9. Doctor Octopus
Whoo, here we go again. Another crap installment. Mister 9. The man who couldn’t be the man. The next criminally insane bastard to make the list is none other than…
His first appearance was in 1963, an very early Spider-man villain. Real name, Otto Octavius, a nuclear scientist, designed a chest harness with artificial mechanical tenacle-like arms for the use of handling radioactive atomic material from a safe distance. During a lab accident, the atomic radiation fused the harness to his body, and he found he was able to control the tenacles with his mind. The radiation also had a negative effect on the doctor’s mind, turning the once timid man into the criminally insane Doctor Octopus, seeking revenge on those he believed made him this way.
Octopus is the classic Spider-man villain, whose plans are far less grand than the average comic book foe. No such plans for world domination and destruction, the Spider-man villain seems to fall into two categories, one being get rich schemers, thieves, criminal masterminds using their gifts in hopes of gathering riches; or personal destitutes, foes who hold personal grudges against the wall-crawlers or those close to him usually due to Spider-man’s unwelcomed interferences in their criminal plots. Octopus is one of many who have crossed from the criminal to the personal due to Spider-man, and has dabbled with a little world destruction, but usually to gain wealth and power.
Why is Doctor Octopus special? He was essentially created to be Spider-man’s most formidable foe. How do you defeat a man that is fast, agile, who can walk up walls, and has the proportional strength of a spider? You create an adversary who is just as quick and nimble, with four powerful arms, that can walk up walls, and move about the skys. You create an individual insane enough to do the terribly incredible, and sane enough to think up plots complicated enough to outwit our hero.
Doctor Octopus was supposed to be Spider-man’s Joker, the man smart enough to create the Sinister Six, bringing together six of Spider-man’s most hated adversaries, which included Sandman, Electro, Mysterio, Kraven, and Vulture. Why try to destroy Spider-man all alone when you can get together several of his enemies and go at him together? And how many villains do you know of that would stoop to the level of trying to marry decrepit ole Aunt May because she had just inherited an atomic plant.
And it is because of contrived plotlines like that one that Octopus doesn’t rank higher. He had the potential to be the top guy in the Spider-man universe, a foe whose every attribute was created to rival our hero. And because writers didn’t create as many memorable tales as his creator Stan Lee did, the character slowly became laughable and stale. At one point he was sent to job for a Spider-clone like Kaine (who?) (what?) (exactly), eventually dying by his hands. And like every poorly written villain, he returns from the dead, Jurassic Park-style, his DNA used to bring him back to life.
But what could have been? Octopus is all about what could have been. Writers return to the character to test the ideal. And the question remains? What if Doctor Octopus was used to his fullest potential? What stories would we all be talking about, then?
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