Lex Luthor

Luthor's ultimate adversary is Superman. Some felt it was because until Superman's arrival, Luthor was considered the hero of Metropolis through his philanthropic acts. Others, such as reporter Lois Lane, believed that Luthor was involved with unethical and perhaps illegal dealings that he feared Superman might expose. Luthor himself insisted that his dislike of Superman was for two reasons. First, as an alien, Superman could not be expected to have the best interests of Earth at heart. Second, even if he was sincere, Superman's very presence encouraged people to be lazy and dependent on their hero to save them and do great things for them, rather than accomplishing amazing deeds themselves. Regardless of the reason, Luthor despised Superman and wanted to rid the world of him.

In his attempts to match Superman's power, Luthor was responsible for the creation of a number of superhuman criminals and menaces, including Bizarro, an "imperfect duplicate" of Superman with all his powers but an addled mind. Luthor has also used technology to match Superman, including his own battle armor, based on reverse-engineered Kryptonian tech. But despite his unethical and criminal activity, Luthor has often genuinely helped the world, both with his scientific innovations and by saving it from threats such as the Crime Syndicate. At one point, his popularity was such that he ran for President of the United States—and won. But the highest office in the land was not enough. Luthor saw the chance to destroy his enemy once and for all.

President Luthor tried to frame Superman as a public enemy responsible for drawing a deadly Kryptonite asteroid toward Earth. Luthor offered a billion-dollar reward for Superman's capture. But soon, this cover story fell apart, and Luthor was caught admitting to his crimes on a live broadcast. Luthor was removed from office. He discovered that Talia al Ghul, to whom he had signed over Lexcorp before assuming the presidency, had sold his company to WayneTech. He went on the run, fleeing arrest, reduced from the most powerful office in the world to a mere fugitive.

When an alternate-world Luthor tried to conquer Earth and was killed in the attempt, the real Lex claimed it was the alternate Luthor who had committed the crimes as President, not him. That was enough to create reasonable doubt and clear him of all charges. Rebuilding LexCorp, Luthor launched the Everyman Project, creating a synthetic metagene to theoretically give everyone powers, even though the process was dangerous and lives were lost developing it. Lex used it to give himself powers equivalent to Superman's, but Natasha Irons, Steel's niece and one of the subjects of the Everyman experiments, shut down the synthetic metagene with a specialized electromagnetic pulse. Reporter Clark Kent revealed Luthor's misdeeds, though he was cleared of criminal charges.

Luthor has allied with villains, including Brainiac, The Joker, and the Legion of Doom. But Luthor has also acted as Earth's champion at times. He joined forces with Superman to fight Darkseid's invasion and battled the undead Black Lanterns as a greed-fueled Orange Lantern. While he has been careful to avoid close relationships that could make him vulnerable, he has shown complicated feelings for Lena, his sister, and Conner Kent, a genetic clone of his that also shares Superman's DNA. At times Luthor has seemed to view Conner, who is also known as Superboy, as a potential successor, but on other occasions, he has condemned Conner as damaged due to having alien DNA. Ultimately, Luthor can be counted on to do one thing: what he thinks is best for Lex Luthor.