Rhys Ifans On The Dynamic Between Peter Parker And Curt Connors; Says He's Not A "Villain"!

Brilliant man who makes a bad decision... I'm pretty sure that's Spider-Man 1 and 2, right there. XD

This movie's gonna be good.
I don't think Toby's gonna get over it. Poor kid :p

Get in the flask

Anyone else think it's a bit played out these actor/villains always pulling the "He's a good man who makes some bad decisions" card? It's like pretty much EVERY villain is written that way. Usually it's some lame attempt to make the villain "pyschologically complex". Actors pull that punch and the writers write all the villains that way so much that the concept has lost value. Yet we're supposed to ooh and ah and go "Interesting!" when it's the friggin' motif of every villain we see. I'll tell you one villain who was just straight up card-carrying evil: Heath Ledger's Joker. They didn't even attempt to give him any psychological depth or arc, or angst or anything. Nolan once compared the Joker to the Shark from Jaws (yet another dope villain) in that the Joker is just pure automated being. Maybe pure villains are a thing of the past cause they certainly are in the minority today. So there's no point in bragging about how complex your villain is cause complex guarantees nothing. In fact complex probably suggests he's gonna be crap.

It's kind of like female actresses in these action flicks constantly saying the same crap about how their character is one- if not all - of the following:

-"A strong role-model for young girls!"
-"Can really kick butt!"
-"Doesn't wait around to be rescued!"

Go ask Keira Knightly, Natalie Portman, Blake Lively, Haley Atwell, Kirsten Dunst, Megan Fox etc etc. And yet in every case their characters are all the same. The damsel in distress always dangling from some ledge and dressing slutty at least at some point. It's like obligatory to just claim your character is "modern" and complex" when it's just the same old crap/different decade.

Katie Holmes would have scored SO MANY points in my book if she had just said this in an interview:

"I play this real hollow crap character whose only job is to point out the obvious themes of the movie out loud to Bruce just in case he (or the audience) isn't clear on it. I obligatoraly hide behind a man's job in a vein attempt to make me seem modern and strong when really I just get kidnapped and wait for the hero to rescue me. Oh and my acting skills are already dubious so I really struggled with wrapping my impressionable brain around this real cookie cutter part. I hope they replace me on the next one cause I don't think I can do this again..."

Oh, cool. The Lizard is really a good guy who experiments his way into doing some bad things. That's nothing like the previous three films other than the fact that it's the exact same thing.

Think your all missing the point, I dont think its lizard so much thats not the villian, its curt connors, which is how it was in the comics, connors was ment to be a decent human being, and the lizard was an orrible [foo foo]! Its not the same as other villians, they can choose to be the way they are and just blame it on something, the lizard has no choice, he tried to regrow an arm thats not a bad thing, just had serious consequences.

@supes17:
very funny gif !
I think his 'Lizzard' will be more lke Godzilla, not really a villain just an outsider...

I mean one of the only "psychologically complex" villains who one can easily sympathize or understand in the movies is Magneto. He's no victim of a convenient freak accident but his point of view is certainly understandable and it's difficult to call him an all-out proper villain. But it doesn't negate the scope of his threat nor the fact that he must absolutely be stopped. But yeah the gimmicky "accident" is necesarry for these stories but usually isn't too organic to the story. In origin stories, it's supposed to be miraculous enough that the hero gains these super powers in an "everyday" world. What are the odds that somewhere across town (in the same town/at the same time) some other dude should also happen to get totally unrelated superpowers?

That's why Batman Begins had a such a strong origin story but is also guilty of lacking in the villain department (it's strength is also its flaw). Batman is a freak. What are the odds of another freak coming out in the same week? So Batman's origin was really believable and organic but it left the villains looking a little flat. Sure, give it some time it's reasonable to believe that a Joker would show up.

@HBAIT: So you're saying that he lost *TWO* "arms"?!

I think that Curt Connors *is* one of those unintentional bad guys, with the good guy made a bad decision dilemma. But I'm pretty sure in the sequel, we'll actually see a heartless prick be the main baddie for Spidey. Norman Osborn anyone? ;) ...hell, maybe it will be the Proto-Goblin. :P

@MrHulkSmashin, after losing one... he needed something to forget the pain. ---sadly, it didn't go as planned. neither did the lizard idea. :P

@FriendlyNeighborhoodSpidey - Well like most of the actors cast in these movies he probably has never seen a comic book movie so he'd just assume his character is unique. Or it's just standard promo answering of questions. More often than not these actors don't enjoy making these movies and know the character is dumb but it's their job to pretend it's Shakespeare while promoting it (see: Tom Hiddleston in every interview).

@meloco - Yeah sounds like a real winner. Haha.

A *just* should be inserted between "not" and "brilliant". I hate not having an edit button.

the lizard was never a "villian" in the comics. so they aer sticking with the source material. green goblin and doc ock were always straight up villians in the book, so spiderman 1 and 2 changed them for the movies.

Well this is obviously gonna be the angsty emo Spidey so maybe the villains should just be his parents (every emo kid's greatest nemesis) and the plot should be them trying to throw out his bad poetry. Can Spider-Man recover his bad angsty poetry and avoid homework? We can avoid the cliche "horrific accident" traditional in the villain origin. Well, the only accident being the conception of their son Peter.

@ ejkousc, you talk too much. Get off this site already.

@ejkousc - Agreed. These buzz phrases need to go. Another one that I can't stand which is so overly used is "fun for the whole family" when they really just mean "uptight parents won't get offended at this".