Showrunner Todd Helbing revealed that Doomsday will appear on Superman & Lois season 2, episode 3. Superman & Lois, which began airing its first season on The CW on February 23, 2021, is one of the newest entries in the Arrowverse, the collection of interconnected television shows based on characters in the DC Comics universe. The series, which tells the story of Tyler Hoechlin as Clark Kent and Elizabeth Tulloch as Lois Lane as they attempt to navigate being working parents, follows up on the characters after they were introduced on The CW's Supergirl.
On the Superman & Lois season 2 premiere, there was a closing tease that explained the source of the mysterious earthquake that occurred earlier in the episode. Viewers saw that the tremors were caused by a fist emerging from the crust of the Earth, an image evoking one of the iconic comic book covers featuring the villain Doomsday. The villain, who is a genetically engineered Kryptonian beast, was created in the early '90s to present the hero with a foe of such prodigious strength that it challenged Superman's incredible powers.
Speaking with EW, Superman & Lois showrunner Todd Helbing spoke a little more about that teased villain. He explained that the character they're introducing is indeed Doomsday, who will be hinted at yet again in next week's episode before being fully revealed in episode 3, titled, appropriately, "The Thing in the Mines." With the introduction of this villain, they will attempt to do the trick they have perfected throughout the Arrowverse, which is "use assumptions about a character, and then flipping that." Read the full quote below:
That [tease] is our homage to a classic Doomsday cover. Then in episode 2, you're going to see him a little bit more. In episode 3, you'll get the full reveal.
There's so much lore [and] mythology in the Superman universe that we feel it's our obligation to tell a unique story. We take inspirations from the comics as much as possible, and then we try to twist it. We did the same thing here.
I think one of the things that we all really dig about the comic book world, but particularly with the villains, is finding ways to use assumptions about a character, and then flipping that, and finding ways to explain things that haven't been explained in the comics, like the use of something, or why a character does a certain thing. It'll all be revealed in episode 3, but there are a couple little things that we're doing that I can't explain too much, because I'll give it away, but you'll see how we're influenced by certain pieces and why we used it to create work that is hopefully a cool reveal.
Doomsday's most recent appearance in live-action DC material was in the 2016 film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which takes place in the DC Extended Universe of films rather than the Arrowverse. That film saw Doomsday achieve his comic book goal of killing Superman (before he was resurrected in Justice League the following year). However, that version of Doomsday is likely entirely different - in personality, design, and power set - from what the Arrowverse is about to set upon their own version of the caped crusader.
Superman & Lois is a much more light-hearted series than the films involving Henry Cavill's Superman. Knowing the way the series typically approaches its comic book characters, Doomsday will probably be more obviously played by a human being and imbued with more of a unique persona. Although the character was played by Robin Atkin Downes in Dawn of Justice, it was mostly a CGI monstrosity with no recognizable human traits.
Source: EW