News Supergirl Supergirl Director Explains Why the Movie Doesn’t Look Like Woman of Tomorrow It turns out Craig Gillespie initially avoided looking at Woman of Tomorrow when crafting the film’s visuals By Matthew Byrd | Published on June 29, 2026 Photo: DC Studios Comment 0 Share New Share Photo: DC Studios Note: This article contains spoilers for Woman of Tomorrow and Supergirl. It’s been a rough start for DC Studios’ Supergirl after a largely negative critical reception preceded what is shaping up to be a disappointing box office run. While responses to the film vary, many criticisms so far have focused on the movie’s loose relationship with its acclaimed source material, the Tom King graphic novel Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow. The movie lacks artist Bilquis Evely’s colorful cosmic visuals and makes several crucial changes to the graphic novel’s storyline.  While that is the nature of the beast when it comes to adaptations, some have wondered if some of the film’s flaws could have been addressed if it had simply stuck to the Woman of Tomorrow story and style a bit closer. As more of a general talking point, fans are simply wondering why the movie deviated so much from source material it once shared a name with.  Well, in a series of interviews released just before and immediately after Supergirl’s debut, we seemingly got a few answers to some of the more pressing questions regarding some of Supergirl’s biggest changes. For instance, in an interview with EveryManCinema, Supergirl director Craig Gillespie was asked about the film’s look, which is much darker than the pages of the incredibly colorful Woman of Tomorrow comic. According to Gillespie, the difference in visual style can be partially attributed to the fact that he initially avoided looking at Woman of Tomorrow when crafting his own visual vision for the film.  “I very deliberately didn’t look at Tom King’s book when I first got the script,” Gillespie says of Woman of Tomorrow. “I went off of Ana [Nogueira’s] script, and there was a grit to that.” Gillespie goes on to explain that Kara visits different worlds that are “on the fringe of society.” Gillespie says he really wanted to emphasize the nature of those worlds through the visuals. “I wanted to feel the poverty. I wanted to feel the crime and the dust and the texture,” Gillespie explains. “I wanted it to feel like this space we hadn’t been before. There’s this real opportunity to get into the underworld. I started with that and pulled a lot of visuals before I went back and looked at the comic book.” Gillespie notes that his concept designs were well-received by James Gunn and the DC Studios brass and were ultimately the basis of the movie’s look. Interestingly, Gillespie also says that he deliberately avoided showing Supergirl in her iconic costume until he absolutely had to.  “I wanted to prolong her not being in the superhero outfit as long as possible and give her this grit,” Gillespie says. “They leaned into it, which was amazing.” As for Ana Nogueira’s script, that too features quite a few notable changes to Woman of Tomorrow. The biggest change may be the addition of Lobo as a major character. Lobo was intended to be part of the original Woman of Tomorrow story but was ultimately cut. According to Nogueira, the decision to include Lobo came from above.  “So that was brought to me,” Nogueira told Variety regarding Lobo’s addition. “[Gunn and Safran] were like, ‘We want to do Woman of Tomorrow, and we want you to find a way to put Lobo in. We think Lobo has a place in this…’ But at the same time, it also makes sense, because it’s intergalactic. It’s hard to bring Lobo to Earth — he’s always taken place in outer space — so they’re like, ‘This is an opportunity to bring in this character that would be hard to bring in.'” Nogueira also praises Jason Momoa’s performance as Lobo in the movie and notes that Tom King’s original vision for Woman of Tomorrow had Lobo and Kara as the two main characters. However, Nogueira looked back to Woman of Tomorrow’s True Grit roots and ultimately based her vision of the character on Texas Ranger, LaBoeuf, who she described as a “frenemy.” As for the other notable change to Woman of Tomorrow, Supergirl’s ending, Nogueira explains that the decision to not show Ruthye killing Krem came down to matters of tone and the differences between the storytelling formats.  “The ending between Kara and Krem was always in it, from the pitch — truly from the very beginning,” Nogueira reveals. “Because the comic ends with Ruthye killing him, but in the far, far future. We knew we weren’t gonna be able to do that kind of time jump, and I find it’s quite a dark ending of the comic. He essentially has changed, and she kills him anyway, because she still just has this anger, and you understand there’s this element of deserve, right? So, we wanted to craft a villain who would deserve this, but we also wanted Kara to really care about preserving Ruthye’s innocence, and to feel like she could take on [killing him], that she could be the one to bring justice to this man, and do it without burdening this child. It’s different for Supergirl, and I think it will feel different for audiences.” Nogueira also notes that she finds it fascinating that this change means that Supergirl and Superman display two distinct “moral compasses,” and that she’s excited to see where all of that leads. However, she confesses that she has no idea what happens to the two characters in the upcoming Superman film Man of Tomorrow.[end-mark] The post <i>Supergirl</i> Director Explains Why the Movie Doesn’t Look Like <i>Woman of Tomorrow</i> appeared first on Reactor.