The Supergirl season 3 finale teased the introduction of some kind of clone of Kara, created as a side effect of defeating Reign, who’d landed in Siberia. Fans who know their comics immediately twigged that this was setting up a loose adaptation of the acclaimed Superman: Red Son graphic novel, which explores an alternate version of the Man of Steel who was raised in communist Russia.
So, how will Supergirl season 4 tackle Red Son? Well, that’s what the Girl of Steel herself, Melissa Benoist, was asked when speaking to the press at Comic-Con this past weekend. She explained that the core of the show’s adaptation of the storyline will be the “nature vs. nurture” debate, as it’ll look at the difference that living in the US versus Russia has on Kara’s personality.
“I think that — the doppelgänger that we saw at the end of Season 3 is gonna be a really cool experiment in ‘nature vs. nurture,’ I think, in the way that ‘Red Son,’ the Superman comic, explored it. Showing how two people with the same abilities can be so different, and what kind of heroes they would be, and what her ideals and morals and moral compass would be. So I think that’s going to be a really interesting thing to explore this season.”
That is certainly a central theme of Red Son, so it looks like the show will closely match the comic book on that front. In fact, you could even say that Supergirl will be a better exploration of this as the original story, from writer Mark Millar, didn’t compare the Russian Supes with the classic character as it was set on another Earth, as per the Elseworlds tradition.
This isn’t the first time the Arrowverse has featured another version of Supergirl who believes in something other that truth, justice and the American way, either. Last year’s “Crisis on Earth-X” crossover featured Kara’s Nazi doppelganger, Overgirl. It was great to see Benoist play the villain on that occasion and we’re definitely looking forward to seeing how this “Red Daughter” storyline unfolds when Supergirl returns to The CW on October 14th.
