Clark: My most vivid memories
Are of the days when my life changed.
[ suspenseful music plays ]
I can't think of a better story, right now, than this one.
Guggenheim: We all need a little hope,
We all need a little escapism,
And we all need a little inspiration.
And superman is hope.
He is driven by using his powers for the greater good.
Superman has stayed with us generation after generation
Because the world has continued to need heroes.
And we need clark kent.
And we need lois lane.
It's lois. What'd you say your name was again?
Uh, kent. Clark. Clark! Kent.
"superman & lois" has a lot going on.
It's really fun.
It's nostalgic, and it's hopeful.
It's about the family. It's about the kids.
It's about how does he handle all these responsibilities
As well as to be a father.
♪♪
Lois: The world will always need superman,
But right now this family needs you more.
Berlanti: He's dealing with a whole new set of problems
We've never seen superman deal with before.
Johns: Superman's there with us, to guide us,
To give us faith that tomorrow's gonna be better.
You have never seen a superman show like this.
Up, up, and away. [ chuckles ]
♪♪
Clark: I remember coming to this earth,
Feeling the sun on my face for the first time.
♪♪
When we think of superheroes,
We have to think about superman.
He was the first. He was the original.
All: Superman!
Superman was the epitome of a hero.
He could do everything.
He had the best powers. He could fly.
Who doesn't want to fly?
For all the comic-book characters
That have ever been, before and after,
He is kind of the dividing line.
Johns: Superman's captured my imagination
Since I watched him fly onscreen,
Since I read a comic book with superman
Or watched an animated series with superman.
And it was clear he was just doing the right thing
Because it was the right thing to do.
And there's a famous phrase, like,
"with great power comes great responsibility,"
And when I think of superman, it's not a question.
It's a statement. That is his essence.
Here you go, friend. Thanks!
Cool costume. Thanks!
My mom made it for me.
This is a guy who can do good things,
And he does them, and it's just as simple as that.
Tulloch: If you stripped him of his powers, he would still be
The same goofy, lovable, kind, decent person,
And that's something to aspire to,
Superhuman strength or not.
Good night, general.
[ whooshing ]
He's got this ability to inspire those around him
To strive to be the best versions of themselves.
I do have a responsibility to the world
As you know who.
Lara: Well, you've got a bigger responsibility
To your family... As a father.
What if we were to see stories in the superman mythos
That we never got to see...
Lara: The boys need to see what a strong
And loving and vulnerable man looks like.
...Which is, once he became a father
And once he became a dad...
I'm trying. ...How did that change him?
[ knocking ]
Wow. Make a pretty good superman.
This is different. It's not a normal superman show.
You know, growing up, I loved "smallville."
This feels like a different show, a whole different vibe
Than any other superman show that's been done.
-I was in wichita for a story. -Yeah, you couldn't catch
A flight back. Mom said.
It's a modern superman, and it's done well.
If you need anything, if you want to go and talk...
He's a dad, and he's a husband.
We're gonna be alright.
To see him challenged on a daily basis,
It brings this unpredictability to a character
That's usually somewhat predictable.
Just leave us alone.
What we wanted to do was to tell a story
That hadn't been told yet,
Which is, like, when superman grows up.
The world will always need superman,
But right now this family needs you more.
It made me think about superman in ways I never have before.
Superman's boring.
I never really thought about how he pays the bills.
Huh. How does he deal with
Basic day-to-day routines?
Lee: We do a little bit of therapy on the characters, right,
And really kind of get at what makes them tick.
What motivates these characters to do what they do?
♪♪
Clark: And suddenly here I am,
Living in metropolis, raising two teenage boys,
Married to the most famous journalist in the world.
All of the shows in the arrowverse
Have some element of family. They always have.
That's your cousin...Sort of.
But this one even more so than any of them.
Your plate's in the fridge. Jonathan's got some news.
And apologize to jordan. You missed therapy today.
Helbing: The theme of family. Sorry about that.
It's the biggest theme
And the most important theme in our show.
Lois is the best journalist in the world,
And superman is...Superman,
But you're seeing them failing sometimes as parents.
Your parents told you about your real heritage when you were 6.
Lois, that was different. I lived on a farm. I had powers.
Guggenheim: It's called "superman & lois,"
I believe, for a reason.
The "and lois" part is really, really critical.
Hoechlin: I really like that they're both
Tackling things on their end
And they're there to assist each other, they're a team.
Lois: When we were dreaming about having a family,
It didn't look like this, did it?
"superman & lois" is a tv show for every generation.
You can take all the hero elements out of it,
And it would still very much stand on its own.
-Love you, guys. -Love you.
-Good luck today, guys! -Thanks, dad.
♪♪
Guggenheim: It's so obvious that the kent home
Is every bit as important as the fortress of solitude.
That's showing a new gear for the arrowverse.
There's a scope to it, capturing the beauty of the landscape.
It looks incredibly cinematic, and it looks like a movie.
A good deal of our time is spent in smallville,
But he is superman
And he is protecting sometimes the entire world.
Helbing: Superman is sort of the hero of the world.
It doesn't really matter where his base is.
Schechter: He's superman, and sometimes you got to show
That the man can fly into space, and that's really cool, too,
And that's part of the fun of it,
Is how many literal worlds superman can travel to.
♪♪
It's lois. What'd you say your name was again?
Uh, kent. Clark. Clark! Kent.
Oh. Oh. [ chuckles ] sorry.
Hmm. Never met a clark before.
Oh. Um, I-I've never met a lois before.
What we used our imagination for
Was not to reimagine who clark and lois were...
Clark: Actually, there was my first-grade teacher,
Lois hannigan, so I guess technically --
Oh. T-technically, you'd be the second!
...But to imagine what clark and lois
Would do and feel in 2021...
Clark: When we fell in love,
I told lois who I really was, where I came from.
...To see this iconic romantic love story
And to see them mature
And deal with the same issues we all deal with.
Helbing: Clark and lois
Have this very similar idea of what a marriage is.
Hoechlin: We're not at the courting phase, we're not at
The, you know, "her finding out about him" phase.
These are two people who have gotten very comfortable
In their life with each other. What? [ chuckles ]
The foundation is very strong, but there is tension.
Should have told them a long time ago.
We just got to be on the same page going forward.
Every decision they make needs to be from both of them.
You think your mom wanted us
To move to smallville and live on the farm?
It's a simpler life.
It's a lot when you have work and kids
And trying to save things from falling down
And things from exploding.
This family needs smallville.
As much as the world needs superman?
Clark and lois are really trying to reacquaint themselves
With not just a town, but with their own family.
But I think she was right.
Really?
♪♪
Jonathan: Are we going to grandma's?
Clark: I think we're overdue.
Great. Smallville.
Place where you can spend a full year in one afternoon.
It's not that bad.
There's a reason why the most famous superhero ever
That probably best embodies the best of us
Was raised in a town like smallville.
A lot of the values that he has as an individual,
He developed in that town.
You remember our boys -- jonathan and jordan.
Helbing: What clark realizes is that
It might just be a good time to take a step back
And slow down their life.
A chance for clark to get back to his roots
And to get away from
The sprawling urban adventures that they've had.
There's a realization like, "maybe metropolis
Is not what's best for our sons right now
And for our relationship."
Clark: All my memories,
My childhood, my parents -- they're all here.
And although on the surface smallville might seem perfect,
There's a lot of problems with smallville.
We had to sell overly foods last year.
I'm really sorry to hear that.
Smallville's changed. There's more than meets the eye.
Everybody leaves. It's almost a ghost town.
Everybody else we know moved away.
She means "bailed."
I felt like that might be a great way to infuse,
You know, what a lot of people are experiencing right now.
Smaller towns are dying in our country.
And who better to give some hope than superman?
Can't be that bad. I mean, it's more the people
That make up a place, right?
Wow. Metropolis boys are really starting to lose their game.
♪♪
Jonathan: Jordan, what are we looking for, anyways?
♪♪
Helbing: Johnson and jordan kent
Are as different as brothers can get.
They're fraternal twins, but they look completely different.
They act completely different.
They're going through the same phases of life
At the same time, right? So it makes them super, super close.
Who are you -- mom?
Someone's got to watch out for you.
You can see that they have the maturity
To still love each other and still make sure
They're okay at the end of each day.
Jonathan and jordan are two really normal
Teenage boys.
Um...Dad?
Oh! Right. Yeah. Okay.
As the children of lois lane and clark kent,
It's a little bit more than most.
It's quite the secret that's exposed.
What are you doing?! Do not touch that!
[ rumbling ]
Oh, my god!
They realize that they're half-kryptonian,
But every kid wants to be special
But is also really scared of standing out.
I'm half-human, half whatever the hell he is!
I understand clark's hesitation to keep that from them.
Your grandparents, they raised me...
Taught me how to control my abilities, how to blend in.
Johns: His powers are passed down.
That's a massive part of the show, too, is that,
How do you help somebody go through what he did?
It's dad's secret, but now it's like, "whoa. Now it's our secret, too."
It's like -- this is something we're gonna have to carry with us our whole lives,
And it's gonna change our whole lives.
[ cellphone rings ]
Clark: Hey, mom. Sorry.
This morning has just been -- dr. Frye?
Hoechlin: One of the most emotional moments
In all the different stories
And the way that the story's been told
Is when his father has his heart attack and dies
In "superman: The movie"
And, reflecting on this loss, clark says, you know,
"all this power, and I couldn't save them."
To see the vulnerability of superman
Makes him really relatable
And makes him, when he is still heroic,
Even more inspiring.
No one ever dreams about their problems,
But every life has them -- even the extraordinary ones.
Superman, the embodiment of the ultimate superhero,
Has a pang of self-doubt.
Everything I do with the boys
Just seems like it blows up in my face.
I think it speaks to his humanity.
Feels like it's my fault that this is all falling apart.
He doesn't think he's iconic, so there isn't that lore
Of superman's been around for 80-plus years.
It's, "I just got here, and I'm just doing everything
That I can to make things better."
Your life falling apart doesn't mean you're special.
It means you're human.
-Thanks for the save. -With a magic arrow, no less.
♪♪
[ glass shatters ]
♪♪
Berlanti: The arrowverse really just started
With a desire to tell the story of arrow and oliver queen,
And it grew because of many of us who work on the shows,
You know, our love either for comic books
But also for the shows.
We enjoy and we love the shared universe.
Happy? Ecstatic.
Apparently, you guys aren't done fooling around. Whoo!
The dc bench is so deep.
You get representation from all walks of life,
Different people from different backgrounds
Coming together and fighting for a singular vision.
My hat's off to greg berlanti
And marc guggenheim and geoff johns.
When they launched "arrow" and then added "flash,"
"legends of tomorrow,"
And "black lightning" and "supergirl,"
They didn't take the easy way out,
Which was just to have each show be independent of one another.
They recognized that, from the fan point of view,
These characters all exist in the same universe.
You want to tag along?
If you don't, I will, smallville.
-[ chuckles ] -who are you?
It's the ultimate sort of adaptation
Of what the dc mythology is about.
A friend.
There's obviously great visual effects,
There's great action sequences.
But the shows work because you care about the characters,
And that's why you can have, like, the silliest episode
Of "legends" or the darkest episode of "batwoman."
You care about the people. Dad?
And when you watch the pilot to "superman & lois,"
It feels very much like that resetting, that restart,
And it's starting a brand-new era of dc universe,
A brand-new era of the arrowverse.
Berlanti: Each show has to stand on its own,
But at its best, they're also still part of a collective.
And like any superhero group, the collective
Is always stronger than the sum of its parts.
♪♪
Comic books in general are such a great metaphor for life
And for the struggles that we all experience.
It's just in a slightly tweaked, heightened version.
I think superhero stories are our greek myths.
Elsass: We all need that light.
We need something that's gonna give us hope.
And superheroes do that. That's what they've always done.
The best ones have emotional stories at their center,
Stories that are very relatable to us,
And they're symbolic or they're metaphors
For what we have to deal with.
New batwoman.
Berlanti: It's clear that right now we're in a time
Where superheroes are more powerful than ever.
Part of that is just by how popular they are,
But the other part of it is how, I think,
Needed they are and what they represent.
When your father first told me, I didn't understand, either.
There is often a correlation
With times of socioeconomic crisis.
You ain't too tough without those extra powers!
You see these people do these amazing things.
They're fighting. They're putting their lives on the line.
It inspires people in a way that other stories don't.
Lee: When we think of heroes,
Especially heroes with incredible powers,
It's reassuring to know that there are people like superman
And they choose to use their powers for good.
♪♪
Told you you'd catch me. [ chuckles ]
Who doesn't want to be able
To imagine waking up and being able to save the world?
Get 'em while they're hot. Thanks.
More juice?
Uh, I think I'm good. Thank you.
We can watch a show and say there are people
Who want things to be better and will do things
To make things better, not just for themselves,
But for people who can't help themselves.
I'm grant gustin from "the flash."
-Hello! It's brec bassinger. -Javicia leslie.
-Nicole maines. -Matt ryan.
Jordan calloway here from cw's "black lightning."
And I just wanted to wish everyone,
Cast and crew from "superman & lois" well.
What I loved most about superman was that he was, like,
Way, you know, beyond his time,
And I think that time that he was in is now.
Not only am I excited
That these characters are back on tv --
Just the fact that they exist in our universe.
To see superman and lois in a different way
That we haven't seen them before -- together, you know?
So excited to see what what "superman & lois" has in store.
Superman has a plethora of powers,
And I am extremely excited to see how they do those
From, like, his super strength to flying.
Anybody that knows me
Knows I've loved this character my entire life.
I've been a fan for a long, long time.
I cannot wait for "superman & lois."
Literally, I grew up watching superman,
So this about to be epic.
[ siren wailing ]
[ helicopter blades whirring ]
Man: Hey, hey!
How long we got before this thing pops its top?
A few minutes, tops!
Now is absolutely the right time for this story.
We could all use an enormous amount of hope.
General lane: Come on, superman.
Guggenheim: Superman's always stood for hope.
The kryptonian "s" glyph on krypton means "hope."
If we can get people to tune in
And sit down with their families and reconnect for an hour.
Then everything that we're doing is worth it.
A lot of what grounds us is family.
Right now is the perfect time to see
The american hero, superman, deal with family.
Tulloch: To have a superhero who really does embody
All good things and kindness and decency,
I think it's really timely.
You were right. I haven't always been there for you.
But I promise you... I will be.
Johns: I'm desperate for more superman stories as a fan,
And I'm desperate to be inspired by somebody.
We need inspiration.
What makes superman who he is is that when he has
The opportunity to do good, he does it.
Berlanti: The world needs him and lois and their family
As much as they ever have.
Lee: For generations of fans that have grown up
On different superman movies or tv shows,
We're gonna get something new and different
Which will continue to keep superman relevant
In our hearts and minds.
Schechter: I'm excited for audiences
To see these characters and see these worlds.
I'm excited for audiences
To fall in love with this family.
They're coming back home, but now clark's a grown man.
He's seen so much more. He's lived so much more life.
So people of all ages will be able to relate to this.
Hoechlin: Kids who are fans of the character
Can watch it and still have an attachment to it,
But people who have been a fan of the character
Since they were young, who are now older and have kids of their own,
Can experience it in a whole new way.
We see so much of ourselves in them,
But we also see what we aspire to be.
♪♪
And now an exclusive sneak peek
At what's to come on "superman & lois."
Clark: After my father died, I felt pretty lost.
Had a lot of questions about who I was...
Why I could do the things I could do.
So I came here, found my answers.
Jor-el: You brought your son to me.
Why?
Each power comes with its own burden.
It's not just what you do. It's also what you don't do.
Jonathan: What's the point of having something special
If you're not allowed to be special?
When your dad gets distracted, lives are at stake.
♪♪
Man: I know you can hear the bomb in my ship.
Where the hell is superman?
Man: Me or them. Make a choice.
Everything you do is a mistake!
I don't know who my kids are anymore.
If you don't like the way something is, change it.
I don't like his priorities changing.
♪♪
It's called being a father!
Clark: I am not throwing away time with my family...
But if anything goes wrong, I will be there.
♪♪