It’s a great time for Superman fans, with the Man of Steel soaring into movies, TV, animation and comics. To help us stay on top of it, writer Tim Beedle shares what's grabbed his attention and why in this monthly Super-Family column.

We started off 2025 by doing something a little bit different here in Super Here For… The first six months of the year were devoted to revisiting all of the earlier Superman live action movies, from Christopher Reeve’s debut to Henry Cavill’s Man of Steel. Our July column, of course, was devoted to James Gunn’s Superman, which means that it’s a taken a full eight months before our first comics-focused column of 2025.

So, I hope you’ll forgive me for devoting it to something that took place a bit earlier this year. In late 2024, due to the events of Absolute Power, Lois Lane gained abilities similar to Superman’s. She seemed to waste no time in putting her new powers to use, immediately joining her husband in taking to the skies as Superwoman to help the people of Metropolis. Unsurprisingly, Lois proved to be quite an effective superhero, even joining the Justice League for a mission when Superman was unable to. She helped the Man of Steel defeat Doomsday, fought crime with Supergirl and Lana Lang and saved countless lives. There’s little doubt that Lois Lane getting superpowers was a good thing for the people of Metropolis and for the world.

But I’m still glad she lost them.

That happened a couple of months ago, after she unleashed what appeared to be a massive solar flare in the pages of Superman #25. The loss was confirmed by the Atom and Mr. Terrific one issue later, who aren’t sure if they’ll ever return. It’s clearly a shock to Superman, who a few pages later looks like he’s entertaining Lex Luthor’s offer to restore Lois’s powers. But Lois herself seems to be okay with it, something I’ll admit I was grateful to see.

Look, it’s not like I want to see Lois go through the emotional roller coaster of gaining remarkable abilities and then having them ripped away from her. No one likes having gifts taken away from them. But the truth is, I think Lois can do a lot more good for her city and for us as readers without her powers.

The reason is because as much as she wanted to deny it, Lois was neglecting her responsibilities at the Daily Planet. As the Editor-in-Chief, her role is pivotal for the paper to be able to function—let alone publish the sort of unyielding stories on which they built their reputation. Lois is a very capable woman, and as far as we know, the Planet was able to continue publishing while she was Superwoman, but we saw a number of times where Lois was too distracted to write or too tempted by the desire to see who might need Superwoman’s help to edit the stories that were piling up on her desk.

Metropolis needs the Daily Planet, but perhaps more importantly, we need the Planet’s best journalist. We need to see Lois searching for truth, sourcing all of her information and relentlessly questioning those in power. Mainstream media has never been less trusted than it is right now, in part because most people don’t realize how much scrutiny is given to every article that a newspaper like the Daily Planet publishes. I think it’s really important that they see that, and Lois—as a character Superman fans have known and trusted for years—can provide a great example of it. And that’s only the beginning. She can also show the bravery and resourcefulness it takes to question power and hold our executives and our elected leaders to the standards we demand of them. As an investigative journalist, she can demonstrate how news outlets can bring hidden, often deceitful truths to light. She can show how journalists, editors and newspapers work for the benefit of everyday people like us.

That’s all really important, and the remarkable thing is that it’s only half of the crucial role Lois plays as a non-powered individual. I wrote about this when I discussed Superman II earlier this year, but I think it’s extremely important that Kal-El has chosen to live his life with a human woman. Putting aside the romantic elements of their relationship, Lois Lane provides a pivotal role in Clark’s life in the way she keeps him grounded and offers a daily reminder of why humanity is worth fighting for. She’s a living, breathing example of the very best of us, which I think is important because the second most important non-powered human in Clark’s life is Lex Luthor—who epitomizes the absolute worst in us.

Without Lois, alone up at the Fortress of Solitude, how long might it be until one of Lex’s ruthless schemes, accompanied by scores of TV commentators defending it, finally causes Superman to question whether we’re worth all of the trouble? And from there, the truly dark turn of realizing how easy it would be for him to assert order over all of us by force isn’t all that far removed.

To be fair, it’s not just Lois who prevents this. We can’t forget Jonathan and Martha Kent, or Kal-El’s other human friends like Bruce Wayne and Oliver Queen, but Lois has always been Superman’s due north. Her influence over who he is and the hero he’s become can’t be denied, and if you doubt this…well, think about how bad things get in the one popular storyline where he loses her.

Would Superman have suddenly broken bad if Lois had kept her powers? Of course not. Lois was still Lois, after all. There’s even an argument to be made that the risk of Superman coming to resent humankind may be less if he didn’t have to rescue Lois from evil people quite so often. But considering how many superhumans there are in the Super-Family, I like having at least one very capable human within it as well.

At least, until Zod shows up blaming Lois for stealing his powers. If that happens and Lex Luthor really can bring back Superwoman, then all bets are off.
 

Tim Beedle covers movies, TV and comics for DC.com, writes our monthly Superman column, "Super Here For...", and is a regular contributor to the Couch Club, our recurring television column. Follow him on Bluesky at @TimBeedle and on Instagram at @notabard.

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed in this feature are solely those of Tim Beedle and do not necessarily reflect those of DC or Warner Bros. Discovery, nor should they be read as confirmation or denial of future DC plans.