The third season of Superman & Lois premieres Tuesday, March 14 and last week, KryptonSite’s Craig Byrne had the opportunity to speak with Showrunners Todd Helbing and Brent Fletcher about what we can expect as we go into Season 3. You can find the interview below; a gallery of photos from “Closer” can be found here!
KRYPTONSITE: For my first very broad question, what would you say is the core theme of Superman & Lois Season 3?
BRENT FLETCHER: It’s always family, but I would say it’s [also] fighting against things. This time, it’s the battle against uncontrollable forces.
Without spoilers, can you talk about the biggest threat that Superman and Lois Lane face in this season?
TODD HELBING: I would say that there are two forces. One is the one that we set up last season, which is Bruno Mannheim, and then we won’t spoil the other one. But it’s funny: They pose an equal threat in some ways, and they both affect the family with equal measure.
FLETCHER: I think every year, the family is under duress and under fire from enemies, and this year, I think it’s the biggest threat to the family that we’ve ever done. The stakes are the highest we’ve ever done, by a lot, and the relationships get pulled apart and put back together the most that we’ve ever done.
There’s a scene in the trailer with the Daily Planet globe crashing toward Lois. Can you talk about what your reaction was when you saw that finished scene with the finished visual effects?
HELBING: It was pretty awesome. We are very fortunate to have some phenomenal VFX artists that love Superman on the show, with Matt Gore and our visual effects team… we have in house team, but all the visual effects houses that we use are phenomenal. Everybody’s just fully on board with making this the best show that it can be in the visual effects regard. So yeah, we were really thrilled. It’s really cool, and what’s been online is just a small piece of it. When you see the final set piece, it’s pretty remarkable.
FLETCHER: In general, I think we’ve pushed ourselves VFX-wise further than we have in the first two seasons, and it’s because of the trust that we have with this team, nd the fact that not only do they understand spectacle visually, but they understand the story underpinnings of it. There’s a real language that we share with them, and we see it when we watch it.
Lois and Clark are now working with Chrissy at the Gazette. Can you talk about that new dynamic, especially now that Chrissy knows?
FLETCHER: One thing that Chrissy finds out pretty quickly is that when you work with the greatest superhero ever, it comes with some [being] absentee, so it’s going to take a little bit of time for her to get used to that dynamic. And, you know, three sometimes it not the best number… three different opinions… but they get through that pretty quickly, and as the season progresses, they make a really fantastic team.
With Morgan Edge no longer being a thing, is the Daily Planet still being published?
HELBING: You’ll see some employees, there are some Easter egg drops of different employees that you may or may not see in the future.
FLETCHER: We’re in Metropolis more than usual this season, so it shows up as backdrop more than once throughout the season.
Can you talk about Michael Bishop, the new actor playing Jonathan Kent?
HELBING: This guy stepped into a very difficult situation. We have a show up and running for two seasons, he’s taking over a beloved role – a big role – and he did it effortlessly. He’s a tremendous actor, an amazing person, and we love having him. I think we wanted to kind of let him do his own thing. We gave him what our interpretation was of the character, and then just let him go for it. I think everybody is gonna fall in love with him as much as we have.
And can you talk about Bruno Mannheim and what separates him from the other villains that we may have seen before on this show?
FLETCHER: I think he’s got a philosophy that a lot of people can relate to. He grew up kind of forgotten, in a forgotten part of the city, and his family had been forgotten, and he ended up taking the reins, to build something for himself and to build something for his city. He’s got a code. It may not always be morally correct, but you can understand it emotionally, and he does do things from the heart. He is an antagonist for us, but he’s also a man that you can understand where his heart is, and it makes him more complicated, and somebody in a weird way that you root for as an antagonist, which sometimes makes the most interesting villains. Chad Coleman’s performance is off the charts. We were so lucky to have him, and what he brought to it from the initial idea is just incredible.
Lex Luthor is coming to Superman & Lois – read what Todd and Brent had to say about his arrival here!
How will the relationship between Jordan and Sarah change this year?
FLETCHER: That’s a great question. I think you have two kids that have had an emotional connection that are now trying out the concept of being friends. That’s always hard when one person maybe has stronger feelings than the other, and balancing that and staying true to the concept of being friends, when maybe the tug of the heart is still pulling on one of them, and the challenges that you face when that happens.
Why should fans be tuning in on March 14?
HELBING: We reassess at the end of every season, and we see what worked and what didn’t work, and what fans responded to, and this year, we’re really proud of the ingredients that we have. We think we put Superman and Lois and all the characters and all the families in our show on a crazy run. That’s super exciting., and the build up over the season leads to pretty massive finale that we’re filming right now.
FLETCHER: Spectacle wise, you’ll get the biggest bang for your buck that we’ve ever done, but we feel like thematically, it’s the most important and planned out, with a good payoff and some fun twists and turns along the way with characters that you know and love. You’ll get everything that you want in a drama, you’ll get some laughs, you’ll get some surprises, and some rockin’ action.
Superman & Lois premieres this Tuesday. March 14 on The CW – see more of our coverage of the show here!