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With "Supergirl" flying to a new network this fall, the DC Comics TV empire will be more closely knit than ever.
"Supergirl" returns for Season 2 on The CW, joining "Arrow," "The Flash" and "DC's Legends of Tomorrow."
"What's great about it is it feels completely natural to be there," said "Supergirl" executive producer Ali Adler, "and to be so welcomed with shows that belong together. Ultimately, we get to really fine-tune the things that we love best about our show."
The move also makes it easier to integrate "Supergirl" into narratives of the other three shows — including a four-show crossover later this year and a two-part, musical crossover between "Flash" and "Supergirl" in early 2017.
The move to The CW also means that production on "Supergirl" is moving from Los Angeles to Vancouver, where the other three shows are produced. Viewers won't notice any big change in the look of the show, but they will notice the absence of one of Season 1's more important characters, Cat Grant (Calista Flockhart) — the media mogul who was Kara/Supergirl's (Melissa Benoist) boss. (Flockhart chose not to move to Canada.)
"Taking her out definitely leaves a vacuum," said Andrew Kreisberg, who's an executive producer of all four shows. "And watching different people try to fill her role …"
"Is the story," Adler interjected.
In addition to Tyler Hoechlin ("Teen Wolf"), who will make at least a couple of appearances as Superman, Chris Wood ("Vampire Diaries") is joining the cast as Mon-El — a Kryptonian who was in the space pod that crash-landed in the closing moments of the Season 1 finale.
Ian Gomez is joining the cast as Snapper Carr, a new editor hired by Cat; Katie McGrath as Lena Luthor, Lex's sister; former Wonder Woman Lynda Carter as the president of the United States; and Floriana Lima as Det. Maggie Sawyer, who's openly gay.
Maggie is not, however, the "significant character" who will come out as gay on one of the four shows during the upcoming season, according to executive producer Greg Berlanti (who heads production on all four shows). The identity of that character — even the show he/she appears in — is a closely guarded secret.
"We're not trying to be coy about it," Berlanti said, adding that he wants viewers to "enjoy the character development" and not be "ahead of the storyline."
Having all four shows on The CW and filming in the same city will make it easier to pull off crossovers. Easier, but not necessarily easy.
"Arrow," "Flash" and "Legends" exist in the same world, but "Supergirl" exists in a parallel universe.
Oh, and over on "Legends," the characters travel through time. And in the first-season finale back in May, our heroes blew up the Time Masters.
"Now there's nobody left to police the timeline," said executive producer Phil Klemmer, "and our ragtag bunch of time travelers … are left holding the bag." And dealing with "all matter of criminals" who "have been unleashed across history."
Which can get complicated because "Legends" shares a timeline with "Arrow" and "The Flash."
"This sounds like a high-school math question," Kreisberg said.
The narrative on "Arrow" will continue to jump back and forth through time, but only through flashbacks. In the upcoming Season 5, we'll flash back to when Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell) joined the Russian Mafia — and Dolph Lundgren will guest star as a "big bad," said executive producer Wendy Mericle.
There are alternate dimensions other than the one in which Supergirl and Superman exist. "The Flash" crossed over into a parallel universe repeatedly last season, spending time on Earth 2 — where most of the regular characters had doppelgängers.
And there's definitely potential for things to get complicated this fall, what with events at the end of last season on "The Flash" — Barry jumped back in time to prevent his mom from being murdered by the Reverse Flash.
That created "an alternative timeline," said Kreisberg. So Season 3 begins "with Barry living in this new version of events, and having to deal with both the benefits … and also some of the costs."
It will also affect "Arrow" and "Legends" "in some capacity," Kreisberg said. "They're all living in one shared universe."
That's not true of "Supergirl," which — again — exists in a parallel dimension. We already know it's possible to jump across that divide, because the Flash did so in an episode of "Supergirl" that aired in March. And we know events in one dimension do not affect events in the other.
"In fact, one of the plot points on 'Flash' this season is that what gets affected in one dimension does not change the other," Kreisberg said. "So there are characters who are from other dimensions who come to 'The Flash' and remark on the changes."
You'll note that he said "dimensions" — plural.
Despite all the logistics involved in coordinating storylines and production schedules, characters from all four shows will visit other shows with increased frequency.
The plan is to air a four-part crossover on Monday, Nov. 28 ("Supergirl"); Tuesday, Nov. 29 ("The Flash"); Wednesday, Nov. 30 ("Arrow"); and Thursday, Dec. 1 ("Legends of Tomorrow").
"There will be a piece of it that touches 'Supergirl,' but it will primarily start in the 'Flash' episode," Berlanti said.
The "Flash"-"Supergirl" musical crossover will air in the "back half of the year," Berlanti said. "Probably around episode 13, 14 — somewhere in there." (That would mean probably February.)
All the excitement in geekdom about the crossovers shouldn't obscure that Berlanti and his team set out to produce four good shows that each stand alone. If a crossover prompts fans of one show to start watching one or more of the others, "That's terrific. Obviously, we would love that. But, actually, I wouldn't say that's our goal."
Twitter: @ScottDPierce