Do you think The Lizard was a poor villain choice for "The Amazing Spiderman" movie?

[thrdthu]

I was at my LCS and saw some of the new toys for Lizard today and have watched some of the new trailers and let out a sigh with the path that I knew they were going with Curt Connors today. See, the Lizard is being given his humanoid face, for those of you who don't know, but will have the rest of him look like a lizard. What is the significance of this? This allows them to CG the actor's face onto the lizard so that the actor can emote as the beast and not just as Curt Connors. Often one would think that would be to give sympathy to the beast to play the whole "Doctor Jekyl/Mr. Hyde" theme of the character, but in terms of the movie, especially after seeing the newest trailers, it will be to allow Doctor Connors o basically pull a Willham Defoe Green Goblin and be completely evil and megalomaniacal. This is not Curt Connors as a character and it makes me think that he is NOT the best villain for this movie reboot.

Now, barring the characters we have seen before, who do you think would be a good villain to appear in a Spiderman movie? Note that Kingpin can't be used as his movie Liscence is owned by 20th century Fox as a Daredevil chracter. Personally I think Kraven the Hunter or Mysterio would make AMAZING villains for a reboot movie to start things off, especially since both characters represent that kind of pride that Peter had at the beginning of his career. Kraven would be able to show Peter that he isn't as indestructible as he thinks he is with his powers and make him feel deflated as a hero when confronted with a, basically, normal person. Mysterio would be able to reflect Peter's showboating and demonstrate a mirror for Peter to look at who he was before Uncle Ben's death and where he is now as a sense of empowerment. Both of which could have very personal reasons for fighting Spiderman with Kraven going to hunt as Spidey becomes more of a myth and with Mysterio wanting to just show the city that he is the greatest effects artist of all time which eventually leads to him fighting Spidey.

What do you guys think?

[CyberHubbs]

I'm thinking he'll be much more Doc Ock in Spider-Man 2 than Defoe's Green Goblin.

[Kevinroc]

Raimi had been setting us up for The Lizard but it never came to be. Oh well.

The Lizard's an okay Spidey villain. Not one of my favorites. But I think they're going to follow a kind of Nolan-Batman model and have a more "minor" villain as the villain in the first one (and Ra's is a more "minor" villain in comparison to The Joker) before setting up The Green Goblin for the sequel.

At least Curt Conners is the kind of guy Peter looks up to and respects. I can actually picture a mentor/student relationship sorta akin to the relationship Peter had with Doc Ock in Spider-Man 2 (but a bit darker here).

[CyberHubbs]

I'd say the Scarecrow was far more minor than Ghul. The latter at least connected to Batman's origin in the movie.

[Kevinroc]

I'd say the Scarecrow was far more minor than Ghul. The latter at least connected to Batman's origin in the movie.

Both Ra's and Scarecrow pale in comparison to The Joker. Just as The Lizard pales in comparison to Norman Osborn.

[Chris N]

I think Lizard was the right choice. Your concerns about his face being wrong are valid, though. Let's hope they do Curt justice.

[Chris N]

Raimi had been setting us up for The Lizard but it never came to be. Oh well.

The Lizard's an okay Spidey villain. Not one of my favorites. But I think they're going to follow a kind of Nolan-Batman model and have a more "minor" villain as the villain in the first one (and Ra's is a more "minor" villain in comparison to The Joker) before setting up The Green Goblin for the sequel.

At least Curt Conners is the kind of guy Peter looks up to and respects. I can actually picture a mentor/student relationship sorta akin to the relationship Peter had with Doc Ock in Spider-Man 2 (but a bit darker here).

The Spider-Man movies did this as wel, though. They had him fight Green Goblin in the first movie, saving Spider-Man's main villain for the sequel.

[Kevinroc]

The Spider-Man movies did this as wel, though. They had him fight Green Goblin in the first movie, saving Spider-Man's main villain for the sequel.

I think these folks look at Norman as the "big villain" because they've set-up Gwen Stacy as a major character for this film franchise.

[Therion]

The Lizard is maybe the best choice... he was the opening bad guy in TAS from 94 and Spectacular toon (yeah, Vulture and Electro fought Spidey first but it was designed as a mini movie with the ending of the first story arc dealing with Lizzy... Lizard has pretty much showed up in every cartoon over the years with the same "feel" to him... Green Goblin cartoon outings were pretty meh until Spectacular, imo....

Can't see Kraven or Mysterio (among others) working that well as main villains on their own (neither was Sandman) for a film, maybe if someone was pulling their strings (Kingpin, but it probably would have to be Gobby)

[CyberHubbs]

Lizard also connects Peter to Oscorp through his experiments.

[Will.S]

Not to me, the previous movies kept building on Curt Conners but they never got to do anything with it so it makes a lot of sense to use the Lizard from the outset.

Plus you get the cool visuals of him in the sewers and his threat level tends to still be pretty high. Granted, I'm not a HUGE fan of the character or anything but I do think he's a lot more refreshing to use after the big ones like Norman and Doc Ock were already done.

[Xenon]

Nothing wrong with Lizard conceptually as a villain. In a lot of ways, he's a better movie villain than most because he has the personal connection to Peter Parker. While you certainly dont' HAVE to havve that, it's easy drama, and all of the previous Spider-Man movies did the same thing. Doc Ock they made a connection for so they could get the same reaction, same with Sandman. Now, that's not to say that they'll handle him right. Or that they won't make a mistake or something won't be wrong with his face. But just the idea of USING him seems solid to me.

As for the original Spider-Man movie using the Green Goblin, I think that's a matter of they were trying to get everything into that one Spider-Man movie. Sure, NOW we plan our superhero movies in trilogies, but Spider-Man's success was never guaranteed. I think a lot of the decisions of that first movie were designed to give us THE Spider-Man story so that if it failed, it'd still be able to stand on its own without much trouble.

Fast Forward Ten years, and we're in a completely different place as far as superhero movies go. Now they can take the time. And since they really seemingly are aping the Dark Knight trilogy heavily, Goblin is the SECOND movie villain so he can kill Gwen.

Of course, since he was brought up, I think Mysterio would make an amazing Movie villain. His first appearance is a solid sequel plot (frame Spider-Man for a bunch of crimes then get paid to take him down). And his story in the 60s is both a spectacular tale and a good set-up for his final confrontation (have him kidnap Gwen or something). His mastery of illusions and robotics gives him the ability to be in several fights without having to make up excuses for him to escape. Honestly, outside of villains that have a personal connection or an easily established one, Mysterio is the best choice in his Rogue's gallery for a villain.

EDIT: Actually, I take that back, you could do a pretty good Kraven movie using Kraven's last hunt as a template of sorts. But you'd have to deviate pretty heavily to make it all work.

[Kevinroc]

I actually think The Jackal would make a great villain for the third movie. And it would keep up with the whole "mad scientist" that Lizard and Goblin exhibit. (Plus its a way to keep Emma Stone in the cast even after killing her.)

But this one is more personal preference and not any kind of guess like Norman for the second film.

[KurtW95]

(Plus its a way to keep Emma Stone in the cast even after killing her.)

SHE WON'T DIE!!!!
s

[ngroove]

Atleast the Lizard will soon be into massive-mega-media public consciousness Spider-Villain knowledge, like Spider-Man's Green Goblin, II's Doctor Octopus, and III's Venom. Overdue time, public knows about Lizard.