The Amazing Spider-Man The Lizard - How does he compare with Spidey's other onscreen adversaries?

[<(o_o)>]

I’ll never understand The Green Goblin being ranked second by fans. Dafoe’s performance range, Dafoe’s character itself, his pverall creepiness/scariness, his relevance and testing of Spider-Man, his ultimate aims, the various layers of his character, it just blows Ock away in my mind. His connection to the Parkers, to Mary Jane and Harry, his impact on Peter’s life, his son’s issues, all just far more compelling than Ock. There was just more to him. Ock has one very good scene with Peter, and then he’s a generic mad scientist/supervillain the rest of the fil until he redeems himself. The only real edge Ock had was the action sequences, thanks to his arms.



I’m pretty sure that the lizards on the webbing was The Lizard controlling them in a sense.



Eh, the whole "Lizard army" would have been out of place when The Lizard himself wasn’t necessarily evil. He wanted to cure genetic imperfections, not enslave people or take over the world.

I also like that the Lizard wasn’t a one trick pony. He had multiple skills and methods of attack and defense. And
regeneration.

Oh, and I like the idea that we could potentially see him again.

Dafoe's Green Goblin was awesome but his costume not so much.

 

[Picard Sisko]

I actually didn't mind the Green Goblin costume. Wasn't that bad. Could have been better, but I'm not going to complain about it.

 

[The Joker]

Dafoe's costume, sub par action scenes, awful one liners, and his generic plan to make Spidey join him rank him below Doc Ock for me.

 

[Picard Sisko]

Dafoe's costume, sub par action scenes, awful one liners, and his generic plan to make Spidey join him rank him below Doc Ock for me.

But his generic plan definitely is better than The Lizard, that's for sure.

 

[The Guard]

I found the quality of both The Green Goblin and Doc Ock's visuals to be about the same in terms of comic book faithfulness and overall effectiveness.

They both had horrible one liners. Definitely think Dafoe handled his better.

 

[Picard Sisko]

Doc Ock had a few one liners such as "Butterfingers," but his character was so much better than Norman's.

 

[The Joker]

Green Goblin's plastic Power Ranger type costume didn't exactly water my eyes with awesomeness. Ock on the other hand was a visual treat.

"Butterfingers" was a great quote. Most of Ock's sardonic one liners were great. "Oh she'll be just fine. Lets talk", "You have a train to catch" etc. All good. But the likes of "We'll meet again, Spider-Maaaaaaaaaaan!!!!!" and "The itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout. Down came the Goblin and took the spider out" were cringe worthy.

 

[Octoberist]

Lizard felt like the 'villain of the week' despite his ties to Parker. But it's all backstory/foreshowing to future events, etc and not in the 'now'.

Goblin in the first Raimi wasn't perfect but he has enough ties to Parker and his relationship with son, to make his arc a bit more complex than Connor's.

 

[DawnWarrior]

The Lizard is an interesting case for a couple of reasons. The first thing I noticed was that Lizard stuck it out through the reboot; he was the most likely villain to appear in Raimi's Spider-Man 4 (having Conners already introduced in the last 2 films). Kinda like Scarecrow in the Batman movies that way.

The second thing is that having Lizard as the main villain may reflect the differences in how these things are decided since the first Spider-Man movie. Back in 2002, the mentality was usually "We have to use the biggest and baddest villain in the origin movie, just in case we don't get to make another one." Now, 10 years later when franchises are much more certain, it's shifted more to "we should use a lesser villain in the origin movie, so we can build up to the biggest and baddest villain in the 2nd or 3rd film." Here Lizard serves a similar function to Iron Monger, with Norman Osborn in the background for the bigger story later.

 

[JamesColemanII]

I think The Lizard was a poor choice, mainly because he is almost the same character as the Green Goblin and Doc Ock: a scientist whose hopes and dreams go wrong.

 

[WolfCypher]

I'd rank them, Movieverses, as such...

Doctor Octopus
Lizard
Green Goblin
...
...
...Spider-Man 3 never happened...

 

[Picard Sisko]

If they saved Lizard for a sequel, they could have really made him a deep character, introduce his family, and make longer action scenes. Didn't Connors have a wedding ring on his finger?

They could have at least showed his wife answering the door and saying "Curt, there is a boy named Peter here to see you" and just have her walk away, and show him interacting with his son Billy, maybe helping with his homework. So perhaps later in the film the Lizard would be going after his own family and Spider-Man would have to stop him.

 

[The Guard]

Green Goblin's plastic Power Ranger type costume didn't exactly water my eyes with awesomeness. Ock on the other hand was a visual treat.

It was a pretty intricate, well designed suit. The mask was good, ditto the glider and his weaponry. Ock's arms was a visual treat. His trenchcoat was pretty boring. I don't think one really has the edge over the other designwise.

"Butterfingers" was a great quote. Most of Ock's sardonic one liners were great. "Oh she'll be just fine. Lets talk", "You have a train to catch" etc. All good. But the likes of "We'll meet again, Spider-Maaaaaaaaaaan!!!!!" and "The itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout. Down came the Goblin and took the spider out" were cringe worthy.

"Butterfingers" is a great quote?

Are you serious?

It's incrediby cheesy, average dialogue, as are lines like "She'll be just fine", "let's talk" and "You have a train to catch". The last one is a pun.

"We'll meet again Spider-Man" is classic Green Goblin. "The itsy bitsy spider" was cheesy, but it creepy as hell. It's all about context.

And these are hardly all their lines of dialogue. The Goblin in general has more interesting exchanges, dialogue that explores the nature of heroism/villainy better, and is just generally a more sadistic and interesting villain characterization, thanks in part to the multiple personalities and those exchanges.

Octavius's best dialogue and character moments come in his talk with Peter Parker, and his call and response line, "The power of the sun in the palm of my hand". For the entire rest of the film, his dialogue is basically just exposition, as he's talking about his plan, or he's talking to his limbs, or the dialogue itself is just very, very average point A to point B stuff.

Oh, and let's not forget the untentionally silliest line ever.

"I will not die a monster!"

(He said, dying a monster)

I get what they're going for, but it always makes me giggle.

 

[DaRkVeNgeanCe]

I'd rank them, Movieverses, as such...

Doctor Octopus
Lizard
Green Goblin
...
...
...Spider-Man 3 never happened...

I would have to agree with this rating!

 

[FrostBite]

I just realized today, why is The Lizard in the film not a lizard? :|

Edit (I should probably elaborate):

A) He has shiny skin. (Amphibian.) Lizards have dry, scaly skin.

B) He seeks solace near water and swims extraordinarily well. Reptiles are generally averse to water and have adapted to survive in dry areas, especially lizards.

C) ...Are those salamanders responding to him and crawling into the sewer to meet their master? Or geckos? Geckos = again, not water animals. Salamanders are amphibians. Either way this is all sorta freaky-whacka-doo.

 

[Lord]

I didn't watch the film yet, but since the early stages of Spider-Man 4 that i don't find the Lizard as a good choice for a villain, allways tought that part of him wanting to turn humanity into lizards was a silly and chesy idea. However i decided to have more faith in him for the film, but from early reviews it seems like i was right in thinking he wasn't going to be a great villain.

 

[Smashlilman]

I just realized today, why is The Lizard in the film not a lizard? :|

They probably choose to give him a human face so that he could emote better facial expresion when he talked.

 

[FrostBite]

They probably choose to give him a human face so that he emote better facial expresion when he talked.

Yeah, my bad for not editing faster, I mean the whole fact that he's really an amphibian in almost every way and that doesn't make sense with the cross-species experiments he was running. Human face is fine, I'm not a snout or no snout fan.

 

[Smashlilman]

Yeah, my bad for not editing faster, I mean the whole fact that he's really an amphibian in almost every way and that doesn't make sense with the cross-species experiments he was running. Human face is fine, I'm not a snout or no snout fan.

Oh ok

 

[Abudefduf]

B) He seeks solace near water and swims extraordinarily well. Reptiles are generally averse to water and have adapted to survive in dry areas, especially lizards.

I have no idea what species Connors used for his experiment, but many lizards do love water: iguanas, basilisks, some monitors... not to mention the water dragons.

 

[Eddie Brock]

Either way this is all sorta freaky-whacka-doo.

Absolute worst line in SM1. Actually, that whole sequence is pretty lame, in general.

 

[Jordacar]

As I was watching the movie I suddenly realized how appropriate the Lizard is for the origin movie (as opposed to a sequel) because it makes sense that the radioactive spider and the lizard serum could come from the same batch of experiments.

 

[Picard Sisko]

Absolute worst line in SM1. Actually, that whole sequence is pretty lame, in general.

I disagree, I love that city montage. I love the guy singing "he dresses like a spider, he looks like a bug! We should all just give him one big hug... a look out, whoo! Here comes the Spider-Man!"

As I was watching the movie I suddenly realized how appropriate the Lizard is for the origin movie (as opposed to a sequel) because it makes sense that the radioactive spider and the lizard serum could come from the same batch of experiments.

That is an interesting point

 

[DACrowe]

As I was watching the movie I suddenly realized how appropriate the Lizard is for the origin movie (as opposed to a sequel) because it makes sense that the radioactive spider and the lizard serum could come from the same batch of experiments.

But Lizard is such a cool villain and he got shafted for the origin.

I think the best way still would have been to have the Lizard be a monster with half-intelligence/memories trying to cure himself while being hunted by Kraven. Thus Spidey has to save Lizard as they're friends (and for Curt's family) from himself and Kraven while also becoming a target of Kraven's to bury alive.

Oh well. I doubt Lizard will be used again in a movie, so I have to settle with what I got in this one.

 

[Eddie Brock]

I disagree, I love that city montage. I love the guy singing "he dresses like a spider, he looks like a bug! We should all just give him one big hug... a look out, whoo! Here comes the Spider-Man!"

It's so unbelievably, ridiculously forced. It's the perfect example of "tell, don't show" film-making.