 Showing
in: Circuit Planète, Concorde,
Starting: 10 June 1999
Production Information
On the streets of
Los Angeles, the beginning of a new world order is simmer ing... A nearly invincible
superweapon is about to be placed in the hands of the world's most power-mad criminal
masterminds. To the highest bidder go the spoils: technology that will appoint the leader
on a world stage where chaos and villainy reign.
The only hope to
thwart the dawning of this dark new day is a gentle giant who knows enough about the
weapon to combat it. But to meet the challenge, he will have to remake himself, temper
himself by the fire and emerge toughened, emboldened and reborn as a victor for today and
hero for tomorrow.
He will have to become Steel.
John Henry Irons (Shaquille
O'neal) was a military metallurgist, applying his speciality to the development
if innovative defense weaponry: a starting device that utilizes sound waves to neutralize
approaching enemies without killing them.
Collaborating with spunky Lieutenant Sparks (Annabeth Gish), a brilliant
electronics expert, John Henry was working to put the U.S. on the verge of a new, more
humane era in arms technology.
But on the fateful
day when the time comes to test the weapons, something--or someone--goes afoul.
Ambitious, duplicitous Nathaniel Burke (Judd Nelson), sensing the tremendous offensive
capabilities of the weapon, sets the device for the maximum--and untested--limit,
resulingin a horrible catastrophe that leaves Sparks a paraplegic. John
Henry, demoralized and sickened by the aggressive application of the technology he helped
create, quits the military and returns home to Los Angeles, leaving the world of weapons
and destruction behind him for good.
He is welcomed home by his grandma Odessa (Irma P.
Hall), little brother Martin (Ray J. Norwood) and Uncle Joe (Richard Roundtree), who rules
over a junkyard of scrap metal that he sculpts into nouveau, museum-quality
treasures.
But John Henry's quiet life is suddenly interrupted when he encounters a robbery by
some street toughs wielding a weapon that is generations beyond anything available in the
local gun store...and something John Henry is astonished to recognize.
Someone is arming common criminals with the
super-secret weaponry John Henry helped develop, and only he realizes the horrible
implications. When he discovers that his old nemesis Burke is behind the
scheme and plans
to place the weapon into the hands of the world's leading terrorists, John Henry commits
himself to stopping Burke before it's too late.
But what can a single man do in the face of such an awsome device
and ruthless adversary?
He can enlist the help of his friends. John Henry
takes Sparks from the V.A. hospital back to L.A., where she is awakened from her
depression by a new sense of purpose in assisting her former colleague and good friend.
With Spark's electronics savvy, Uncle Joe's sculpting skills and John Henry's metal
working expertise, the three form a scrappy, can-do team to counter the growing threat.
They create a dazzling suit of armor that protects
John Henry in a silvery second skin. They develop a sensational "hammer" full of
an array of high-tech counter-weaponry. Layered in his fantastic, magnetic metal sheath
and armed with his formidable, powerful hammer, John Henry metamorphoses into a mythic
alter-ego: Steel. |
Business & 
