Supergirl Will Have a Bigger Role in the DCU Than First Thought

By this point, everyone knows that in addition to Big Blue, the Man of Steel, and the Last Son of Krypton, one of Superman’s nicknames is the Man of Tomorrow, thanks to the title James Gunn has chosen for his Superman sequel. Even though the appellation could also refer to co-lead Lex Luthor, the term usually applies to Clark Kent, thanks to the sci-fi elements of his origin story, with its exploding planets and babies in rockets.

But with some modifications, the term can also be applied to his cousin Kara Zor-El, especially in the new DCU. Variety has revealed that Milly Alcock will be reprising her role as Supergirl for Man of Tomorrow. “She’s a major part of what we’re doing,” said DC Studios co-head Peter Safran, referring not just to the next movie but the shared universe in general.

It may defy conventional logic to put Supergirl at the center of a universe, especially when Superman is already there. Why do you need two people with similar backstories and power sets, especially when those powers are exactly the same?

The answer is clear to anyone who has seen the marketing for Supergirl. Where Gunn used “Look Up” as the tagline for Superman, Supergirl‘s tagline is “Look Out.” The former speaks to the sense of hope and awe inspired by Kal-El, an alien who came to this planet as a baby and devotes his life to making things better for everyone.

As we saw in the final scenes of that film, Supergirl is a little more messy, someone perfectly happy to leave her dog with her cousin so she can go on an interplanetary drinking binge. Trailers for the film have further established that Kara grew up on Argo City, a portion of Krypton initially shielded from the planet’s collapse, and was nearly grown when she lost her parents and everyone she knew. Worse, she arrived on Earth to discover that she had incredible powers, but that her cousin was already established as a beloved hero, putting her forever in his shadow.

Thanks to that background, Supergirl isn’t so much a copy of Superman as she is a twist on the main concept, which means that there’s room for both in the center of the DCU. Gunn has a clear model for this approach to the two Kryptonians in the comics. Although the first version of Supergirl, who debuted in Action Comics #252 (1959) was largely similar to her cousin and thus a redundancy on the Justice League, later variations allowed her to do things that Kal-El couldn’t.

The Matrix Supergirl, a shapeshifting alien in the form of Kara Zor-El brought a new sci-fi twist and more complicated morality to the character, as did the Earthborn Angel version, which used magic to bond the Matrix alien to a normal teenager. Even the original Kara Zor-El has found her own place in the universe, either palling around with teens Batgirl and Robin, going to the future to be the Superman stand-in for a more cynical lineup of the Legion of Super-Heroes, becoming a member of the rage-filled Red Lantern Corps, or having more lighthearted adventures, as in the current run by Sophie Campbell.

Simply put, Supergirl has proven to be a more elastic, mutable character than Superman (even when she’s not a literal shapeshifter). Putting her alongside Superman isn’t a redundancy—it’s an expansion, giving Gunn and Safran more storytelling possibilities for their universe, today and tomorrow.

Supergirl comes to theaters on June 26, 2026.