DC Could Have Its Own Version Of No Way Home With Superman

The DCU could have its own Spider-Man: No Way Home style multiverse event with Superman. For the first time in years, the Man of Steel is finally back into the DCU’s plans after Henry Cavill’s return as Superman. With the formation of DC Studios, the future roadmap of the DCU is being written by co-CEOs James Gunn and Peter Safran, with Superman sure to be one of the most key DCU players moving ahead.

One aspect of the DCU franchise’s future is the exploration of its multiverse, which The Flash is set to open the doors of upon its release. Marvel and Sony’s 2021 mega-hit Spider-Man: No Way Home also tells its own multiverse story with Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield, and Tom Holland’s Spider-Men. With the exact details of how the DCU will explore its own multiverse still a secret, a No Way Home-esque meeting of different versions of Superman could be a perfect story for the franchise to dive into.

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DC’s Multiverse Needs More Than Just Multiple Versions Of Different Characters

While DC has introduced the Multiverse with Crisis On Infinite Earths and will continue ahead on this path with The Flash, the storytelling freedoms this opens also have certain limitations if not utilized well. With the multiverse concept enabling multiple versions of one character to exist at a time, there is also an inherent need to give each version distinct traits that show different facets of their mythos. No Way Home‘s Spider-Man team-up did this very well, but without doing so, the gimmick amounts to little more than several actors playing the same character.

No Way Home had the advantage of Maguire, Garfield, and Holland’s versions of Spider-Man being distinctly different takes on the hero, which made seeing the three team-up a fun ride for audiences. Meanwhile, DC itself has already headed down that road with its different versions of Batman, via Ben Affleck’s scarred street fighter of the night and Robert Pattinson’s sleuth-like detective in The Batman. Michael Keaton’s returning Batman in The Flash will likely continue his gothic eccentricity seen in Tim Burton’s Batman films, affording audiences three radically different versions of Batman at once. Similarly, for Superman, the groundwork has similar been laid.

Cavill, Hoechlin, & Routh Channel Different Sides Of Superman

Henry Cavill’s returning Superman has evolved from an outsider grappling with self-doubt to a fully confident beacon of hope of the course of his four appearances, while Hoechlin and Routh have each tackled the Man of Steel differently. Routh’s Superman, as the modern embodiment of Christopher Reeve’s version, was last seen as the Kingdom Come-inspired Superman with gray temples in Crisis On Infinite Earths.

Meanwhile, Hoechlin (having portrayed five different multiversal variations of Superman himself) has been primarily seen as a version of Clark Kent trading journalism for the challenges of raising teenage sons on Superman & Lois. While Cavill, Hoechlin, and Routh each project the purity of Superman, their individual versions of Kal-El also stand apart, each a compelling version of the character on his own. That individuality between their Men of Steel would make the three of them together something really special to see for audiences.

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DC’s Superman Crossover Could Add Another Superman

While No Way Home had three versions of Spider-Man for audiences to keep up with, a similar multiversal story could also up the ante with a fourth Superman, namely Tom Welling of Smallville fame. Welling established a widely beloved and popular version of Clark Kent on Smallville, with the series showing his formative years in the lead up to becoming Superman. Welling has not left Smallville behind either, co-hosting the Talkville Podcast with Michael Rosenbaum and pitching an animated continuation of the show, along with he and Erica Durance expressing interest in more Smallville adventures.

Though Welling’s last appearance as Clark Kent showed him as a voluntarily de-powered husband and father on Crisis On Infinite Earths, restoring his powers for a necessary mission would hardly be impossible with the right story. Even better, with Welling having never been fully showcased on camera in his Superman garb (other than in the Smallville season 11 comic book series), a multiversal crossover with Cavill, Hoechlin, and Routh could be just the event to finally show him bearing Kal-El’s S-shield and red cape at last.

How The Superman Multiverse Event Could Happen

For any meeting of the various film and television versions of Superman to happen, telling a unique story to distinguish it from No Way Home would be necessary to avoid comparisons between the two as much as possible. The Flash’s multiverse story could help facilitate that with Cavill back as the DCU’s Superman, and the movie itself known to feature multiple versions of Barry Allen. This discovery could prompt Cavill’s Man of Steel to determine that a meeting of his own multiversal counterparts might be necessary, with Barry helping make that happen.

Indeed, The Flash revealing time-travel and multiverse hopping can have great impacts on the wider multiverse, and could lead Cavill’s Superman to determine a unity between different heroes of alternate Earths is necessary to maintain stability amongst them. With the mission to maintain the equilibrium of the multiverse, Cavill’s Superman could convene his own Kryptonian council of sorts, with Hoechlin, Routh, and Welling joining him in establishing a set of procedures to keep the multiverse stable. Naturally, that would open the door for an assortment of villains to oppose the Superman of Infinite Earths, from the Anti-Monitor to Ray Porter’s Darkseid.

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One of the major mandates of DC Studios lies in bringing clarity to the DCU’s future, which has infamously been in a flux for years, and Cavill’s return as the DCU’s Superman is a big first step in accomplishing that goal. Still, even after the debut of The Flash, the DCEU cannot abandon the multiverse with the growing popularity of multiverse stories (even outside of superhero movies, as Everything Everywhere All At Once shows). With Cavill donning Superman’s red cape again, a love letter to the Man of Steel in the vein of Spider-Man: No Way Home could well be the secret weapon to keeping Superman from falling through the big-screen cracks again.

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