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John Henry Irons, also known as Steel, is a supporting character in the animated superhero television series My Adventures with Superman.
He is the lead scientist for the company AmerTek. He invented the Steel armor suits and planned on giving them to first responders to help keep Metropolis safe. However, his sinister boss, Thomas Weston, shut this idea down in favor of building autonomous and unstable Metallo robots.
John grew up in the city of Metropolis, giving him a great pride for the city. He later had to move out of the city after joining AmerTek, though he would return years later when the company decided to open its new headquarters in the city.
At some point, John would design the Steel armors, powerful mech suits he hoped to provide to first responders as a means to protect Metropolis. However, his boss, the greedy and uncaring Thomas Weston, denied John this, believing the suits were to difficult to make. Weston had John and the scientists create the Metallos, powerful robots that ran on Amer fusion, the same energy source that powered their new headquarters. John and fellow scientist Silas Stone discovered that the Amer fusion cores would bond together, creating catastrophic explosions. Thomas refused to acknowledge this, and he hired the supervillain Livewire to hunt the pair down and destroy all of their evidence, forcing John into hiding.
Fullmetal Scientist[]
John reconnected with his niece, Flip Johnson, and her new boss, Jimmy Olsen, after Flip has discovered information about the Metallo robots. After Superman, Lois Lane, and Vicki Vale arrived, as the three of them were each trying to uncover the mystery of AmerTek on their own, John explained his backstory. Immediately after, Livewire arrived and destroyed John's computer, and all of his evidence along with it.
Afterwards, the heroes traveled to AmerTek to stop Thomas Weston from activating the Metallos, as they would fuse with the core powering the AmerTek building and create an explosion so massive that it would destroy Metropolis. Thomas crushed the controller, forcing John and Superman to shut down the core by force. After equipping one of the Steel suits, John fought off the Metallos and destroyed the pillars powering the core, thus saving the city.
After Metropolis was saved, John was able to fulfil his goal and distribute the Steel suits. However, the evil Lex Luthor arrived, and he informed John that he had absorbed AmerTek. He then forced John to relinquish his armor and leave the premisis.
