hat
“I become a transparent eye-ball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or parcel of God.”

c. 1837, apparently based on a misunderstanding of what transparent means.

That said, especially in reference to film, any gentleperson of taste and sophistication would more quickly recognize it as

the Guardian

Prop of a floating head; it has a grimaced wrinkly face surrounded by many small eye balls
“A Guardian. What it sees — Lo Pan knows!”

from Big Trouble in Little China.

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    I think a floating ball with a big central eye & a number of smaller eyes on stalks is sufficiently different from a humanoid with a single eye on a stalk as a head, that Breachworld will be safe from WotC's lawyers.
    – Adeptus
    Jul 23, 2018 at 7:29
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    @Adeptus: Oh, sure. I included that guy just because the art is so good, honestly. Even Big Trouble in Little China's Guardian is different enough because it has two eyes. All the same, I think the Beholder's importance to D&D role-playing popularized the creepy-eye monster more than anything else. You're welcome to find earlier horror-movie-of-the-week examples, though, if you can.
    – lly
    Jul 23, 2018 at 10:01
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    Heroes of Might and Magic III has a great version of Beholders too.
    – user428517
    Jul 23, 2018 at 15:54
  • @ell beat me to it. heroes3towns.com/towns/dungeon/NWC_11.jpg
    – DickieBoy
    Jul 23, 2018 at 16:51
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The core of the planetary parasite Axos from Doctor Who ("The Claws of Axos," 1971) resembles a floating eye on a stalk.

Axos core; interior of some being; a skin coloured stalk comes down from the top into a spherical shape with an eyeball like structure: a reddish outer with a green inner covered in a translucent layer

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Could this be The Floating Eye of Death from The Aquabats?

The floating eye: it is a singular eyeball surrounded by the skin eye lid, below which are red "tentacles"

It also reminds me of Omi the Dianoga from Star Wars.

Omi: a fleshy red stalk of a creature rises from the bottom into a single eye ball of red and green

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The Aquabats vs. the Floating Eye of Death! is the third studio album from American band The Aquabats, released on October 26, 1999. Here's the cover album:

Album cover with a pink background and yellow spiral through it; the band members and a car appear on it at random locations as well as the large eyeball with long tentacles out of the bottom

It also reminds me the alien twins Bwelelyang and Bob from the movies Men In Black, but they don't shoot beams, as I remember.

Agents J, K and Zed stand in the centre of the MiB head quarters surrounded by various lab coats with experimental weapons on the walls; in front of them are the alien twins working away at a console: they are tallish creatures with an octopus leg like top which through the centre is a long stalk with a yellow eyeball on the end

There's also an animated series, but the design is not the same:

The twins from the MiB animated series as described above work away at a portable machine

Note that the movie version looks like Elder Things from HP Lovecraft, but with no wings.

Six feet end to end, three and five-tenths feet central diameter, tapering to one foot at each end. Like a barrel with five bulging ridges in place of staves. Lateral breakages, as of thinnish stalks, are at equator in middle of these ridges. In furrows between ridges are curious growths – combs or wings that fold up and spread out like fans. . . which gives almost seven-foot wing spread. Arrangement reminds one of certain monsters of primal myth, especially fabled Elder Things in the Necronomicon. —H.P. Lovecraft, At the Mountains of Madness

They are a lot of different interpretations of the creature. You maybe have seen one with a big eye... Here is one illustration, but each artist delivers something different from this description:

Elder Thing: a devilish creature stands on 6 crab-like legs, it has 4 similar arms with one holding a skull; it has bat-like wings coming out of its back; the head consists of multiple small mouths and multiple small eyes on stalks

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They’re Demon Eyes from Terraria. They fly around bombing you and shooting you, etc

A male character stands in a forest holding a weapon, on each side of him and at the top a demon eye is flying towards him; they are blue and white with red tentacles trailing behind them

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This is possibly the monster from Cybersix, episode 9: "The Eye" (1999):

In this episode, Von Reichter sends José one of his newest creations to test out, a small floating eyeball which grows larger as it sucks out people's souls. José nearly takes over the entire city until he loses control of it, leaving it up to Cybersix to save the city and take the monster down.

Cybersix giant floating eye monster: it is pinkish and fish shaped: the eyeball itself is green and black. The creature flies over several characters in the foreground and some buildings

The visual effects in the episode are similar to the drawing.

Shooting destructive beams (at 137 seconds):

Absorbing souls (at 269 seconds):

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    Your YouTube videos are dead.
    – TheLethalCarrot ♦
    Jul 31, 2020 at 11:13
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Could be the aliens from the "Moonstone" episode of the original The Outer Limits.

Gif showing the eyeball like creatures emerging from the depths; they are dark and surrounded by eyelash like things all the way around

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To add to the other answers, it also made me think of the one eye monster called Ocula in Small Soldiers (1998).

enter image description here

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  • The answer has already been found and accepted. There's little to no point adding an answer after the fact. People are divided on the issue so I won't vote to delete alone but I am tempted to because we know this isn't what the OP was looking for. Personally I think this would be better suited as a comment.
    – TheLethalCarrot ♦
    Jul 31, 2020 at 12:52
  • I can't post an image in a comment, thats why it's in an answer, but feel free to delete it.
    – LeaG
    Jul 31, 2020 at 12:53
  • [Images can be posted in comments.](https://i.stack.imgur.com/cJTQA.jpg) Images can be posted in comments. Just use normal link formatting like that.
    – TheLethalCarrot ♦
    Jul 31, 2020 at 12:55
  • Sorry, my bad, I didn't know that.
    – LeaG
    Jul 31, 2020 at 12:56
  • No worries, the site has quite a large learning curve, you'll pick things up as you go.
    – TheLethalCarrot ♦
    Jul 31, 2020 at 12:58
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They may also be the Atraxi from Doctor Who, from "The Eleventh Hour" episode with the Eleventh Doctor.

The Doctor stands on a bridge in front of an Atraxi; a large white eyeball twice the size of a human with a blue iris projecting a hologram of the Earth between the two

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