SUPERGIRL: It Doesn't Sound Like Tyler Hoechlin's Superman Will Have Much In Common With Henry Cavill

With Supergirl making the leap to The CW, it was inevitable that the show would need to go to drastic measures to ensure that those who tuned in on CBS followed the series to its new home. Adding Superman - a character who was only teased in the show's first season - to the mix is a smart way of achieving that, and producer Andrew Kreisberg has now shed some light on what we should expect.

It definitely sounds as if this will be a Superman who is a lot more optimistic in nature, especially when compared to the version played by Henry Cavill in Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. This version of the hero has been operating for years too, so that should definitely add an interesting new dynamic to how we'll see his adventures now play out in the DC TV Universe. 

"I think our take on him is probably something a little bit more traditional. There’s certainly a little bit of the “Aw shucks” about him, but he’s been Superman for awhile, so there’s a savviness about him as Superman and as Clark. If he’s been Superman for 12 years, that also means that he’s been Clark Kent for 12 years. He knows how to interview somebody. He knows how to get a story out of someone. As always, with any of these things, we’re never doing a direct adaptation of a specific comic book. We cherry pick the best parts and things that we love. So, there’s a little bit of the Christopher Reeve Superman in there, a healthy dose of the Superman animated series, which we’re huge fans of, a little bit of Lois & Clark, a little George Reeves, and a little Super Friends.

And as far as finding the right guy, as soon as we said we were going to do Superman, Greg [Berlanti] mentioned Tyler [Hoechlin]. We’ve been fans of his for years, and when we sat down with him, he is Superman. Not just with the looks, but he’s such a good guy, such a nice guy, and he’s so open and forthright and brimming with life. You just feel better when you’re around him, which I think is part of the secret of Superman. He is that ideal, but not in an unattainable way. Superman should make you feel like you can do anything, even though he’s the one that can do anything. And Tyler just had all that in spades. So, it was less a question of us reaching out. It was more a question of hoping he would say yes. After Tyler, I’m not sure what we would have done."

For the vast majority of fans, this is the kind of Superman that they'd rather see in live-action, so Supergirl may very well earn some new fans during its second season. An argument could be made that Cavill's Man of Steel really isn't that different to this and that he just has to deal with some more serious subject matter, but we'll find out how the two different versions compare this October...