Lizard (character): Difference between revisions

The Lizard (a.k.a. Curt Connors) is a

The Lizard first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man #6 (November 1963), and was created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko.^[2]

Fictional character biography

Origin

Curtis "Curt" Connors was born in Template:USCity. He was a gifted surgeon who enlisted in the U.S. Army. He performed emergency battlefield surgery on wounded GIs. However his right arm was terribly injured in a wartime blast, resulting in its amputation.^[3][4]

After his return to civilian life as a research technologist, Connors became obsessed with uncovering the secrets of reptilian limb regeneration. Working from his home in the Florida Everglades with the help of war buddy Ted Sallis, he finally developed an experimental serum taken from reptilian DNA.^[4] The serum successfully regrew the missing limb of a rabbit, so then Connors chose to test the serum on himself. He ingested the formula and his missing arm did indeed grow back.

However, the formula had a

Later, Curt Connors relocated to New York City. He was able to repay Spider-Man by developing a formula to save May Parker's life after Peter Parker had given his aunt his radioactive blood during a transfusion, unintentionally putting her in mortal peril.^[6] It later became clear that the success of Connors' apparent cure from the Lizard persona was short-lived. A repeating pattern occurred, with stress or a chemical reaction turning Connors into the Lizard, Spider-Man fighting him, and then forming some kind of temporary cure to reverse the transformation until the next time. A second personality had formed with the Lizard, one with the familiar goal shared by many villains of taking over the world. The Lizard envisioned a world where all humans had been transformed into (or replaced by) super-reptiles like himself. Despite the Lizard's overall hatred of humans, he was often shown to be unwilling to harm his wife Martha or young son Billy.

As Connors, he aided Spider-Man in defeating the

Connors then tried to straighten out his life and control the Lizard, with some degree of success. This ended when the villain Calypso used her voodoo magic to take control of the Lizard (during the Torment storyline) for her own purposes, reducing him to a mindless savage state. After a series of bloody battles, the Lizard and Calypso were defeated by Spider-Man, and Spider-Man assumed that he perished under Calypso's spell.^[19] Connors once again gained control of the Lizard's mind and body, although it was very weak. Curt carried out a plan to cure himself temporarily,^[20] after which he voluntarily submitted to incarceration in the supervillain prison, the Vault.^[21] When Calypso forced the transformation and attempted to control the Lizard once again, the creature killed her and escaped from the Vault. After this escape, the Lizard fell into a quicksand pit during a battle with Spider-Man and the bounty hunter Warrant and was believed to have died.^[22]

Shortly after Connors' apparent death in quicksand during the Lizard's battle with Spider-Man and Warrant, a huge bestial Lizard appeared,^[23] shortly after Connors was called in to investigate Peter Parker's sudden sickness (the result of Peter's recently lost spider-powers returning). Spider-Man (Ben Reilly) realized that not only had the Lizard survived, but revealed later his new monstrous transformation seemed to be permanent and the personality of Curt Connors appeared completely lost. However when this savage mindless Lizard later unexpectedly encountered Dr. Connors himself while Connors was helping Peter, Curt became the true Lizard once again and saved his family by killing the "Lizard-clone". It was revealed that the Lizard-clone was a scientific accident resulting from an experimental formula being tested on a piece of the original Lizard's tail, which had then grown into a fully formed second creature.^[24]

Although reunited after Curt's apparent death, Martha and Billy were diagnosed with cancer after being exposed to carcinogens from living near an industrial lab in Florida. Spider-Man assisted Curt in successfully forcing Monnano, the lab's owner, to admit culpability, but Martha died from her cancer.^[25] Billy recovered but remained bitter towards his father. Curt's guilt and internalized anger led him to become the Lizard once again, and once human, Curt attempted a bank robbery so he would be sent to prison.^[26] After a short lived term, Connors was released and changed into the Lizard once more, this time due to a scheme by Norman Osborn to form the Sinister Twelve to kill Spider-Man. The Sinister Twelve were defeated and captured by the combined forces of Daredevil, the Fantastic Four, and the Avengers.^[27]

The Lizard resurfaced to face Spider-Man with the aid of Billy Connors, who was changed into an adolescent Lizard by his father.

During the events of The Gauntlet, Doctor Curt Connors is working for the pharmaceutical company Phelcorp under executive Brian King. Connors has lost custody of his son, Billy. The lizard persona tries to goad Connors to give it control, and he relents when his assistant sleeps with King. When he changes, the Lizard devours King.^[33] Peter Parker decides to protect Billy and swings to his foster parents' home, where he finds that Billy was kidnapped and his new parents held hostage by Ana Kravinoff. Ana has left Billy in an ally, where the Lizard eats him and destroys the Connors persona temporarily.^[34] The devouring of Billy causes the Lizard to gain a new form, sporting a leaner physique, long brown hair, spikes on its right forearm, human intelligence and the telepathic ability to communicate with the underdeveloped "lizard part" of human brains; he demonstrates the latter ability by hypnotizing Spider-Man into thinking he has prey to stalk, causing the superhero to leave. Operating from the sewers, the Lizard hypnotizes several people into taking what they want.^[35] Away from the Lizard, Spider-Man ingests Connors' lizard suppressant formula, which makes Spider-Man immune to the Lizard's mind controlling powers. Spider-Man then combats the Lizard and injects him with some of the formula and reveals he regrets what he has done: Connors' psyche is still in the Lizard's body. The Lizard disappears after the fight.^[36]

During the Origin of the Species, the Lizard joins

Peter Parker (whose mind was trapped within Doctor Octopus' dying body) is freed from the Raft by Trapster, Hydro-Man, and Scorpion. Trapster offers to free the Lizard, but Connors declines.[48] When Morbius the Living Vampire manages to escape his cell, the Lizard points out that he still has nowhere to go. For unknown reasons, Morbius then frees the Lizard.^[48]

The Lizard is seen back in his cell, being one of the few inmates left to be transported out of the decommissioned Raft.^[49] When Alistair Smythe attempts an escape from the Raft, he temporarily shuts down the Raft's power, letting the Lizard out of his cell.^[50] The Lizard protects J. Jonah Jameson from Scorpion, revealing that he has the mind of Curt Conners, and that he "will never let the monsters win again." Jameson defends the Lizard from the raft's warden, calling him a hero, and protesting the use of a restraining device, though the Lizard himself prefers to be cautious. During Smythe's final escape attempt, the Lizard is impaled through the shoulder, but survives.^[51]

Powers and abilities

Doctor Curtis Connors gave himself superhuman powers as a result of exposure to mutagenic chemicals, allowing him to transform into the Lizard. In human form, he has none of his superhuman powers, but he is highly intelligent and a well known scientist in fields of genetics, physics, biochemistry, and herpetology.

When Connors is transformed into the Lizard, his strength is increased to superhuman levels. Likewise, his speed, stamina, agility, and reflexes are also raised to a level equivalent to that of Spider-Man. He can also scale walls using a combination of his sharp claws and micro-scales on his hands and feet that create molecular friction like those of a gecko lizard. He is highly resistant to injury due to his thick scaly hide, allowing him to resist punctures and lacerations from ordinary weapons and lower-caliber firearms. In addition, the Lizard has highly enhanced healing abilities which allow him to quickly recover from grievous wounds, including regenerating lost limbs. He also has a powerful tail which he can whip at high speeds. The Lizard has razor-sharp teeth set in muscular jaws that can deal a lethal bite. (The latter is established in the Lizard's later appearances; in his earlier appearances he seems to have no teeth at all.) Like a reptile, he has cold-blooded characteristics and is therefore sensitive to drops in temperature; a sufficiently cold environment will cause his metabolism to slow drastically and become dormant if he is exposed to cold temperatures for too long.^[52]

The Lizard can mentally communicate and command all reptiles within a mile of himself via limited telepathy. He has also on at least one occasion secreted powerful pheromones which caused nearby humans to behave violently. Post-Brand New Day, a further enhancement of his telepathy granted him the power of telepathically compelling humans to act out their primal urges, by suppressing emotional control in their amygdala (the "lizard brain").^{[volume & issue needed]}

Based on various physiological and environmental factors, the Lizard's intelligence can range from bestial and animalistic to normal human intelligence. The Lizard personality has most often manifested with human intelligence, capable of speech and higher reasoning, although some versions have been more feral than others. During the

The Lizard has apparently "destroyed" the Curt Connors persona, but has subsequently begun to display some of Connors's human emotions.^[volume & issue needed] In contrast to his previously feral nature, he has also shown sufficient intellectual capabilities to understand Connors' work and use it for himself, although he is still hampered by his inability to fully comprehend human emotions.^{[volume & issue needed]}

Continuity

In a 2004 story arc entitled Lizard's Tale, written by Paul Jenkins in the Spectacular Spider-Man comic book, it was revealed that the Lizard persona was not a separate personality from Dr. Connors after all - Curt had been consciously controlling his reptilian alter ego all along. Furthermore, Connors was shown to know that Peter Parker was Spider-Man, despite the discovery of the secret identity never being explained or depicted. The story ended with Dr. Connors deliberately getting himself sent to prison and hoping the Lizard wouldn't be unleashed again. The Lizard's next appearance after this was as a member of the Sinister Twelve, where he showed no indication of being controlled by the mind of Dr. Connors. Although the idea of Connors controlling the Lizard was subsequently ignored, when the Lizard's mind was briefly trapped in Connors' human form, he attempted to mutate the staff of Horizon Labs into lizard-creatures like himself, with none of the other lizards demonstrating the same hostility to humans as the Lizard, prompting Spider-Man to speculate that the Lizard's anti-human traits came from Connors' anger at the world for his lost arm and family rather than the Lizard being completely separate from Connors.^[47]

Another continuity-related issue involves Connors' son Billy. Unlike many other Marvel Comics children, he had not appreciably grown up since the comics' stories of the 1960s. Billy's visible age also seemed to waver back and forth between approximately eight and thirteen years old, depending on the particular comic artist drawing the character.

Other versions

Ultimate Marvel

The one comic storyline to date featuring the Ultimate Marvel universe version of the Lizard appeared in Ultimate Marvel Team-Up #10. The character has appeared in a few subsequent issues of Ultimate Spider-Man, but only in flashbacks and dream sequences. Ultimate Lizard appears to be based on a basilisk lizard in design and has been presented as being less intelligent than the original Marvel Universe Lizard.^[55]

Curt Connors is noted geneticist who lost his right arm under unrevealed circumstances. He dedicated himself to finding a means of restoring lost limbs studying the regenerative capabilities of reptiles. However after five years without major breakthroughs, his sponsors were on the verge of cutting his funding. Drowning his disappointment with alcohol, the drunken Conners injected himself with an experimental serum in a desperate attempt to achieve results. The serum regenerated his right arm, but also transformed Connors into an inhuman reptilian creature. Seeking refuge in the sewers, he became an urban legend dubbed "The Lizard" by the press. A sympathetic Spider-Man sought out Conners who attacked the young hero until Man-Thing happened upon the scene and restored Conners to human form. Conners' restored right arm soon withered and died. However, his DNA remained irreparably damaged with dormant potential for further transformation. Curt Connors cut himself off from his wife and son out of fear for their safety.^[56]

Dr. Curt Connors also unintentionally created the Ultimate version of the supervillain

Early details of Conners' history match his 616 counterpart, with him studying reptiles to fix his arm (the cause of this has yet to be revealed), and the condition of him leaving his wife and son (here called Doris and Timmy [60]) out of fear, thereby turning to alcoholism.^[55]

Exiles

The reality-hopping heroic team, the Exiles, once found themselves on an alternate earth where Connors' experiment (in this world for a left arm rather than a right) had taken a different turn. Finding himself as the Lizard, Curt felt the need to "reproduce" by immediately injecting the Lizard-formula into other people. He infected his family and they infected others, all feeling the urge to spread the transformation into Lizard-men. The forces of this particular world eventually managed to restrain the infected reptile-people behind miles-long, man-made walls. When the Exiles visited this world, they discovered that Connors - having turned back into his human form a year ago - was intending to detonate a nuclear bomb in an abandoned submarine to wipe out the lizard race, but they were able to talk him down by arguing that the radioactive fallout would cause more damage, particularly since the lizards were now mere herbivores (albeit partly because of the absence of other kinds of meat). Grief-stricken over what had become of his life, Connors subsequently killed himself.^[61]

Marvel 1602

In this reality, Curtis Connors is a philosopher who was infected with the bubonic plague. He created an elixir that transformed him into a reptilian creature that resembled a Velociraptor, but retained his mind. He worked with Baron Victor Octavius to capture the Spider.^[62]

Marvel Noir

In the Marvel Noir reality, Curt Connors is an assistant to Dr. Otto Octavius.^[63] They operated in an abandoned hospital building on Ellis Island, where they secretly used kidnapped African-Americans as specimen subjects in turning them into mindless slaves. It is unknown what happened to Connors after federal authorities raided the hospital, though he was presumably arrested among Octavius' affiliates.^[64]

Marvel Zombies

In Marvel Zombies, the Lizard, like almost every other hero and villain, has become a zombie. This particular incarnation of the Lizard is apparently destroyed when he is blasted apart by several cosmic-powered heroes while fighting (and eating) Galactus.^[65]

MC2

The Connors Family appear in the first story of the

On Earth-65 where Gwen Stacy became Spider-Woman after being bitten by the spider,^[67] Peter Parker attempts to exact revenge on those who bullied him, becoming this universe's version of the Lizard. Gwen subdues him, but Peter ended up dying towards the end of the battle due to his use of the chemicals that transformed him. Spider-Woman is blamed for his death, causing an uproar for her arrest, led by J. Jonah Jameson, with Peter essentially becoming Gwen's Uncle Ben, serving as inspiration of the need to use her powers to help others.^[68]

Marvel Age

Lizard's history is the same in this reality. Spider-Man went to Florida to investigate the "Lizard Man" sightings. Spider-Man meets Martha Connors and learns that Lizard is her husband Dr. Curt Connors. After making an antidote, Spider-Man ensnares Lizard and uses the antidote to restore him to Curt Connors. Peter Parker later told J. Jonah Jameson that the "Lizard Man" was a hoax.^[69]

In other media

Television

• Lizard appears in the 1967 Spider-Man cartoon series, voiced by Gillie Fenwick. This version is referred to as Dr. Curt Conner and is depicted as having both of his arms in "Where Crawls the Lizard"; his serum is intended to cure "swamp fever". Conner later appears in the episode "Fountain of Terror" where he finds the Fountain of Youth and ends up held prisoner by someone that looks like Juan Ponce de León before Spider-Man appears and the Fountain of Youth is accidentally destroyed. Spider-Man manages to rescue him after defeating Harley Clivendon. In the episode "Conner's Reptiles", Lizard appears again. This time, it's not Conner but one of his experimental alligators with increased intelligence that abducted him. The episode uses footage from "Where Crawls the Lizard", just changing the order of scenes and the voices.

• Lizard appears in the 1981 Spider-Man cartoon series episode "Lizards, Lizards, Everywhere", voiced by Corey Burton. Dr. Curt Connors is not mentioned in the episode, the Lizard being presented as a monster villain with no alter-ego. He ends up springing every reptile from the zoo in order to make Manhattan a reptile paradise. Lizard is defeated by Spider-Man who leaves him webbed up in an empty zoo cage.

• Curt Connors/Lizard appears in the
  Mister Fantastic
  managed to use a machine to activate the dormant part of Lizard's mind enabling the Connors part of the mind to be awakened.

• Lizard appeared in the first Spider-Man 3-D environment video game by Neversoft, voiced by Dee Bradley Baker. Lizard has a small role in the game, trapped behind a cage in the NYC sewers. Lizard reveals that Venom had taken control over a group of lizardmen that he created and imprisoned him. Here, the Lizard is the only villain not fought against.

• Curt Connors/Lizard appears in the sequel to the 3-D Neversoft game
  Spider-Man 2: Enter Electro, again voiced by Dee Bradley Baker. Curt Connors was seen in the beginning of the game when Electro breaks into ESU to locate a device to amplify his powers: the Bio-Nexus Device. He shocks Connors and steals the device. Later on, Spider-Man tries to call Connors on the phone but to no avail. Lizard is a boss character. Resembling a Velociraptor
  , the mindless Lizard rampages around his lab and must be defeated again by injecting him with a cure.

• Dr. Curt Connors made a minor appearance in Spider-Man 2 console game, voiced by Joe Alaskey. Originally, Lizard was supposed to have been included in this particular video game and was even prominently featured in some promotional materials before being suddenly removed. However, there are some hints that the Lizard was still going to be in the game, such as the use of green (his alter ego's color) in his lab, Doctor Octopus breaking Dr. Connors arm, the reptile-like creatures that appear in the Fight Area, the hex editor containing a skin named Lizard. Lizard did appear as a level boss in the game's Game Boy Advance and Nintendo DS versions.

• Lizard makes an appearance in the 2006 RPG video game Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, voiced by James Arnold Taylor. He is seen as a member of Doctor Doom's Masters of Evil. In the game, he appears alongside the Scorpion guarding a just-defeated Tyr. He and Scorpion have special dialogue with Spider-Man. A simulation disk has the heroes fighting Lizard, and notes the connection to Connors, but Lizard casually ignores the mention of his alter ego's name and attacks anyway.

• Lizard is a major character in the
  PS3
  and Xbox 360 versions, Connors and Spider-Man collaborate to disperse a gaseous antidote that will turn those people Connors mutated into lizards back into their human selves, as Connors's will help Spider-Man with his analysis on his black suit.