Lex Luthor

When Superman (2025) begins, Lex has been working to bring the hero down for a long time. He studies every one of Superman's fights, runs a team that includes the Engineer, a metahuman with nanotech in her body, and hides an ace up his sleeve: the Hammer of Boravia, the masked man who hands Superman the first loss of his life.

Lex also has a private prison inside a pocket universe, linked to Metropolis by portals. He locks up anyone who gets in his way there, and keeps a room full of monkeys that spend all day posting attacks on Superman online. In public, he sells himself as a U.S. government adviser on the Kryptonian threat. Behind the scenes, he made a deal with Boravia's president, Vasil Ghurkos: he'd help with the invasion of Jarhanpur in exchange for a piece of the country to rule.

While Superman fights a giant monster in Metropolis, Lex breaks into the Fortress of Solitude, kidnaps Krypto, and restores the damaged part of Jor-El and Lara's message. In it, the birth parents tell their son to rule the Earth. Lex leaks the video and public opinion flips overnight.

With the hero in government custody, Lex takes him to the pocket-universe prison. He uses Metamorpho's baby son to force him to create Kryptonite and leaves Superman powerless. To prove he isn't bluffing, he kills a prisoner, Malik Ali, right in front of him.

When Superman escapes, Lex opens an unstable portal that cracks Metropolis open and puts the city at risk. The Hammer of Boravia is revealed to be Ultraman, a Superman clone created by Lex and controlled remotely by him. Ultraman ends up pulled into a black hole.

The one who takes Lex down is an insider: Eve Teschmacher, his girlfriend, sends Jimmy Olsen photos and proof of the Boravia deal. The scheme goes public and Lex is arrested. In the final face-off, his motive becomes clear: Lex can't accept that someone was born with that much power without doing anything to earn it. Superman answers that he's just as human as Lex.

Lex returns in Peacemaker season 2, episode 6, "Ignorance Is Chris." He's at Belle Reve, serving a 265-year sentence. Rick Flag Sr., head of A.R.G.U.S., goes there looking for help finding Peacemaker and the portal to another dimension he's hiding. Flag offers a shot at redemption and a transfer to a prison with no metahumans. In return, Lex has to provide scanners to track both. He takes the deal.

In the next episode, Sydney Happersen, Lex's former aide at LuthorCorp, uses Lex's communications hub to locate the portal. James Gunn called Lex's scene an important step for the future of the DCU.

Nicholas Hoult returns in Man of Tomorrow, set for July 9, 2027, written and directed by James Gunn. The premise announced by the studio: Superman and Lex Luthor reluctantly team up to face a bigger threat, the superintelligent Brainiac, played by Lars Eidinger. The movie hasn't been released yet.

Lex Luthor first appeared in Action Comics #23 in 1940, created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. He started out as a mad scientist and became a billionaire businessman in John Byrne's 1986 reboot. In the comics he even became President of the United States and, at several points, teamed up with Superman against bigger threats, an idea Man of Tomorrow is set to use.