The Spider-Man Villain Fans Think Was Horribly Written
Critiquing comic book stories is always a fun experience because, on the one hand, it requires analyzing the thematic undertones of a character who probably wears multicolored spandex and goes by a silly name. On the other hand, it inevitably ends with a bout of vehement vitriol from a third party who feels slighted on the character's behalf. The internet can be a scary place and superhero fans can be scary people. With that in mind, let's talk about criticizing one of Marvel's tiny little indie projects that no one has strong opinions on — "Spider-Man."
Don't worry, this isn't about comparing the different cinematic Peter Parkers, nothing quite so dangerous. Instead, let's focus the lens on the antagonists with whom Spidey does battle. They're safer to poke and their depictions vary in more ways. Also, superhero media seems to struggle with correctly characterizing villains. Some supervillains are ostensibly better than others but, at least, in this case, fans agree on which baddie got the worst end of the stick.
Fans hate the Lizard
On a subreddit dedicated to the famous wall-crawler, u/BitesTheDust_4 posed the question, "who is the worst-written Spider-Man villain?" Their discussion topic received a comparatively small sample size of 13 comments, but of those 13, five mentioned the same antagonist — Dr. Curtis Connors aka the Lizard. Although the reasons each commenter gave were unique, it seems that the hate isn't even specific to one medium — neither the "Amazing Spider-Man" iteration of the scaly menace nor the comics version are safe. For instance, while u/jugheadshat said, "Lizard, the comics don't know what to do with him at all," u/AdiagoAgile2821 said, "In the movies ... Connors when he becomes Lizard. Though I am biased cause I was never a fan of the Lizard to begin with and his whole plan is kinda dumb."
The other three who spoke out against the Lizard didn't provide any further elaboration about their choices, so dissecting their intentions are a touch difficult. That being said, it seems that the driving consensus behind those who did share is that the Lizard feels underbaked, storywise. For those who haven't seen "The Amazing Spider-Man" in a while, Dr. Connors' plan goes something like this: turn everyone into a lizard. Seriously, that's it. Before his initial transformation, he had a purpose and a character, but afterward, well, he became slightly less dimensional than Mojo Jojo. Tangentially related, the public consensus (or at least CBR's) about Andrew Garfield's movies is that they were marred by atrocious caricatures of the villains. And while that's probably true, it's important to note how u/jugheadshat dragged Lizard's comic book form into the mud, too. And if Marvel's list of prominent stories about the Lizard is any indicator of the character's performance across the medium ... yikes.