Tyler Hoechlin stresses the importance of his Superman being only a supporting character in Supergirl's TV show.

Superman is a character who is often portrayed as inherently good, and the actor who plays him, Tyler Hoechlin, doesn’t seem much different from the Man of Steel in that regard.

Speaking to press at a Q&A last week, the actor talked about the importance of playing Superman in a supporting role to Supergirl’s lead character, as played by Melissa Benoist.

“The word ‘support’ is, I think, the strongest one that I try to lean on, because this is not his origin story,” Tyler said on Tuesday. “This is someone who’s been doing this for a long time and has become very comfortable in a way I can always relate to things best: It’s like a sports thing, where the game has slowed down for him, so these things that maybe seem like a big deal to her, he’s gone through those issues already, and so the role of him coming into this, for me, from the very beginning, was to support her, and that kind of lends itself into being a supporting character. There was never an intention for this to be about him. It’s always about her. It’s called Supergirl; it’s about her, and Melissa does such a great job,” he stressed.

“It’s like being a veteran presence on a sports team, where the young guy needs the encouragement,” he continued. “The young guy needs to be elevated and told how great they can be and what their potential is. The veteran knows. It’s not about them. They are there to encourage the next group, and so for him, it’s always about building her up and being there to impart wisdom when he can, to support her when he can, but I in no way tried to make her feel like she’s not capable of doing anything that he could do.”

Tyler Hoechlin’s Superman appears in this week’s episode of Supergirl, “The Last Children of Krypton,” airing at 8PM Monday night on The CW!