Superman & Lois Losing A Staggering Number Of Series Regulars Ahead Of Season 4

With the end of "The Flash" and the cancellation of "Gotham Knights" after just one season, "Superman & Lois" will soon stand alone as The CW's only ongoing DC Comics-based program. The Tyler Hoechlin and Elizabeth Tulloch-led superhero drama is chugging along through its third season, and it recently came to light that fans can look forward to a fourth batch of episodes. However, when Season 4 does inevitably reach the small screen, don't expect to spend much time with all of the series regulars from previous seasons.

According to a report by Deadline on June 14, "Superman & Lois" Season 4 will drop a host of series regulars. Dylan Walsh, Emmanuelle Chriqui, Erik Valdez, Inde Navarrette, Wolé Parks, Tayler Buck, and Sofia Hasmik are all no longer considered series regulars ahead of the upcoming season. Deadline notes that the hope is that they'll be willing or have the time to still appear sparingly throughout the season as guest stars or recurring players. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor actor Michael Cudlitz has been promoted to a series regular.

What could've possibly brought on this unexpected downsizing of the "Superman & Lois" main cast? The same thing that leads to big changes in pretty much every industry in the world: money.

In a previous report by Deadline, the publication noted that The CW's recent renewals — "Superman & Lois" and "All American: Homecoming" — would receive sizeable budget cuts ahead of their upcoming seasons. Thus, both of them are left with fewer series regulars than they had in previous seasons. Additionally, Deadline mentions that, specifically in the case of "Superman & Lois," which has only been renewed for 10 episodes, also likely due to budget cuts, the look and feel of the show may be quite different in Season 4.

As the title clearly states, Superman (Hoechlin) and his super-heroics are major focuses of the program alongside the drama within the Kent-Lane household. Given his superhuman abilities such as flight and heat vision, coupled with the visual effects-heavy nature of his battles with the forces of evil, "Superman & Lois" can become quite expensive to pull off. Therefore, don't be surprised if the next season is a bit more grounded than its predecessors for the sake of keeping production costs down.

Between its shrunken main cast, lower episode count, and potentially decreased VFX usage, "Superman & Lois" is already an outlier compared to the past three seasons. One can only hope that it doesn't stick out like a sore thumb as a result, especially if the show follows in the footsteps of its DC-based contemporaries and disappears from The CW in the near future.