James Gunn introduced several new heroes to his rebooted DC Universe in 2025’s Superman, and one of them calls back to an eight-year-old mystery from The CW’s Arrow season 5. Following 2024’s animated Creature Commandos series, it was fantastic to see some of DC’s most iconic heroes and villains make their live-action DCU debuts in Superman. This includes the Justice Gang, comprising Guy Gardner’s Green Lantern, Kendra Saunders’ Hawkgirl, and Michael Holt’s Mister Terrific, the latter of whom has quickly become one of the movie’s fan-favorite heroes.
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While Edi Gathegi has certainly earned his superhero movie redemption in Superman, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen Mister Terrific depicted in live-action. Echo Kellum first appeared as technological savant, inventor, and Olympic decathlete Curtis Holt, an adaptation of Michael Holt, in season 4 of The CW’s Arrow back in 2015. After helping to save Ray Palmer (Brandon Routh), defeat Brie Larvan (Emily Kinney), and shut down Rubicon, Holt officially joined Team Arrow in season 5, bringing him face-to-face with characters from Earth-2, and leading him to wonder what his own doppelgänger would be like.
After Superman, we now know exactly what Curtis Holt’s doppelgänger is like, assuming the Arrowverse from The CW is included as a DC Elseworlds project, taking place across the new multiverse of the rebooted DCU. Curtis Holt officially became Arrow’s Mister Terrific in season 5, but his more charismatic personality set him apart from Edi Gathegi’s new iteration of the hero, who is closer in line to his DC Comics counterpart. In fact, while Kellum’s version was well-received, Gathegi’s Mister Terrific has quickly become the definitive version.
First seen in DC Comics back in 1997’s Spectre #54, created by John Ostrander and Tom Mandrake, Michael Holt was a child prodigy who earned 14 PhDs and became a self-made millionaire and Olympic decathlete before taking up arms as the superhero Mister Terrific after the deaths of his wife and unborn child. Noted as the most intelligent member of the Justice Society of America and the world’s third-smartest person, Mister Terrific uses his intellect and advanced technology to operate as a superhero,
Curtis Holt probably couldn’t have imagined the success and popularity of his DCU doppelgänger when he wondered what his variant would be like back in Arrow season 5, episode 10, “Who Are You?” in 2017. Following his disappointing time as adaptable mutant Darwin in 2011’s X-Men: First Class, it was great to see Edi Gathegi finally transform into a formidable and central superhero in Superman, and the future is looking bright for him after his theatrical debut. If the DCU’s multiverse is explored, Mister Terrific could come face-to-face with his own doppelgängers, perhaps including Echo Kellum’s Curtis Holt.
What did you think of Edi Gathegi’s Mister Terrific in Superman? Let us know in the comments!
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