James Gunn's Superman is absolutely packed with characters, and the Daily Planet editorial is no different. The Metropolis newspaper will star Rachel Brosnahan as Clark Kent's fellow reporter and love interest, Lois Lane, while Wendell Pierce of The Wire fame will portray editor-in-chief Perry White. We'll also see Beck Bennett as sports reporter Steve Lombard and Sarah Sampaio as Eva Teschmacher, but surely one of the most intriguing characters is Skyler Gisondo's Jimmy Olsen.

Gisondo ("Grandpa Clarita's Diet," "Righteous Gems") will portray the cub reporter in what will likely be one of the character's most prominent big-screen appearances in some time. Why? Because Zack Snyder decided it was best to take this beloved Superman character and turn him into a CIA operative (played by Michael Cassidy), who is almost immediately killed off in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. After that unceremonious appearance in the DC Extended Universe, Jimmy will return, as embodied by Gissondo, in Gunn's Man of Steel, and hopefully last a bit longer than Cassidy's version.

After filming wrapped at the end of July, Warner Bros. dropped out the first trailer for 'Superman' introduces Gunn's bold new DC Universe, in a spectacular way. While fans drifted away from the fact the trailer also introduced DC's cutest character in the form of Krypto the Superdog, some have suggested that specific preview footage hints at a big Jimmy Olsen turn.

The Superman trailer is a veritable smorgasbord of Easter eggs. The teaser has Dragon Ball Z fans obsessed with one particularly dark momentwhile that robot that David Korensvet's Man of Steel kneels on in a quick shot is actually more important than you think. Now, fans have taken things a step further by developing their own Jimmy Olsen theory based on some of the fancier visuals from the trailer.

At one point, Superman fights a giant kaiju in Metropolis, suggesting some kind of climax between the Man of Steel and your typical superhero movie monster. But what if this beast is not typical at all? Fans on both Twitter/X and Reddit suggest that the kaiju in question is actually Jimmy Olsen - and there's certainly precedent for this in the comics.

It's going to be so great when it's revealed that the kaiju is actually Jimmy Olsen, who drank a mysterious potion https://t.co/tAt8y4j4dA

— Owen Likes Comics (@owenlikescomics) December 19, 2024

As proof of that, people release a Silver Age comic book cover featuring a giant Jimmy Olsen who has been extinguished by a growth beam and transformed into a "giant turtle man". That particular issue of Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen was published back in 1961, though the giant turtle returned in 2023's Fire & Ice: Welcome to Smallville #3. What's more, this is far from the only time Jimmy Olsen has transformed in DC comics.

At this point, absolutely nothing has been confirmed regarding Skyler Gisondo's transmogrification of Jimmy Olsen into some kind of giant beast in Superman. The trailer mainly shows the character in the Daily Planet newsroom and contains no footage that even hints at his actual transformation process. But if the kaiju in the trailer actually turns out to be Olsen (that giant monster in the trailer has the same eye color as Gisondo, after all), it wouldn't come completely out of nowhere.

Aside from his giant turtle-man form, Jimmy has undergone all sorts of metamorphoses throughout DC history. 11 issues before the turtle monster's debut, Olsen became "Jimmy the Genie," announcing on the front page that he "became the genie of Aladdin's lamp." Olsen was later transformed into a bizarre version of himself after being hit by Professor Potter's beam in 1964's Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #80.

During his time in the comics, Olsen also became a werewolf, a mind reader, and in 1960's Jimmy Olsen #44, the Werewolf of Metropolis. All of which means that the character has a long history of transforming into all sorts of bizarre creatures, and while James Gunn says Superman is about a uniquely modern concernthis Silver Age preoccupation with science fiction tropes is surely something he would have found a way to work into his Superman story.

While it remains far from confirmed that Jimmy Olsen will take on his monster form in Superman, such a crazy idea seems like exactly what James Gunn would embrace for the film, which is otherwise populated by the kind of lesser-known DC characters who might you expect them from the director. Anthony Carrigan's Metamorpho, Eddie Gathegi's Mr. Wonderful and a few Justice League members featured in Superman trailer. all are comparative deep cuts from what we've seen before, and Gunn clearly brings at least some of his awesome Supes sensibility (just look at Nathan Fillion's Guy Gardner haircut). All of this bodes well for the Jimmy Olsen kayuu in the final film, and the giant turtle man himself is a bit of a deep cut from DC history.

With Nicholas Hoult's Lex Luthor supposed to be the film's main villain, it could very well be that, in true Gunn fashion, the footage of Superman battling a giant kaiju in the heart of Metropolis has nothing to do with some climactic battle and actually come from Jimmy Olsen's wild intro. Just think how refreshing it would be to find Supes fighting Olsen's giant turtle when the movie opens, only for him to successfully return the young reporter to his original form. It will surely go down as one of the greatest character introductions in comic book history and will go a long way toward setting the tone for Gunn's own DC vision.

Superman opens in theaters on July 11, 2025.