Kara Zor-El introduced herself to us last summer by crashing into the Fortress of Solitude and asking the host why he moved the door. She took a more polite path to the fore last Sunday in the basement of a New York City hotel, emerging onto a small stage wide-eyed and slightly amused.
“It’s gonna happen. Shit,” said Zor-El, as given human form by Milly Alcock.
You can forgive the actress her wonderment. Supergirl has had a long flight to the present, having begun development in 2018, gotten postponed amid the pandemic in 2020, scrapped by new Warner Bros Discovery chief David Zaslav in 2022 and then retooled as part of James Gunn’s transitioning of the DCEU to the DCU in 2023.
So long ago did this all start, of course, that the House of the Dragon star wasn’t initially cast as the character. That honor belonged to Sasha Calle, who even appeared in 2023’s The Flash. But with Alcock and the directorial hand of Craig Gillespie (I, Tonya) on board and the film now shot, Supergirl could finally begin its slow marketing rollout ahead of its theatrical release on June 26.
James Gunn speaks to Milly Alcock about ‘Supergirl’ at Artspace at Public Hotel in New York City on December 7, 2025. The movie will look to take the character in a new messily human direction when it opens in June
Steven Zeitchik
In this incarnation, according to a teaser trailer showed at the hotel event and dropped online Thursday, Kara Zor-el is a universe-hopping party girl in her early 20s thrown into some intergalactic battles after a particularly self-pitying solitary birthday binge; she is on a mission of vengeance on behalf of the alien girl Ruthye and gets in deeper than she realizes. Ana Nogueira’s script, inspired by the comic-book miniseries Supergirl: Women of Tomorrow by Tom King and Bilquis Evely, leans hard into the character’s messiness.
“This is really an anti-hero story. She’s got a lot of demons, a lot of baggage coming into this, which is very different forms where superman is in his life,” Gillespie told the New York crowd.
Added Gunn from the stage. “So many times female superheroes are so perfect. She’s not that at all.”
He paused. “Like male superheroes have been allowed to be for a while.”
The character showed her unvarnished side on-screen, at one point noting that Superman “sees the good in everyone, and I see the truth.”
The event had a bit of an unexpected vibe, with attendees going Comic-Con crazy inside the space while, outside it, the company making the film had just been cast into extraordinary limbo. Only three days earlier its CEO Zaslav said Warner Bros. would be sold to Netflix, and the day after the event Paramount owner David Ellison would launch a hostile takeover bid for the studio, making the room feel a little like a bar mitzvah whose guests had just been told an asteroid was heading toward earth; sure, the world may end tomorrow, but tonight can’t we just hang out and do the Dougie?
At the very least this film would not be disrupted by the corporate drama, as any new owner would not be likely to clear regulatory hurdles and close the deal before early 2027 (incidentally, the same time that the current contracts expire for Gunn and his DC Studios co-chief and producing partner Peter Safran).
And so more important matters were at hand: getting a new movie off on the right boot. Supergirl’s journey to the big screen has been hexed, in a sense, dating all the way back to 1984 and the Helen Slater bombfest and all the uncertainty leading up to the Superman release. But Gunn and Safran think a whole new day dawns.
Do you feel like you’re in a much better spot, The Hollywood Reporter, asked Gunn? “Oh, yeah,” he said emphatically.
Safran believes the franchise is in a much different position than even six months ago, too.
“We came in as a little bit of the underdog,” the producer and executive told THR Sunday at the event as he reflected about the summer release of Superman. Asked if the box office success of the film raised expectations to the point that he and Gunn had a target on their back, the producer waved aside the concern. “Nah,” he said. “Because we’re just getting started.”