Given that it’s the month of Halloween,
let’s talk about a few characters that are a bit more horrific than others,
shall we?
Our next character is one of the
staples of Spider-Man’s rogues gallery, Dr. Curt Connors aka the Lizard. Connors
shares traits with Dr. Kirk Langstrom and Dr. Henry Jekyll, in that they’re all
brilliant scientists that took their research just a little too far,
discovered a formula that transformed them into horrific monsters, and ended up
ruining their lives. Smart guys have a habit of doing incredibly dumb things
when push comes to shove. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s get to it, shall
we?
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| He smells blood in the water. |
Dr. Curtis “Curt” Connors (Stan Lee
and Steven Ditko loved alliteration) began his comic career as a surgeon for the
US Army. He earned a name for himself by performing several emergency surgeries
on the battlefield. This career ended prematurely and terribly as an explosion
in the field severely damaged his right arm, which required the limb to be
amputated. After his honorable discharge, Connors became obsessed with discovering
how certain species of lizard’s regenerate and began researching the phenomenon.
In his home in the Florida Everglades, he was able to synthesize a serum from reptile
DNA. Connors used it to regenerate the limb of a rabbit, got really excited and
tried it on himself. Curt, buddy, in general it’s smart to perform a few more
tests before leaping to human testing. Just saying.
At first, the serum worked
perfectly. He quickly grew a new right arm. But there were a few unfortunate
side effects. Namely that the serum continued to rewrite his DNA, turning him
into a colossal lizard-man. In this form Connors became a berserk beast that
hunted on the everglades. Peter Parker found out about the Floridian lizard man
when he was challenged by Spider-Man hate enthusiast J. Jonah Jameson to get
pics of the beast. He traveled to Florida, and learned about Connors, his
family, and what caused the researcher to go full beast. As Spider-Man, Peter
was able to develop an antidote for Connors, tracked the Lizard, fought and
cured the good doctor. Unfortunately, he lost his new arm after the formula was
purged from his system. He briefly reverted to Lizard form a short time later,
but was saved by an old friend and colleague Professor Charles Xavier and his
X-Men. Ice Man cooled the Lizard so much that the Lizard went into hibernation
long enough for the science types on the team to make another cure.
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| The almost human face of the movie version is very uncanny valley. |
After two transformations into a rampaging
Lizard, Connors decided he needed a change of scenery. Connors and his family
relocated to New York City… I can think of no worse city for someone that has
turned into a horrible monster to live in. Just saying. Connor’s quickly
ingratiated himself with Spider-Man, often helping Spider-Man developing new
tech to combat his various foes. Connors did things like develop a cure for
Peter’s Aunt May when she was dying of radiation poisoning from an emergency
blood transfusion that Peter gave her, and to an acid to eat through Rhino’s
nearly impenetrable hide. He had to earn his keep somehow, as it quickly became
clear that Connors was always just one bad day away from transforming into the
Lizard again. Turns out, high stress and/or foreign chemicals can force Connors
to mutate again. Peter would then have to whip up a new cure and turn Connors
back again. Rinse and repeat. As time passed, the Lizard’s intellect seemed to
increase. He eventually developed a mind on par with his human form, and began
plotting to overthrow humanity by either making a new race of Lizard people,
either from scratch or from transforming the global population into Lizards. He
is always stopped by Peter and his amazing friends.
Dr. Curtis Connors was once a
gifted surgeon, but the lost of his right hand made that career impossible to
maintain. He’s since used his high intelligence to become an expert in genetics,
biochemistry, herpetology (study of reptiles, amphibians, and caecilians) and
physics. As the Lizard, Connors gets superhuman strength, speed, agility and
reflexes. He also gains razor sharp claws and fangs, and a massive, powerful tail.
He can also cling to walls like a gecko. His thick scales make him highly
resistant to damage, and his superhuman regeneration means that he’ll quickly get
over hits that land. He seems to be able to control other reptiles within a mile
of himself. This is either due to pheromones or a form of limited telepathy, it
seems to vary from story to story. The Lizard’s intelligence also varies. At
times he’s as dumb as a beast, other times he’s as smart a human and is able to
speak and reason. He’s almost never as smart as he is as Connors, but tends to
steal his human form’s research to further the Lizards ends.
The Lizard’s appearance varies from
story to story, but, in general his body seems to be based on monitor lizards
or iguanas. So massive, scaly, and occasionally with a sort of fringe on his
head. Others will mix in more human elements to make the Lizard seem more
uncanny and creepy.
Dr. Connors and the Lizard are two
of Spider-Man’s more recurring friend and foe respectively. Connors is often viewed
as a mentor to Peter, which makes his unwilling transformations all the more
tragic.
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| It all stemmed from a simple, all consuming desire to be whole again. |
Connors and the Lizard appeared several
times in Spider-Man: TAS. He was actually the first villain of the series,
appearing in the first episode Night of the Lizard. In it, the college
aged Peter Parker discovers that his science teacher was transformed into a monstrous
Lizard due to an experiment gone wrong. This Lizard is smart enough to use
Connors technology to develop his usual plan to turn the world into Lizards. The
Lizard kidnaps his/Connor’s wife, Margaret, to be the first of his new race of
Lizard people. Spider-Man swings in and saves the day. Connors is a supporting
character for the rest of the series, appearing in Tablet of Time, The
Ravages of Time, The Alien Costume pt. 2, The Final Nightmare, The Return of
Kraven, The Lizard King, and all three parts of Secret Wars. In that
last entry, Spider-Man and a team of heroes are fighting to save a world that
had been taken over by Earth’s villains, as part of a ‘test’ created by a being
called the Beyonder. Spider-Man and his allies are almost immediately attacked
by the Lizard. They’re able to subdue him and use the alien tech available to
them to awaken Connor’s mind in the Lizard’s body. Which must have been weird
for the scientist, just saying.
He appeared in The Spectacular
Spider-Man. He’s a professor at Empire State University, and mentor to
Peter and his childhood friend Eddie Brock. He’s introduced in the second
episode Interactions, and develops the usual Lizard DNA cocktail that lets
him regrow his arm. The formula seems to be thrown out of whack by an attack by
Electro. Or it seemed that he only started growing scales and such after
getting shocked by the deraigned Max Dillon. The next episode Natural
Selection shows him transforming into the Lizard. With the help of Connor’s
wife, Martha Connors, Eddie Brock and Gwen Stacy, they’re able to hit the
Lizard with the cure to turn him back into Connors. The Connors remain as
support characters for the rest of the series. That is until a number of
Spider-Man related accidence, the loss of the Venom Symbiote, Venom stealing a
vial of “gene cleaser” a perfected form of Curt’s Lizard cure, and such causes
the Connors to lose control of their lab to another scientist Miles Warren. The
Connors then move to Florida.
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| It's amazing how often Peter finds himself between a Rock and a Hard Place. Or in this case between Claws and Robotic arms. |
Curt Connors is introduced as an
engineer working for SHIELD in Ultimate Spider-Man. He has both arms for
the first season, but loses it in the first season finale when a rampaging
Goblin destroys the SHIELD Helicarrier. In the second season episode “The Lizard,”
Spider-Man and Connors discover a lab run by Doctor Octopus. There they
discover dozens of vials of animal-based formulas, including but not limited to
lizard, rhino, scorpion and vulture. Oh, I wonder if these animals will ever
come up again? Ugh, that amount of sarcasm actually hurt. Yeah, this is the one
time that Connors didn’t develop the Lizard formula himself. Super odd when you
think about it. Connors uses the lizard formula, both to regenerate his arm and
to help Spider-Man fight off one of Ock’s Octobots. Subsequent injections cause
him to go full Lizard. The Lizard, knowing that his time in this form is limited,
tracks down Ock to get more serum. Peter follows him and faces off against both
the Lizard and Ock, and is able to develop a cure for Connors. Connors is a
recurring character for the rest of the series. He transforms into the Lizard
again in the episodes The Sinister Six, Stan By Me, Return of the Sinister
Six, Lizards, and Return to the Spider-Verse pt. 1. I should note
that when he transforms again in Stan By Me, Connors seems to choose to remain
the Lizard at the end of the episode and runs off. This “failure” to save
Connors, in Peter’s eyes, haunts him until Return of the Sinister Six
where they’re able to cure Connors once again.
Curt Connors is a supporting
character in the Spider-Man Raimi Trilogy, he’s mentioned in the first
film, and is portrayed by Dylan Baker in two and three. In the second film, he
introduces Peter to his friend Doctor Octavius, and in the third is the scientist
that researches that Symbiote when Peter gives him a sample. The Lizard was on
the table to appear in Spider-Man 4, but that never came to be as Sony
and Raimi’s relationship broke down.
Both sides of Connors appeared in The
Amazing Spider-Man, portrayed by Rhys Ifans. He is a scientist at Oscorp
that is researching how to combine Human and Animal DNA to improve health. He
worked with Peter’s father, Richard Parker. He and Peter meet around when Peter
was bitten by the Spider. Peter discovers his father’s research notes and gives
it to Connors. Connors uses it to formulate a working serum. His superior, Dr.
Ratha, fires Curt when he refuses to rush human trials. Connors uses a sample
of the serum to regrow his arm, but then discovers that Dr. Ratha is going to
use the formula at a VA hospital. He chases after Ratha, fully transforming
into the Lizard on the way. He causes major damage to the Williamsburg Bridge,
which Peter intervenes in. The Lizard escapes and returns to normal in the sewers.
Connors works in the sewer, slowly being driven insane by the chemicals and growing
obsessed with perfecting humanity with his formula. He and Peter clash in the sewers,
where The Lizard finds out Peter’s identity when he finds one of Peter’s
camera. He attacks Peter at his school, but is forced to withdrawal when the
cops arrive. He then attacks Oscorp in an attempt to spread his formula across
the city. Peter and Captain George Stacey are able to stop Connors, curing him,
but The Lizard mortally wounds Stacey in the fight. Connors uses his last few
seconds with his regrown arm to save Peter from falling. He’s arrested and
taken to Beloit Psychiatric Hospital. A mysterious man arrives and asks Connors
if he told Peter the truth about his father. He says no, and demands that Peter
be left alone. The man disappears in a flash of lightning. No, the identity of
this man is never revealed.
Like Mysterio and Scorpion, The
Lizard has appeared in nearly every videogame featuring the wall-crawler.
Weird.
The Lizard and Connors are two very
good Marvel characters. As far as baddies go, he’s one of the most
understandable. When you break down his motivations to their base level, he’s
just trying to get back something that he lost. His obsession with getting back
his right arm leads him to some very dark places, but I think his fall is very understandable.
It starts with getting his arm back, leads to perfecting his Lizard form, to spreading
his “perfection” across the world. Each step seems reasonable until he finally
reaches the world domination phase. There’s a really good scene in The
Amazing Spider-Man where we see Rhys’ version of Connors raising his left
arm beside a mirror so he can see his “right” arm again. The movie itself is
incredibly flawed, but the scene is amazing at showing Connors pain. Or so I
think. Connors, like Langstrom and Jekyll, started out trying to improve himself
and ended up becoming a monster along the way. It’s rather sad, especially when
later versions of the character develop into one of Peter’s various mentors. Do.
Not. Become Peter’s mentor, it leads to death, becoming a supervillain, or both.
Just saying. We probably won’t see the Lizard again in anything live action for
a while, but there’s always hope… so long as Disney and Sony don’t get into another
pissing contest. Fingers crossed.
Twitter: @BasicsSuperhero
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