Superman And Lois To End With Season Four

Who guessed that the miracle fourth season of Superman And Lois on The CW would also be its last? If you did, congratulations, you win a leftover candy apple from three days ago.

Everyone expected The CW’s new owners Nexstar to dump any and all traces of mildly budgeted superhero-based content the network was formerly known for, but they threw us a curveball by renewing this one. We weren’t sure how, then we found out: the budget was slashed to the point where the only regular characters are Superman, Lois and the boys. Lex Luthor made his first appearance toward the end of Season 3, and they’re keeping him along with Doomsday…but that’s it for the regular payroll. We’re not sure who our heroes are going to talk to besides each other, or how they’re going to explain how empty Smallville is now.

Anyway, Season 4 was such a longshot that Season 5 was even more unlikely, so they’re wisely bowing out now. “Over the last three seasons, Superman & Lois redefined both the superhero genre and family drama as Tyler, Elizabeth and the entire cast effortlessly portrayed these classic characters with new layers of depth and complexity that had never before been explored in the Superman universe,” CW president Brad Schwartz says in a statement. “We are grateful for the years of hard work and graceful storytelling from the show’s writers, producers, actors and crew, as well as our terrific partners at Warner Bros. Television and Berlanti Productions. As Superman embarks on his final flight, the team is leaving us with an absolutely epic 10-episode must-watch-every-minute farewell to one of the most legendary CW families ever.”

For years, The CW was “The Network For The Rest Of Us”…a place to escape the uniformity of most network television and see all sorts of bizarre things. But there’s no money in that anymore, and the network is no longer a co-production of CBS and WB. So it’s mostly Canadian imports and golf from here, until the network inevitably disappears. We miss it already.

No one knows when Season 4 of Superman And Lois will appear. It was originally planned for early 2024, but the strike currently makes it impossible to film, even for Superman (who is too purehearted to cross a picket line).