On January 31, 2019, The CW renewed Supergirl for a fifth season. Jessica Queller and Robert Rovner serve as the season's showrunners.
Writing
Queller described the fifth season of Supergirl as the series' "Black Mirror season", with Rovner elaborating that "What we’re looking at is how technology is impacting the way people engage and giving them an escape not to engage. It seems like nowadays, everyone is kind of on their phones or not really present, and so we wanted to speak to that and kind of how it might be hard to live in the ugliness of what's going on, and how a character like Kara can try and help us overcome that." Melissa Benoist, who stars as Kara Danvers / Supergirl, said the season would be "a fight for soul", following Lex Luthor exposing to Lena that Kara, her best friend, is Supergirl. Rovner said the rift between Kara and Lena was something the writers had been building towards for a number of years, with the fifth season serving as the "long-awaited payoff". Queller described "betrayal" as Lena's Achilles heel due to every member of the Luthor family having betrayed her in some way over the years: "She has to put on this protective shell, and the last person she thought would betray her was Kara, and that really hurts more deeply than any of the others".
Casting
Main cast members Melissa Benoist, Mehcad Brooks, Chyler Leigh, Katie McGrath, Jesse Rath, Nicole Maines and David Harewood return as Kara Danvers / Supergirl, James Olsen, Alex Danvers, Lena Luthor, Querl Dox / Brainiac 5, Nia Nal / Dreamer, and J'onn J'onzz respectively. This is Brooks' final season; his last appearance was in the episode "In Plain Sight". Azie Tesfai, who was introduced as Kelly Olsen in the fourth season, was promoted to the main cast for the fifth season, as was Andrea Brooks, who recurred as Eve Teschmacher since the second season. They are joined by new cast members Julie Gonzalo playing Andrea Rojas and Staz Nair playing William Dey, an original creation for the series. Jeremy Jordan, who starred as Winn Schott in the first three seasons and was absent during the fourth, returned as a guest star for three episodes.
Design
The season introduces a new Supergirl suit which eschews the skirt seen in the older suit in favour of a full pant. Benoist and the showrunners said giving Supergirl pants was something they discussed since the first season. Querl Dox is credited with creating a new microscopic motion-activator for the new suit that attaches to Kara's glasses and unleashes the suit when she whips off the glasses, resulting in Supergirl being fully dressed in her costume.
Filming
Filming began in late June 2019 at Vancouver. The seventeenth episode of the season marks Benoist's directorial debut. Filming was expected to last until April 14, 2020. On March 12, 2020, Warner Bros. Television shut down production on the series due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the series in the middle of shooting episode 20. Leigh stated she had two more days of filming on the episode. As a result, some of the material shot for episode 20 was incorporated into episode 19, rather than saving it for season six. Some new dialogue was also recorded by actors in their homes for episode 19.
The season began airing in the United States on The CW on October 6, 2019. It was originally set to run for 22 episodes, later brought down to 20. As production on episode 20 could not be completed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 19th episode served as the season finale.
