Superman's Biggest Supergirl Plot Hole Explained By Director James Gunn

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"Superman" does a great job of fleshing out its world, which is already filled with metahumans and kaiju-level threats. It also sets up what's to come next, with the film's ending introducing Milly Alcock's Supergirl (who was hidden from the marketing). Her cameo is clearly meant to tease 2026's "Supergirl" (which could be even better than "Superman"), although her inclusion does raise some questions. 

Earlier in the movie, Superman (David Corenswet) becomes a pariah once it gets out that his biological parents sent him to Earth to conquer it and take up a harem of women. This message appears to be unaltered, so Jor-El (Bradley Cooper) and Lara Lor-Van (Angela Sarafyan) really were just genocidal despots. It's a big storytelling risk that ultimately pays off, but it does raise the question as to why Supergirl didn't tell her cousin about his parents' true nature, seeing as he believed they were kind Kryptonians from the first half of their message to him. Now, writer/director James Gunn has spoken with Rolling Stone about this apparent oversight:

"You're assuming that everybody on Krypton is the same! And how would she know? She's younger than him, so she wouldn't know. She wouldn't know anything about his parents."

Elsewhere in the interview, Gunn also responded to people who don't like the idea of an evil Jor-El (who's normally portrayed as benevolent), stating, "They're s*** out of luck!" There's the Gunn we all know and love.

It's worth noting that James Gunn said Supergirl is younger than Superman when, technically, she's older. She was born before Kal-El, and according to her origins in Tom King and Bilquis Evely's graphic novel "Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow," she and her family managed to survive a bit after Krypton's destruction. Whereas Kal-El was sent away from Krypton as a baby and doesn't remember anything from his home planet, Kara was much older. And part of the Kryptonian civilization, Argo City, survived, with Supergirl's father placing a bubble over it to capture some of the atmosphere. But its people still slowly died off, including Kara Zor-El's mother.

Kara was then sent away in a pod similar to the one Kal-El traveled to Earth in to continue spreading good throughout the universe, but she carries a heavy burden. In case you were wondering why she seems like such a heavy drinker at the end of "Superman," she'd been through a ton of trauma when she was still a child. But it's possible she had no idea what Kal-El's parents' true nature was, especially if they hid their intentions from other Kryptonians who might not approve. Next year's "Supergirl" should provide a nice contrast of how different Supergirl's parents were.

David Krumholtz and Emily Beecham have been cast as Zor-El and Alura In-Ze, respectively. Perhaps they, too, were in the dark about what Jor-El wanted his son to do to Earth. Or maybe they knew and chose to instill a message of hope into Kara, ensuring she would be different. Whatever the case, we'll learn more about the House of El's family drama when "Supergirl" hits theaters on June 26, 2026.