It was an announcement that rocked Smallville: Teri Hatcher will appear on an episode of The CW later this season as Ella Lane, Lois' mother.

This character is dead, of course, begging an obvious question: how will this work?!?

Producer Kelly Souders and Brian Peterson spoke to E! News this week and explained that Ella discovered she was dying, so she "sat down and made these videos for her child," said Peterson "What we did was pull that into the show because it was so heart wrenching."

Added Souders:

"It came together beautifully. I just watched three takes and I had to stop for awhile because it was so heart wrenching. Teri just had an incredible performance, and it was beautiful."

Matt Richenthal is the Editor in Chief of TV Fanatic. Follow him on Twitter and on Google+.