The impending launch of his company’s revolutionary new operating system Lex/OS (I got my hands on the beta and, yeah, it’s awesome) seemed like the perfect moment to sit down with the dynamic and, at times, controversial, young genius behind the LexCorp magic to see what else he’s got up his sleeve.

The elevator doors open and I step into the opulent Royal Penthouse Suite at the Park Metropolis Downtown. Eleven lavish bedrooms, each with its own floor-to-ceiling Italian marble bath, a 100-seat cinema/lecture hall, a four-lane bowling alley (two standard American, one duckpin, one Belgian feather), twin helipads and its own private Caffè Bene. In other words: exactly what you’d expect for $95,000 a night.

Of course, no one’s actually staying here. This is just the space he’s rented for my fifteen-minutes-but-more-like-ten, no-holds-barred-except-several interview.

If I didn’t know better, I’d think billionaire tech wunderkind Lex Luthor was trying to intimidate me.

Ron Troupe: Nice digs. Lex Luthor: We’re not doing that. Ron Troupe: Doing what? Lex Luthor: We’re not opening with a wide-eyed layman’s description of the hotel room that makes me look unrelatable just to set up a dramatic twist wherein, lo and behold, you discover I’m surprisingly down-to-earth because I know the score of the last Metros game. Ron Troupe: Do you? Lex Luthor: Metros 102, Guardsmen 86. Ron Troupe: Weird. (it’s the correct “relatable” small talk, but coming out of him, it sounds less like a basketball score than a set of algebraic integers.) Lex Luthor: Which is why we’re not doing it. Ron Troupe: Would you say you’re a man who’s always gotten what he wants? Lex Luthor: Nice pivot. Here’s mine: What I want is to leave the planet in better shape for the next generation. To make the world and its children safer. I want it. And I bet you do too, Ron. Ron Troupe: You sound like someone running for political office.