The creature first appeared in the Mandalorian Season Two episode "Chapter 11: The Heiress," which was directed by Bryce Dallas Howard, written by Jon Favreau, and first aired on November 13, 2020. The creature appears near the end of the episode and approaches Grogu. According to animation director Hal Hickel, the production considered reusing a creature from earlier in the episode, but it was decided that a more threatening creature was needed.
Although the creature is not named in the episode, it was called an "octo-crab" during production. A similarly-named octo-fish was previously mentioned in the 2017 novel Aftermath: Empire's End.