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If there’s one unexpected result of a Donald Trump presidency (never mind two of them), it’s a repeated comparison between the very real resident of the White House and Lex Luthor, Superman’s long-time arch-nemesis since his 1940 debut in Action Comics #23.

At the root of the comparison isn’t Luthor’s scientific genius or Machiavellian cunning, but the character’s 1980s makeover into a corrupt and egotistical businessman that cares more about his success than anything else in the world — including the fate of the rest of the world. The comparison between President Trump and Lex Luthor has become very common since Trump’s first election in 2016 — not helped by the fact that a 1989 Lex Luthor comic has a cover that’s very intentionally based on Trump’s book The Art of The Deal.

While the Superman lore was rebooted wholesale by writer/artist John Byrne in 1986’s Man of Steel comic book miniseries, the concept behind the “new” Lex Luthor actually came from writer Marv Wolfman, who was writing the Adventures of Superman comic book series alongside Byrne’s work in the mid 1980s.

“I called John and essentially told him the concept and said, ‘What do you think?’” Wolfman explained in 1986’s Amazing Heroes #86. According to Byrne in 2016, the concept was (word for word, he claims), “Outside Metropolis is a mountain. On that mountain, in his fabulous Xanadu-like estate, lives Lex Luthor, the world's richest man, and his mistress, Lois Lane. You see, she's drawn to power.”

While the Lois Lane aspect was dropped — Byrne had his own plans for her — the Luthor elements were folded into Byrne’s plans… and the idea of Luthor as “the world’s richest man” meant that Byrne looked for real-world examples of ostentatiously rich men… which, even in the 1980s, meant Donald Trump.

Ultimately, Byrne said that the businessman incarnation of Luthor has some Donald Trump in his DNA, but the character shouldn’t be taken as a commentary on Trump in particular: “Luthor was a composite, really. The overall tapestry was Trump, but into that were woven the likes of Ted Turner, and even the more unsavory aspects of Thomas Edison. There was a hint of Tesla around the edges, too.”

It makes sense. After all, if Luthor was only based on Donald Trump, surely he’d be sporting a wig by now.

James Gunn's Superman is flying into theaters soon enough, and Popverse has all you need to prepare. Refreshing your cinematic memory with our Superman movie watch order, learn what we know about the upcoming Superman movie, Superman's S-Shield through the ages, and read about what DC is doing ahead of their flagship hero's triumphant return.