How ‘Superman’s’ Mister Terrific could become DC’s cinematic version of Black Panther

Jul 24, 2025 - 18:32
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How ‘Superman’s’ Mister Terrific could become DC’s cinematic version of Black Panther

Note: This story contains spoilers for “Superman”

There is a brief exchange in the most recent superhero blockbuster film, Superman, that captures the undeniable cool of the scene-stealing Mister Terrific.

After the Man of Steel (David Corenswet) is imprisoned in a pocket universe by maniacal billionaire Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult), Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) reaches out to the Justice Gang for help in finding Superman. Mister Terrific is the only one willing to search for the seemingly disgraced hero.

Lois (Superman’s on-again, off-again girlfriend) soon discovers just how hardcore the super tech genius, inventor and adventurer truly is.

“You put nanobot GPS trackers in your friend’s bloodstream?” an utterly flabbergasted Lois asks when she discovers the extreme lengths Mister Terrific, played by the talented Edi Gathegi, will go to protect Superman and his heroic teammates. Without missing a beat, he responds with deadpan timing: “Oh, I do that to everybody.”

As of this week, Superman has raked in an impressive global take of $426 million, topping the summit for two consecutive weeks. The James Gunn directed, tentpole kickoff has delivered a much-needed adrenaline shot to the sagging superhero movie genre, embracing the fantastical, throwback comic book world of the 1950s and ‘60s Silver Age (who knew Krypto the dog would become a huge fan favorite?).

But the most intriguing revelation in Superman has been breakout character Mister Terrific, aka Michael Holt, who may just be DC Studios’ first legit cinematic answer to Marvel’s $2 billion Black Panther franchise. 

“Fourteen PhDs, polyglot, polymath, auto-didactic, natural aptitude for natural aptitudes, Olympic athlete — all of these characteristics,” an excited Gathegi described to Variety when asked about his experience playing the imaginative hero who’s ranked as the third smartest person in the DC Universe, among the likes of the Dark Knight himself, Batman. Holt even has his own catch phrase that has become a social media meme: “I’m Mister Terrific, God dammit.”

The sudden and loud interest in Mister Terrific is no mere feat considering that before Superman’s release, Holt was a virtual unknown to most non-comic book heads compared to his Justice Gang cohorts, like the hilariously cantankerous Green Lantern, Guy Gardner (Nathan Fillion), and the fierce Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced).

But that all changed following arguably Superman’s most memorable fight scene in which Mister Terrific single-handedly vanquishes an army of LuthorCorp Raptor henchmen using his T-Spheres. A stunned Lois watches on as Mister Terrific methodically beats down the villains while protecting her with a force field shield.

Before the mainstream emergence of Mister Terrific, DC Comics’ record of elevating its Black do-gooders was at best mixed. Cyborg, widely its most well-known Black hero, has had the spotlight in various iterations of the Teen Titans from the wildly popular Cartoon Network series Teen Titans Go! to an appearance in the 2017 live action Justice League movie.

Black Lightning enjoyed a four-season run on The CW and the short-lived series Naomi — also known in the DC Universe as Powerhouse — boasted executive production credits from Emmy winner and Oscar nominated filmmaker Ava DuVernay. And yet it could be argued that an underrated character like Vixen, who gains her powers from the Tantu Totem, a mystical object that grants her the abilities of any animal she can think of, has been criminally underused.

Then there’s Static (known to fans as Static Shock, from the hit 2000s’ animated series of the same name), who continues to be an in-demand property despite legal hurdles surrounding DC’s long-in-the-making film that at one point had Michael B. Jordan attached as a producer. The electricity-powered Virgin D. Hawkins, created by Milestone Comics founders the late Dwayne McDuffie, Denys Cowan, Michael Davis, Derek T. Dingle and Christopher Priest, is just one of the former groundbreaking crew’s roster of Black superheroes (including Icon, Rocket, Hardware, and the Blood Syndicate) ready for the small and big screen.

Which makes Mister Terrific’s glow-up so satisfying. Since his star-making showing, there have been a myriad of op-eds, features and videos dissecting and lauding the pop culture ascent of Mister Terrific.

Yet for Gathegi, who has been on a press whirlwind since the release of Superman, the meteoric ascent of Mister Terrific represents a profoundly deeper meaning, similar to how Netflix and Marvel’s Luke Cage series and Black Panther/T’Challa reimagined the landscape for Black superheroes.

“There’s an opportunity to create new norms for kids — Black kids, but also all kids — who are told they’re too smart, or nerdy, or quiet,” he told The Wrap. “Mister Terrific inspires them to feel like they can be themselves. It’s their intellect that’s powerful.”

And the similarities between the Wakandan king and the all-world Holt Industries CEO are more than striking. Both heroes are obsessive strategists, equally adept at defeating their foes with their brawn as they are with their superior mind. Mister Terrific and the Black Panther are pragmatic yet impatient given that few share their astronomical genius. But where T’Challa can be deeply distrustful of outsiders (in the comics he once joined the Avengers to spy on them), Holt has a more optimistic view of the world.

Created by John Ostrander and Tom Mandrake, Mister Terrific/Michael Holt made his first appearance in the 1997 issue of The Spectre. His costume includes a black, red and white leather jacket that features the words “Fair Play” on the sleeves, a respectful nod to the original Mister Terrific (Terry Sloane), who made his debut in Sensation Comics #1 in January 1942. Yet Holt’s Mister Terrific was born out of tragedy.

Following the horrific death of his pregnant wife Paula in a car accident, Holt, an atheist, blamed himself for her death. Before the crash, he was arguing with her about the value of religion. Contemplating suicide, Holt was visited by a mystical messenger of God, the Spectre, who told him about the heroics of Sloane. He decided to use his meta genius as the next Mister Terrific.

Since his debut, Mister Terrific has made appearances in the Justice League Unlimited series, Beware the Batman and the CW show Arrow as well as the 2021 animated movie Injustice. But it’s his showing in Superman that has gotten fans excited about the future of the cerebral hero. Just as Marvel Comics savvily timed Black Panther’s movie star turn with a series of new books, DC is taking advantage of his incoming headliner’s buzz.

There’s the current, well-reviewed Mister Terrific: Year One comic book. And Holt, who has led the Justice Society of America as well as his own four-person unit, the Fantastic Four-nod The Terrifics (The hilarious banter between serious Holt and the off-the-wall Plastic Man would be cinematic gold), is set to head up another team billed as the Terrific Ten, due this fall.

For now, we will have to wait patiently for the next movie (or television show?) appearance of Mister Terrific. Gunn’s DC Studios has done a brilliant job of giving the character a path to his own big-screen glory.

“Terrific is definitely the most morally good of the Justice Gang,” Gunn said of the character. “But at the same time, he’s so logical, so humorless in certain ways that it makes him funny even though he’s humorless. And it’s a character we haven’t seen very much in movies, but especially in any sort of comic book cinema.”

Mr. Gunn, you are on the clock.

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