John Stewart (character)

John Stewart, one of the characters known as Green Lantern, is a fictional superhero appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics and was the second African-American superhero to appear in DC Comics.

Early years
John Stewart is an architect, later "retconned" into a veteran U.S. Marine from Detroit, Michigan, who was selected by the Guardians as a backup Green Lantern to then-current Green Lantern Hal Jordan, after the previous backup, Guy Gardner, was seriously injured after getting hit by a car while trying to save a civilian. Although Jordan objected to the decision after seeing that Stewart had a belligerent attitude to authority figures, the Guardians stood by their decision, and chided Jordan for his supposed bigoted outlook on the issue. Jordan explained that he just felt that even though Stewart might have the integrity for the task, he "obviously would have a chip on his shoulder bigger than the rock of Gibraltar."

Jordan's opinion was that Stewart's first mission began badly. His assignment was to protect a racist politician, and Stewart, while averting an accident, took advantage of the situation to embarrass Jordan in the process. When an assassin shoots at the politician, Stewart does not intervene with Jordan in response to the attack, which initially makes Stewart seem suspect. However, it turns out Stewart had good reasons for this apparent dereliction of duty because he was stopping a gunman from killing a police officer in the outside parking lot at the event while Jordan was pursuing a decoy. When Jordan confronts Stewart about his actions, Stewart explains that the politician had staged the attack for political advantage. Jordan then concludes that Stewart was an excellent recruit and has proven his worth.

For some time, Stewart occasionally filled in as Green Lantern when Jordan was unavailable, including some missions of the Justice League.