The Rise of Doc Ock, Part Two
First Aired: January 21st, 2018
Synopsis: Spider-Man, Miles, and Doctor Octavius work to save a collapsing bridge before fighting the Lizard. The Lizard gets away, but while researching his tail which was shed they realise that it was attacking Norman Osborn. They also look into a herpetologist who can help them research the Lizard and find out that there's one at Oscorp, Curt Connors. They head over to Oscorp to meet with him but are eventually greeted by Norman himself, who reveals that Curt is the Lizard. He stole an untested regeneration serum in the hopes of restoring his missing arm, and it transformed him. The Lizard attacks the group then, but they manage to stop and restrain him. Norman asks Octavius to cure him, as he's the only person smart enough, and gives Octavius what data he has on the Lizard. After he's gone, however, Norman restores the Lizard to being Connors, and tells him that he has one more job to go. Meanwhile, at school Miles is wary of Octavius as a team player, which Peter blames himself for, saying that he should be a better mentor.
Octavius is approached by Max Modell, who says that he got a call saying that he's working on a dangerous project, which Octavius denies. Max decides to trust him, but shortly afterwards Norman transforms Connors again and calls Octavius, claiming he's being attacked. Octavius heads to Oscorp, followed by Spider-Man and Miles, and injects the Lizard with his serum. Instead of curing him it causes him to grow to gigantic size, and Norman tricks Octavius into thinking that Spider-Man tampered with it. Octavius is taken out by the Lizard, and while Spider-Man restrains him Miles returns to Horizon to find a cure for the Lizard. He's successful, but while he's at it notes that the information Norman gave Octavius is faulty. Spider-Man is able to use Miles' cure to save the Lizard, but Norman leaks information to the press that Octavius is responsible for what happened. As a result Max fires Octavius from Horizon Labs, causing him to accept a job offer from Norman. Spider-Man talks to Norman afterwards, who says that they're definitely enemies and that he'll be going after him even harder than before now.
Review: Once again we've got a pretty good episode here. Lizard episodes are a bit old hat by now, but this shakes up the usual formula quite well - Connors isn't transformed as a result of hubris here, but because he's being manipulated by Norman. We also find out that he's the Lizard fairly early in the episode, so that aspect of things isn't drawn out too far. Introducing Curt as already being the Lizard also helps to speed things up and keep the plot moving; it all works pretty well.
The biggest flaw with the episode is definitely the way that the Lizard becomes gigantic once Octavius injects him with his serum. I can just about buy the comic book logic of it, but it doesn't do the plot any favours - there's never a sense that there's any real danger to him being gigantic, and the episode kind of skims over how long he has to be restrained by Spider-Man while Miles finds a cure. I get that we need to have Octavius screw up, and in a way visible to the public so that Max can fire him, but it's all a bit awkward, and doesn't really have the room required to sell it as a big deal. I'm sure there's a better way to have Octavius' serum go wrong while meeting the criteria, and I wish that that had been used.
Outside of that though, this episode is, as mentioned, quite good. Norman is delightfully manipulative here, and he really runs rings around the characters in his plans. Octavius going over to his side is believable, and it has all the more impact after seeing Spider-Man try to work with him to make him a hero. Weirdly enough, I think another flaw of this episode - of this arc - is that we know that it's centred around Doctor Octavius and his slow descent. If each episode was named something related directly to it then we wouldn't know when Octavius completes his fall, and I think it'd be all the stronger for it. Still, that doesn't take away from this episode on its own and its many positive qualities.
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