SUPERMAN: THE MAN OF STEEL #22

Cover shows sharp corners, strong glossy surface, and no visible spine stress or ticks; the red cover ink shows no noticeable fading or color break. No creases, tears, or stains are apparent in this photo. The book appears bagged, and interior pages and back cover were not assessed, so grade is estimated conservatively from the visible front cover only.

Superman: The Man of Steel #22 (June 1993) arrived from the ongoing creative team of writer Louise Simonson and penciler/cover artist Jon Bogdanove, during the storyline that quietly seeded one of the era's more enduring supporting characters. The issue marks the first appearance of John Henry Irons, an engineer entangled with a black-market weapons operation, months before he reforged himself as the armored hero Steel in the wake of Superman's death. Arriving in the same publishing week as Adventures of Superman #500 and amid the lead-up to "Reign of the Supermen," the book sits at the edge of one of comics' most commercially significant crossover events of the 1990s, even though its own cover makes no overt reference to that saga.

Market data for this issue is sparse, reflecting both its status as a high-print-run direct and newsstand-era book and the character's second-tier (rather than top-tier) key status relative to Superman #75 or Adventures of Superman #500. Certified sales are limited to a handful of transactions, with pristine 9.8 copies commanding a real premium over anything in the mid-9 range, a pattern consistent with a book that survives in quantity at lower grades but becomes scarce in true gem condition. Demand is driven almost entirely by completists building out Steel's origin story and by Superman