Stan Lee and Steve Ditko were onto something.
Their most recent creation was catching on with comic book readers in a big way. By casting a teenager as a hero, they had zeroed in on their target demographic, giving their young audience a character with realistic and relatable problems. In having that hero adopt the guise and modus operandi of a spider, they inadvertently created a template for one of the most iconic rogues galleries in popular fiction. Soon the arachnid-powered adventurer known as Spider-Man would face a veritable menagerie of foes: there would be Rhinos, Vultures, and Scorpions, Oxes, Kangaroos, and Gibbons, as well as Tarantulas, Chameleons, and Beetles. And don’t forget Black Cats, Octopi, and Jackals. Oh, yeah, and then there’s this cold-blooded bastard:
The Lizard is just Stan Lee ripping-off Robert Louis Stevenson’s Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde. Err, again. Only instead of turning into a hirsute beast of the id, this doctor gets scaly and stresses all his “S” sounds. First appearing in The Amazing Spider-Man #6, the Lizard was the product of Marvel Comics unique brand of mad science. One of the world’s leading authorities on reptiles, Doctor Curt Connors toiled alone in his lab deep in the heart of the Florida Everglades. He sought to isolate the regenerative qualities of the lizard, both to aid mankind and to replace his own missing right arm. Like any good mad scientist, Doctor Connors chose to test his serum on himself, with predictable results: gaining an arm but losing the ability to regulate his body temperature, Connors became a 6-foot lizard man with the feels:
That’s right — he’s crying. In spite of being cured at the end of his first appearance, the Lizard would rear his scaly head again before too long. Unlike “normal” human foes like Doc Ock or the Vulture, the Lizard was truly bestial, without any of the base motivations of your typical Marvel bad guy. He didn’t want to rob a bank or rule the world; he just wanted to be left alone in his swamp to eat birds and the occasional sports fisherman. But it wasn’t meant to be: an ill-advised move to New York saw Connors transform into his scaly alter ego multiple times in the following years. With each transformation, more of his human will slipped away, replaced by the Lizard’s growing savagery and contempt for humankind. To his horror, Connors discovered he no longer needed the serum to transform — mere stress was enough to induce the change.
Even during periods of relative genetic stability, Connors struggled with his reptilian side. Life away from the swamp and his constant defeat at the hands of Spider-Man resulted in a deep and burning hatred for the warm-blooded creatures of Earth. Asserting his mental dominance, Connor’s Lizard persona used his scientist alter ego’s knowledge to plot the human race’s destruction. Over time he built and used many strange devices in his war on humanity, including a “revitalization ray” capable of bringing dinosaurs back to life. Seriously.
Nutty, I know, but that’s Bronze Age Marvel for you. And while the whole dinosaur thing didn’t work out as planned, the Lizard carried on. He remains a thorn in Spidey’s side to this day, even getting his cinematic turn at bat with 2012’s The Amazing Spider-Man. And while it’s not easy bein’ green, but he’s done all right for his scaly self. He’s even had a few action figures.
Mego was the first to immortalize the Lizard in plastic. The usually thrifty company popped for new tooling for the Lizard’s lower arms, legs and head, but quickly recouped their losses by re-releasing the figure in brown plastic as the Gorn in their concurrent Star Trek line. In his Lizard incarnation he proved to be one of the more colorful villains in the World’s Greatest Super-Heroes line, which undoubtedly netted him more sales than name recognition alone possibly could. This was one Mego I simply never managed to get my hands on, although I coveted my cousin’s Lizard figure with an almost-frightening intensity. That’s just the power of toys.
Mattel skipped over the Lizard despite the character’s participation in Secret Wars. That’s right — Hobgoblin, Daredevil, and Iceman all got figures in the line, and they didn’t even appear in the comic. The Lizard had a significant sub-plot and got jack-squat for his troubles. Collectors had to wait until 1994’s Spider-Man: the Animated Series line to get another crack at the character. For all the waiting, it was well worth it — the figure was a high-point in the line and sold well enough to be re-released with different paint decos in both 5- and 10-inch scale.
1997 saw the release of a more bestial “Spider Smash” Lizard. ToyBiz was clearly pushing the envelope here, surpassing previous sculpt and articulation limits. The company would continue to raise the bar. In 2000 ToyBiz released their Spider-Man Classics line, which showed just how far the company had come in its ten years producing Marvel toys. Gone were clunky gimmicks like suction cups and shooting webs — the new norm was hyper-detailed sculpts, intensive paint apps, and more articulation than many people knew what to do with. In 2002, a now “S”-less Spider-Man Classic saw the release of the first Lizard figure in 6-inch scale.
Collectors were thrilled, but this guy left me cold. I don’t know if it was the ripped sleeves or the funky pre-posed legs, but I passed on this figure both times it was released (2002 and then in 2004.) I also passed on series ten’s Tail Attack Lizard because it was a take on the Ultimates version of the character. I was committed to getting a classic-looking Lizard to stand alongside all of my other Spider-Rogues and the ideal version came in 2005. Too bad I never actually saw it at retail.
This figure was part of the Spider-Man’s Fearsome Foes box set, which made him a tough figure to find. I kept hoping I’d stumble across one if I was patient, and I was, but in this case patience has gotten me jack-squat. My Spidey shelf remains Lizard-less, and probably will until Hasbro makes a new classic Lizard. In the past two year we’ve seen new versions of Kraven, Hobgoblin, Venom, and Carnage — it’s high time Hasbro took a crack at this classic foe. If they need to justify the cost they can just re-release him in brown and call him a Gorn …
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