After its ninth-season finale pitted Clark Kent against General Zod, fans might think that biggest battles of the CW's "Smallville" were all on the table. But as it turns out, a conflict in the real world has bubbled up around the series - which will wrap its run with next years Season 10 -with the show's former producers going toe-to-toe with Warner Brothers.

As the Hollywood Reporter reports, original "Smallville" developers Al Gough and Miles Millar as well as co-producer Tollin/Robbins Productions this week saw a March claim they made against Warners for breach of contract and breach of fiduciary duty thrown in their faces by the entertainment giant. In layman's terms, the producers argued that they were owed more money than they'd been paid by both the studio and the network. However rather than this money not being delivered via foul play, they argued that less money was made for them to be paid from due to a "sweetheart" deal between the networks (The WB and later CW) and licensors (fans may remember similar claims being filed in the Siegel and Shuster family's long battle over the rights to Superman).

The new papers released last week reveal that Warner Brothers counter to the producers argument is to say that Gough, Millar and the rest are wrong at a base leve. Not only are they not owed money earned or theoretical, the studio says, they were never in contracts to share in certain profits thanks to the exclusion of the word "joint" from the original contracts. Spinoff Online has more analysis on this aspect fo the case.

No one will likely know who's right in this matter before it moves into a July 16 hearing, but for now read more at the Hollywood Reporter and check back to CBR for more news on "Smallville" on and off the screen.