my personal pick for most underrated animal is the european legless lizard, which i think is often taken to just look like a normal and rather plain snake, but if you're familiar with reptile anatomy at all it looks more like some sort of bizarre heraldic fantasy creature than basically anything else on earth

They are so uncanny valley to me, partially because of how they look, but moreso because of how different handling them is from actual snakes.

If you've held a snake, you probably know that, for the most part, they're good at holding on to you. They're pliable and you can bend them around pretty easily. They grip onto you on their own. An excellent experience, overall.

These guys are rigid as HELL. They're covered in these scales called osteoderms that have bone in them, and it makes them STIFF. This makes supporting them comfortably much more difficult, especially because you need to support these guys specifically at their hips.

Also, one of their main defenses against predators that have caught them is to death roll and twist their bodies. So if a legless lizard does not want to be held, it is going to put in a GOOD deal of effort to roll out of your hands and probably fall to the ground.

They can also drop their tails, which is nerve-wracking.