Lizard (The Amazing Spider-Man)

Lizard When you try to fix people, there are always consequences. Gender: Male Type: Lizard Guy Crazy Monster Ugly CGI Lizard Species: Human Portrayed by: Rhys Ifans Status: Alive Media of origin: The Amazing Spider-Man

Curtis "Curt" Connors, also known as The Lizard, is a major antagonist of Marc Webb's The Amazing Spider-Man duology, serving as the main antagonist of The Amazing Spider-Man and also serves as a supporting antagonist of the 2021 Marvel Cinematic Universe film Spider-Man: No Way Home. He is a former associate/friend of Doctor Richard Parker and the mentor/friend of Peter Parker who took a serum embedded with lizard DNA to regrow his missing arm. However, the serum not only granted this but also turned Dr. Connors into a lizard-humanoid.

Nine years later, Connors, while being stuck as the Lizard, was accidentally transported to the MCU through space and time from a spell performed by Doctor Strange, where he teams up with supervillains from other worlds, to continue his plan to turn everyone in the Earth-199999 into Lizard-people like himself. Connors is eventually cured and sent back to the point he was pulled from his universe, which creates a branched timeline in which Connors likely gets a second chance.

Lizard Qualities

1. To start with, the Lizard's design is pretty bad as he looks more human-like than lizard like due to bad CGI, even the Goombas from the 1993 movie Super Mario Bros looked as bad and he doesn't wear his lab coat like his other counterparts. It would have looked better if they gave him a lab coat.
2. While Curt Connors is great, his other self Lizard, acts like a generic and one dimensional villain.
3. His goal is to mutate everyone in New York City into reptilian humanoids, so as to change human life and create a world without weakness.
4. His Lizard form isn't seen until halfway through the movie.
5. Once he becomes Lizard, he starts by attacking the bridge, throwing cars with people in it, so he can kill Ratha. Thankfully, Spider-Man stops him and saves everyone.
6. When Peter tries to catch him in the sewers, Lizard ambushed him and even wounds him, but manages to escape.
   • Also, the way he finds out that Peter is Spider-Man when he leaves his camera behind with his name on it was pretty stupid.
7. He attacked Peter's school for no other reason than to stop him from interfering with his plans.
8. When he gets attacked by a SWAT team, he easily defeats and mutates them into similar lizard-like creatures. He also transforms bystanders into lizards.
9. He destroys Peters web shooters and killed Captain Stacy when trying to help Peter.
10. He was underutilized in No Way Home, as not only he gets less screen time, he has no real motivation and didn't having meaningful interaction with anyone besides Electro, not even to his own Spider-Man, and gets redeemed with no real reason other than to get cured.
    • He gets captured by Strange offscreen before Peter is tasked with finding the other dimension-hopping villains, and doesn't even enter Happy's apartment to research cures with Peter and the other villains.
    • The moments when he does get involved in dialogue are mostly Played for Laughs due to everyone's collective surprise that he can talk and because the others think he just wants to turn people into lizards for the Evulz.
    • Lizard's motivation goes from wanting to turn people into lizard-people like himself because he believes it's the next step of evolution to doing it just because, even offering to augment Electro by turning him into a lizard despite the fact that he's already greatly enhanced by his power set.
    • Once all the villains escape thanks to Green Goblin, Lizard attacks and throws Peter into the building, warning him of his earlier threats of the consequences of helping people.
    • Unlike the other villains who got radical redesigns (with the exception of maybe Doc Ock), his design is the same from The Amazing Spider-Man, just with some small changes.

Connors Qualities

1. To be fair, Dr. Connors' goal of his desire to heal his arm is entirely understandable. He seems to be a genuinely good man, only working for the shady Norman Osborn. He only becomes the Lizard when his lizard-based serum is slated for public testing without his consent.
2. Connors becomes acquainted with Peter since he was friends with his parents and their intergenerational friendship isn't depending on Connors knowing Peter's parents. He even saves Peter from falling off the building after he gets cured.
3. Rhys Ifans did a good job portraying him.
4. The Lizard's fight scenes with Spider-Man were really cool and amazing.
5. Despite being underutilized, it was still good to see him again in No Way Home, as his interact with Electro was decent, and they redesigned him to be more reptilian like.
6. Some fans may like him.
7. The part in The Amazing Spider-Man where he mostly reverts back to his human self and saves Peter from falling is quite nice and it's sad that he loses his arm again. Furthermore, Connors even feels guilty and remorseful because of all the things he did as The Lizard, even if it's unintentional.

Trivia

• The Lizard in The Amazing Spider-Man is missing several key features that he usually has in the comics, such as a snout and torn clothes (usually a white lab coat and purple pants). Marc Webb has stated that Lizard lacks a snout because Rhys Ifans is using motion-capture to play the character, and he believes that Ifan's emotions would have been lost if a snout was present. The clothes were also removed to give the character a more realistic look. Though he is seen wearing a lab coat a few of times in the movie. The Lizard's appearance is also based off of the original Lizard design by Steve Ditko, which also lacked a snout.

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