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Superman & Lois Boss Breaks Down Clark's Moment of Anger: 'If There Was Even an Ounce of Evil in Him...'

Andy Swift
·5 min read

Just when Jordan thought he was getting his powers under control, along came Tuesday’s midseason premiere of Superman & Lois to knock him (and his entire family) down a peg.

Jordan’s troubles began with a morning headache and a near-meltdown at school, forcing Clark to reconsider letting his son play in the big football game against Metropolis — and if he could go back in time, he definitely wouldn’t have let him. After leading his team to victory, Jordan was the victim of a pile-up instigated by his former bullies, triggering a second near-meltdown. (Poor Clark. Muffling Jordan’s laser beams in his hand had to have been painful, even for Superman.)

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And Jordan’s troubles didn’t end there. While Clark flew off to rescue Sarah from Tag’s clutches (another mess!), Jordan and Jonathan joined their teammates for some celebratory drinking… only to run into their on-field rivals, who were itching for an off-field rematch. With Clark busy doing Super stuff, it was Jonathan who had to hold Jordan back, breaking his own arm in the process.

The overwhelming guilt of hurting Jonathan and lying to Sarah eventually became too much for Jordan to handle, triggering a seizure. The episode ended with a terrified Clark clutching his son and rushing him to the Fortress of Solitude.

Elsewhere in the hour, “Marcus” (aka Captain Luthor) helped Lois sneak into the mines, where they stumbled upon a buttload of X-Kryptonite. Leslie tried to prevent their escape, but a single shot from Marcus’ ray gun made quick work of Morgan Edge’s right-hand woman. Naturally, Lois had a million questions about what went down, to which Marcus would only respond, “I am trying to prevent something bad from happening.”

Below, showrunner Todd Helbing answers a few of our burning questions about the episode:

TVLINE | The moment that’s sticking with me is when Superman confronted the soldier who shot at him. Is this a sign of Captain Luthor’s warning coming true?
When Captain Luthor gave Sam that medallion in Episode 2, he said, “He’s not what you think he is.” So we are looking for as many places as we can to have Superman look like Kal-El from the other earth. We do it again in Episode 7 in a different way. We’re trying to get Superman to get angry as much as possible, which is hard to do sometimes. He’s the most even-keeled guy on the planet.

TVLINE | And of course he was only at odds with the Army because someone like him was being mistreated. Even as the “bad guy,” he’s not the bad guy.
Well, if you’re Captain Luthor, you’re seeing it slightly differently. But we know who he is. In that moment when he speeds up to the soldier and tells him to stand down, if there was an ounce of evil in him, he would have just taken that dude out. It’s like that speech he gives to Jordan at the end. He’s constantly tested, but he has to prove to people that they can trust him.

TVLINE | I really do find myself caring just as much about Clark as I do about Superman.
That was important to us. Superman to me was always presented as the real identity and Clark was the cover. But Clark is the guy! He grew up in a small town, which is where all of his morals and values come from. Being part of that community influenced him, and that sticks with you for a long time. It always felt to me like Clark was the real person and Superman is the alter ego. He really doesn’t want to be held up on this pedestal. He just wants to do a good job and save as many people as he can and then go back to being Clark.

TVLINE | Speaking of alter egos, I enjoyed Lois’ team-up with “Marcus.” But am I crazy for feeling sorry for Leslie when he blasted her with that ray gun? She looked so helpless just lying there.
Leslie is someone you’re not really sure about yet. She kind of gets snapped at by Edge a lot, so you don’t know what that relationship is like right now. Out of any character right now, we know the least about her, but you’ll get more about who she is — her whole backstory.

TVLINE | I also find myself not loving Kyle. I feel like he’s one step away from joining the dark side.
He has some vices that he turns to — maybe too much — so we’re going to get into that a little bit. We’re also going to get underneath what the issues are between him and Sarah, and him and Lana, and their family — what the real trouble is. We explore that for a while.

TVLINE | Even though Jordan insists he isn’t hiding anything from her, will Sarah continue investigating the rumors about him?
Let’s just say that there’s other stuff that starts to happen in town that helps Jordan out in that regard.

Your thoughts on Superman & Lois‘ return? Grade the episode below, then drop a comment with your full review.

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