The CW is making room for Supergirl’s Tyler Hoechlin and Elizabeth Tulloch’s Clark Kent/Superman and Lois Lane respectively as Superman and Lois is in the works for next season. The Arrowverse spin-off is set to follow the iconic couple as they deal with parenthood. While this will be their own show, several Superman characters have already appeared in the Kara Zor-El-led drama for the last five years. From villains and heroes alike, the Girl of Steel has faced several familiar faces from the Superman lore. When it comes to the villains, many of them have come and left, with only a few remaining, including Jon Cryer’s Lex Luthor. With the Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover coming up, it might allow the spin-off to redo some of those iconic Superman foes.
With the comic storyline focusing heavily on merging worlds and rewriting continuity, it benefits Superman and Lois greatly. Given what has happened to some of Clark’s enemies on Supergirl, the Crisis could essentially reboot some of them so they can appear on his show. With that said, these are the ten Superman villains that Crisis on Infinite Earths should reboot for Superman and Lois.
Maxwell Lord
Following the first season, we have not seen the return of Maxwell Lord (Peter Facinelli) even once. The series never even followed up with the mysterious scene between him and General Lance (Glenn Morshower) after getting the Omegahedron in his possession.
In this version of the character, Maxwell isn’t a metahuman like his comic counterpart where he can control minds. Whether it would be Facinelli or a new actor in the role, Crisis could get a do-over with Maxwell where he has his powers and can play a larger role than he did on Supergirl.
Morgan Edge
While mostly associated as a member of Intergang, Supergirl’s version of Morgan Edge (Adrian Pasdar) didn’t have that history. During the fourth season, he is mostly there to serve as a foe for Lena Luthor (Katie McGrath) for a handful of episodes.
The Arrowverse has yet to really explore Intergang other than being name-dropped a few times. If the crossover alters Morgan, he could appear on Superman and Lois by bringing that organization into play.
Mxyzlptk
Mister Mxyzptlk (Peter Gadiot), despite being a literal imp from the Fifth Dimension in the comics, had a very human form on Supergirl. The show’s version of the iconic villain was restricted to just be there to win Kara’s love.
With the character having larger mythology, the Crisis could re-introduce the character and, this time, try to depict him closer to the comic version. A rebooted version could also be a way for Supergirl as well as Superman and Lois to have a shared villain jumping between the two shows.
Silver Banshee
The first season had Kara go up against Siobhan Smythe (Italia Ricci) a.k.a. Silver Banshee, a shared foe between the two cousins in the comics. While this version doesn’t have a history with Hoechlin’s Man of Steel, Crisis could be the beginning of that character coming back into play.
The crossover doesn’t really have to alter the character’s history, it’s mostly the design. Despite resembling her comic look, a re-do might be appropriate with the Silver Banshee’s TV look having been received with mixed feelings back in season one.
Toyman
One of the bigger Superman villains in the comics is Winslow Schott a.k.a. Toyman. On Supergirl, Winslow (Henry Czerny) was both a foe for Superman as well as the father of Winn Schott (Jeremy Jordan.)
Despite only having appeared once, the character was killed off-screen in the third season. Given that he is one of the creepier villains in the DC lore, it wouldn’t be the worst idea the Crisis resurrected him and gave the villain a spot on the spin-off as a recurring foe.
Maxima
While it was brief, Maxima had a short guest spot in the show’s penultimate episode in season one. Played by Eve Torres Gracie, Maxima was a prisoner at the D.E.O. and almost escaped during the Myriad storyline. But it didn’t take long before she was stopped and locked up again.
A Crisis reboot could allow the character to get a shot at a bigger arc as a foe for both Clark and Kara. Maxima deserves to be explored more in the Arrowverse and it would be genuinely fun to see Torres return to the role for an expanded arc.
Parasite
One of Superman’s most powerful villains is Parasite and while the Rudy Jones (William Mapother) version appeared in season two, the foe was quickly killed off. Given the character’s size in the comics, it was a big mistake for the series to kill him off after just one episode.
Since the character can cause real trouble for the Man of Tomorrow, a retcon through Crisis is more than appropriate. This time around, Rudy could be portrayed as having had a long history with the heroes of the House of El for the spin-off.
Metallo
Another iconic Superman foe that Supergirl killed off after just three episodes was Metallo. John Corben (Fredrick Schmidt) became the famous Kryptonite-based antagonist in the second season when Hoechlin’s Superman made his debut in the same episode.
It would be hard to imagine not having Metallo as a regular villain on a Superman series which is why Crisis can give Corben another chance. This time, however, they should have him look like Metallo-X from the Crisis on Earth-X crossover where he looked more cybernetic.
Mercy and Otis Graves
Assuming that Lex joins Superman and Lois, you got to have Mercy and Otis. Appearing the fourth season, played by Rhona Mitra and Robert Baker respectively, the Graves siblings ended up killed off before the season was over. It was always weird that two characters like them were introduced only to be killed off throughout the season.
It didn’t help that they also had Otis become the third Metallo in the series which didn’t keep him alive by the end of it. If Lex does become a regular character in this spin-off, it wouldn’t hurt if Crisis resurrected Mercy and Otis so they can continue to team-up with the famous Luthor baddie.
General Zod
Despite appearing in the season two finale, we have yet to fully meet General Zod in the flesh. Played by Mark Gibbon as a hallucination to Clark under the effect of Silver Kryptonite, the show has set up a weird mythology for Zod so far. At some point, the iconic General was killed off during a clash with Superman. But somehow in the 31st century, Zod was resurrected and has fought the Legion of Super-Heroes.
At some point, it would be proper to have Superman and Lois bring Zod into the series. To do that, Crisis would have to reboot the villain to make his history a bit less convoluted. Since Zod is such a big and important character in Superman’s history, we hope the crossover sets up for the character to appear down the line.