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For alternate versions of Alistair Smythe, see Alistair Smythe's Character Hub


Doctor Alistair Smythe was an employee of Oscorp Industries who bullied Max Dillon and would indirectly lead him to become Electro.

Biography[]

Max Dillon's Birthday[]

Smythe rudely greeted Max Dillon at Oscorp, the latter having recently arrived from being saved by Spider-Man. He casually undermined Dillon, informing him that his colleagues and himself had "borrowed" the schematics Dillon had designed for the grid systems at OscorPower. The next day, Smythe ordered Dillon to stay late and fix a broken power surge on the building's experimentation floor, sarcastically wishing him a happy birthday in the process.

Video Game Continuity[]

The Amazing Spider-Man[]

Alistaire Smythe

Alistair Smythe of Earth-TRN376

Alistair Smythe grew up as an only child in Brooklyn, New York. The son of Spencer Smythe, a single father whose work always took precedence over family, young Alistair grew up with no motherly influence as he adapted to a childhood of neglect. During his high school years, Alistair was surprised to find his father make a concerted effort to atone for his faults as a parent. Only months before dying of radiation poisoning (itself a lab accident gone awry), Spencer passed along all of his knowledge of robotics and technology to Alistair – years of research that Alistair absorbed with full comprehension in mere weeks.

At Empire State University, Smythe was roommates and close friends with a young Curt Connors. The two geniuses shared a playful rivalry, frequently arguing over the merits of technology versus biology. But Smythe's beliefs were not as popular, and he lost several prominent grants to Connors. Their steadfast friendship started to show cracks...

As he struggled to gain funding for his work in robotics and nanotechnology, Smythe watched Connors join the prestigious Oscorp Industries, and rapidly rise through its ranks. Jealousy began to fester in his heart... Smythe was devastated by the accident that turned Connors into the Lizard, but as fate would have it, it was also his greatest boon. After Connors’ inglorious dismissal from the company, Oscorp hired Smythe and funneled all of Connors’ resources to its new robotics division. Smythe became “the new face of Oscorp,” determined to change the world, and erase the stain of Connors’ biological freak show.

Amazing Spiderman 1 Video Game

Smythe's work would cause the main events for The Amazing Spider-Man (video game)

But Connors' legacy would not be that easy to destroy. During the removal of the cross-species specimens, Smythe and his scientists were infected by their virus. The control of Smythe prided himself on began to slip away; his vengeance led him to program robots to destroy cross-species who escaped the Oscorp quarantine. His greed led him to inject himself with an untested cure, a mistake that took the use of his legs, as well as his sanity. The order Smythe built around himself collapsed into chaos. Instead of wasting time to develop a cure, he was more determined than ever to eliminate the infected, including Spider-Man. Smythe's robots caused more harm than good, and put many innocent lives at risk. He was ultimately dismissed from Oscorp and forced to take sole blame for the outbreak. This fueled Smythe's rage more, as he released his most deadly wave of robots on the city. It was an all out extermination.

Spider-Man and the Lizard formed an uneasy alliance to stop Smythe's S-03, and manufactured a successful cure capable of saving the city. At this point, all threats were ceased and the city was saved. His EXO-01 armor is destroyed in the battle. At the end of the game, Smythe was back inside one of his robot labs in Oscorp Tower and was almost completely infected from the virus, as he wasn't able to get the cure. It was too late, however, and so the regretful Doctor Alistair Smythe committed suicide by way of programming one of his own hunter bots to shoot him.

Trivia[]

  • Smythe (along with George Stacy) was one of the few people that knew Spider-Man's true identity before he died. The ones alive are Curt Connors and Gwen Stacy. This knowledge only counts for his video game counterpart.
  • In comics, J. Jonah Jameson of the Daily Bugle hired Alistair's father, Spencer, to build the Spider-Slayers to capture Spider-Man. After Spencer died, Alistair wanted to get revenge on both Spider-Man and Jameson, and carried on his father's legacy of Spider-Slayer making.
  • The only technical boss battle is when the S-03 is unleashed and he gets out the EXO-01 to battle.
  • In the film canon, it was said that Black Cat and the Spider-Slayers were slated to appear in future installments, meaning that Smythe's appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 would set up his role in building them, likely in the third or fourth movies.

External links[]

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