Professor Ivo

Anthony Ivo first appeared in The Brave and the Bold #30 (June 1960), and was created by Gardner Fox and Mike Sekowsky.^[1]

Anthony Ivo grows up with thanatophobia, a fear of death so strong that he even avoids his own mother's funeral. He becomes obsessed with obtaining immortality and becomes a criminal to obtain resources for his experiments.^[2] Ivo additionally builds the android Amazo to assist him.

JLA: Year One revises Ivo's history, revealing that he was originally an employee for the criminal organization Locus and gained his technology from them.

Ivo successfully creates an elixir to gain immortality, but it gradually disfigures him.^[3] He attempts to commit suicide, but is unsuccessful. Ice of the Justice League sympathizes with Ivo and unintentionally cures him using Guy Gardner's power ring. Despite this, Ivo creates another elixir and disfigures himself once more, accepting his condition.

 

Ivo later becomes an ally and friendly rival of T. O. Morrow. He joins the Secret Society of Super Villains in Infinite Crisis, and helps them create the villain Genocide.^[4] Maxwell Lord later recruits Ivo to reprogram the Metal Men and help build OMAC Prime.^[5]

In 2011, The New 52 reboots the DC Comics universe. Ivo is depicted as a former biology professor at Ivy University and the director of the Red Room, a S.T.A.R. Labs project that collects and analyzes technology.^[6][7][8]

In Dark Nights: Metal, Ivo appears as a member of the Science Squad during Barbatos' invasion.^[9]

Anthony Ivo is a criminal mastermind and a scientific genius, skilled in genetics, biology, programming, robotics, artificial intelligence, and engineering. According to JLA: Year One, he obtained some of his knowledge and expertise by studying the technology and biology of aliens and super-villains. He is responsible for the creation of various artificially intelligent androids including Amazo and, with help from T.O. Morrow, the Tomorrow Woman. Ivo has intense thanatophobia, with the one exception being a short time when he believed suicide was preferable to increasing pain and immobility.

As a result of his immortality elixir, Ivo's skin seems to be invulnerable to conventional weapons, fire, and most forms of energy attack. It is unknown if his aging is completely halted, but Ivo believes that his first elixir would extend his life for five hundred years and that he can consume more elixir when it wears off.

The following androids were created by Anthony Ivo:

• Amazo - Android capable of mimicking physical abilities, superpowers, and creating copies of weapons.
• Amazoid - Androids similar to Amazo, but each can only duplicate the abilities of one superhuman.
• Composite Superman - In one version of Ivo's origin, his android Composite Superman is an early attempt to duplicate the Justice League's powers before later creating Amazo.^[10]
• Kid Amazo - The "Son" of Amazo, a techno-organic being created with Amazo technology and manipulation of human biology.
• Red Volcano - An android with great speed and heat-based abilities.
• Shaggy Man - In "The New 52", Shaggy Man is a robotic creation dressed in a hairy humanoid costume that Ivo created to strengthen Outsider's Secret Society of Super Villains.
• Tomorrow Woman - An artificial life-form with telekinetic powers, artificial respiration and pulse, and false memories of a human life; co-created by T.O. Morrow and originally designed to infiltrate and eventually destroy the Justice League.

• Anthony Ivo appears in Young Justice, voiced by Peter MacNicol.^[11] This version is a member of the Light who is assisted by monkey-like robots dubbed M.O.N.Q.I.s (Mobile Optimal Neural Quotient Infiltrators) and an android duplicate who is serving time in Belle Reve in his place.
• Anthony Ivo appears in the "Vibe" segment of DC Nation Shorts, voiced by Jason Marsden.
• Anthony Ivo appears in flashbacks depicted in the second season of Arrow, portrayed by Dylan Neal.^[12] In his quest to find a sunken Japanese submarine containing the Mirakuru serum and save his wife Jessica from an unspecified, worsening illness, he employed the crew of the ship, the Amazo, traveled to the island of Lian Yu, and rescued Sara Lance from the sinking Queen's Gambit yacht. While on the island, Ivo encounters the stranded Oliver Queen and claimed that he intended to "save the human race" before forcing him to choose between whether Lance or Shado dies by his hand. After killing Shado and losing his right hand and the Amazo to a crazed Slade Wilson, Ivo begins to suffer from blood poisoning before being killed by Queen.^[13][14]
• Anthony Ivo appears in My Adventures with Superman, voiced by Jake Green.^[15][11] This version is the CEO of AmazoTech who is suspected of being involved in illegal activities, is served by Alex Luthor in the first season, and is wary of Superman's intentions. Additionally, he utilizes the energy-draining Parasite armor and temporarily joins Task Force X later in the season.

• Anthony Ivo makes a cameo appearance in Justice League: War as a S.T.A.R. Labs scientist.
• Anthony Ivo appears in Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths, voiced by Ike Amadi.^[16][11]

• Anthony Ivo appears as a character summon in Scribblenauts Unmasked: A DC Comics Adventure.^[17]
• Anthony Ivo appears in a picture depicted in Lego DC Super-Villains.

• Anthony Ivo appears in DC Super Friends #1. This version intended to become famous via his robotics genius, but was overshadowed by the Super Friends.^[18]
• Anthony Ivo appears in Smallville Season 11 #10 as a S.T.A.R. Labs scientist.^[19]
• Anthony Ivo appears in the Injustice 2 prequel comic.^[20][21][22] After the League of Assassins kidnap his family, he builds Amazo for Ra's al Ghul. Upon learning from Jason Todd his family was murdered, Ivo retakes control of Amazo and allows the Justice League Task Force and Supergirl to destroy it. For his betrayal, Ivo is executed by Batman and Talia al Ghul's daughter, Athanasia al Ghul.