Nate Heywood

Nate Heywood is a historian, specializing in deductive historical reconstruction. Due to his skills, he was able to deduce that an aberration-created reality, one in which the Nazis nuked New York City in 1942, due to the machinations of Damien Darhk and Eobard Thawne, and World War II continued until 1947, was starting to cement in the timeline, supplanting the previous reality.

With the help of Oliver Queen, he was able to locate the submerged Waverider in 2016, waking Mick Rory from time stasis. Together with Mick, Nate traveled through time, using his skills as a historian to find the locations and time periods in which different members of the Legends team were stranded. For his support, Nate was made a new member of the team. After being injected with a biomolecular enhancer created by Eobard Thawne and modified by Ray Palmer, Nate gained the ability to transform his skin into steel, making him extremely strong and resilient. After learning to use his abilities he was given the codename "Steel" by Ray, after his grandfather Henry Heywood/Commander Steel. Among the other nicknames he suggested himself were Corporal Steel, Mr. Steel and Citizen Steel.

Publication Information

Legends : Nate Heywood
Version : Arrowverse
Alter Ego : Steel
Multiverse : Earth-1
Known As :
Type :
- Historian
- Yoga instructor
- Formerly Conspiracy theorist
- Member of Team Legends
- Former Member of Team Flash
Relative :
- Henry Heywood : Grandfather
- Bettie Heywood : Grandmother
- Hank Heywood : Father
- Unnamed Mother
Origin : Earth One
Season : DC's Legends of Tomorrow
First Appeareance : DC's Legends of Tomorrow Season 2 Episod 1 : Out of Time
Last Appeareance :
Number of Appeareance :
Potrayer : Nick Zano
Main View : Full Episod

Main Article : Nate Heywood Timeline

Nate was born a haemophiliac, and as a result of his parents' decision to protect him from all harm, he was never allowed outside after one scrapped knee at the age of 5. As a child, he was inspired by George Lucas' Indiana Jones movies, deciding to become a historian, spending all his time studying at home. In addition, Nate was always interested in stories about his paternal grandfather, eventually getting his soldier dog tags passed down to him. Nate didn't have the best relationship with his father and always referred to him as "Hank". Eventually Nate left home at sixteen for college.

He studied abroad at Oxford for a year while completing his masters degree, during which time he dated a girl named Wendy and read an unpublished paper by J.R.R. Tolkien titled The Burden of the Purest Heart. He graduated and earned a PhD, becoming a historian specializing in historical reconstruction and deduction, calling himself a "time detective". He observed the past and current events of Earth One, with special interest in vigilantes, as shown by him deducing the identities of the Green Arrow and all members of Rip Hunter's team, identifying them as "the Legends" and figuring out their appearances in the past from research and overview of historical artifacts and written sources.

Nate is an easily excitable individual, with great passion for his work and a tendency to ramble off when describing his findings or hypotheses, clashing in character with the no-nonsense attitude of Oliver Queen. Nate is altruistic, ready to go and save a team of complete strangers at the bat of an eye, just because he noticed something terrible might have happened to them in a certain period of history. He is also brave, risking his skin to get help from Oliver and revealing to the vigilante's face that he knows their secret identity; as well as resourceful, in securing both human resources and relevant historical artifacts that helped located the Legends throughout time.

Despite calling himself a "time detective", Nate is awed and humbled by the concept of time travel, at first refusing the call, saying that he only intended to go on a salvage mission, before being persuaded by Oliver that this adventure is something Nate had been waiting for his entire life. He also experienced a nerdy thrill the first time he traveled in time, similar to that expressed by Ray and Professor Stein when they first time traveled and later, Cisco and Felicity.

His adoration of time travel is further shown when he looks with awe at Einstein's speech, commenting on how he can't believe the Legends, him included, had just changed history. However, it is seen that traveling to the future makes him uncomfortable as it's too uncertain and his historical knowledge is of little use. It also frustrates him when he encounters something that history has regarded as legend or fabrication but turns out to be true such as the legends of Camelot, though in that case it was partially a case of time travelers changing history according to the legend retroactively.

Throughout his life, Nate has suffered from his hemophilia, spending half of his childhood in a hospital and never leaving home until 16. Sheltered at home and unable to make his own decisions, Nate longed for a life as an adult, where he took the choice to go on an adventure as soon as one came up. Brave and dedicated, he refused to agree with Sara's suggestion to have him leave the Waverider in fear for his safety. Instead, Nate risked his life for the team and the Justice Society of America, ending up on the verge of death, but recovered after Ray injected him with a dose of Eobard Thawne's biomolecular enhancer that Ray's modified to drastically increase his strength, as well as Grant him accelerated healing and enhanced durability.

After gaining powers due to the enhancer, Nate showed even more childlike excitement, testing out his strength against that of Ray's A.T.O.M. Exosuit rather recklessly, ending up with a damaged timeship and two time travelers freefalling through the Temporal Zone. Arriving to Medieval Japan, Nate immediately recognized the time period, claiming it to be awesome, before passing out. Despite being a historian and trying to make his story of a "gaijin merchant" to Masako Yamashiro seem believable, he ended up blundering when he referenced the United States, before realizing those weren't supposed to exist yet.

Nate also shown himself to be a fan of popular fiction, referencing the fictional "Master Yoda" when listening to Masako's advice, further confusing her. During his stay with the Yamashiro family, Nate showed both a flirtatious side in his interactions with Masako, and, once again, his altruism when trying to protect her and the village's freedom from the Shogun's Samurai. Despite his infatuation with Masako, Nate agreed with her pragmatic response regarding their possible relationship: as a time traveler, he could not stay with her. He also was willing to kill in battle, as he personally took the life of Tokugawa Iemitsu when he destroyed the A.T.O.M. Exosuit Tokugwa was wearing.

When the Legends visited Liberty, Colorado in 1874, Nate stopped a train containing a large amount of dwarf star alloy that Quentin Turnbull was using to create his own country; Turnbull Country. Nate stood in front of the train and, using his steel powers, stopped it. This ultimately fixed the time aberration. Since joining the Legends, Nate has shown to grow especially close to Ray, forming a brother-like friendship and friendly rivalry and started to develop feelings for Amaya along the way. After the Legends went their separate ways when Rip disbanded the team, he went off and worked with Team Flash in Central City, forming a bond with Wally West. The two of them shared similar backgrounds with absentee fathers, getting powers by accident, and having similar personalities when it came to being heroes thus giving the two much in common.

Steel