The youngest of the group, he is brash and impetuous in comparison to his reticent, overprotective and compassionate older sister, Susan Storm, his sensible brother-in-law, Reed Richards, and the grumbling Ben Grimm.

In his plot summary for this first issue, Lee passed on to Kirby that the recently formed Comics Code Authority had told him that the Human Torch was only permitted to burn objects, never people.

At 16, Storm joined his sister and her fiancé, Reed Richards, in a space flight in which cosmic radiation transformed those three and spacecraft pilot Ben Grimm into superpowered beings who would become the celebrated superhero team the Fantastic Four.

[23] Storm briefly joined his nephew Franklin Richards' Fantastic Force team, where he battled his otherdimensional counterpart, Vangaard (formerly Gaard).

[volume & issue needed] Seeking an acting career, Storm was cast as the Old West hero the Rawhide Kid, but producers reconsidered and gave the role to Lon Zelig (actually the alien Super-Skrull).

[24][volume & issue needed] Frustrated with her brother's directionless life and near-disastrous pranksterism, his sister compelled him to become chief financial officer for the Fantastic Four, Inc. Infighting and betrayal resulted in a near-catastrophe, ending Storm's position.

[28] During the 2006–2007 "Civil War" company-wide crossover, in which the superpowered community is split over the Superhuman Registration Act, which required them to register with, and become agents of, the US government, Storm and his sister allied with the underground rebels, the Secret Avengers.

[36] It is later revealed that the Human Torch was revived by a species of insect-like creatures that were implanted in his body by Annihilus in an attempt to force Storm to help open the Negative Zone portal.

[37] The Human Torch becomes an ambassador within Inhuman society and joins Steve Rogers's Avengers Unity Squad and helps Rogue in incinerating the telepathic portions of Professor Xavier's brains, thus unknowingly preventing Hydra from using it for their secret empire.

[40] He is seemingly annihilated when he grabs a cosmic object called Pyramoids during the fight between the Lethal Legion and the Black Order in Peru, but is restored after Living Lightning wins a high stakes poker game versus Grandmaster.

[41] To help the Thing cope with Mister Fantastic and the Invisible Woman's disappearance, the Human Torch takes him on a journey through the Multiverse using the Multisect in order to find them.

Although the Baxter Building is now owned by a new superhero team Fantastix, the Thing allows his teammates to use his hometown Yancy Street as their current operation base.

[45] During a conflict at Doctor Doom's wedding, where his infidelity with Victorious is revealed, Johnny Storm becomes permanently stuck in his Human Torch form and his powers are boosted to the point where it is unsafe for him to be around others.

[47] Johnny Storm gained a number of superhuman powers as a result of the mutagenic effects of the cosmic radiation he was exposed to, all of which are related to fire.

Even when not engulfed in flame himself, Storm has the ability to control any fire within his immediate range of vision, causing it to increase or decrease in intensity or to move in a pattern directed by his thoughts.

[48] Storm has demonstrated enough control with fire that he can safely shave another's hair,[49] or hold a person while in his flame form without his passenger feeling discomforting heat.

[53] Lyja, while in the disguise of the Thing's former girlfriend Alicia Masters, carried on a long-term relationship including marriage with the Torch,[54] until it was revealed that her true nature was as a Skrull double agent.

[55] Although the two attempted reconciliation after it was learned that their "child" was actually an implanted weapon to be used against the Fantastic Four,[volume & issue needed] they ultimately parted on less than favorable terms.

[64] In the Heroes Reborn history of the Marvel Universe, created after a battle with Onslaught, Johnny is an owner of a popular casino and part financial backer of Reed Richards' plan to go into space.

His rivalry with Ben Grimm now extends into much more dangerous areas, such as a potentially deadly game of 'chicken' without thought to the life of the woman in his passenger seat.

[volume & issue needed] In the House of M: Iron Man limited series, Johnny Storm is a contestant on a reality game show called Sapien Death Match.

Along with his sister, who is escaping a man she does not love, he joins Sir Richard Reed on his explorations, and is caught in the radiation of the Anomaly, turning him into a Human Torch.

[volume & issue needed] At the start of the miniseries 1602: Fantastick Four, Jon has rejoined high society, and once more finds himself embroiled in a duel, this time with Lord Wingfoot, who is betrothed to the 1602 version of Doris Evans.

The team uses power-packs to boost their talents to manifest at mecha-sized levels in order to combat Godzilla-sized monsters that seem to constantly attack Earth.

After witnessing the murder of the other Fantastic 4 members by supernatural assassins, she joins Spider-Man, Spider-Woman (Mary Jane Watson), Black Cat, Wolverine, and Iron Man, in hopes of getting revenge.

When he activates his powers, fat cells beneath his skin create clean nuclear fusion and jet out between the plates as plasma which then ignites on contact with air.

Unlike the mainstream Human Torch, Ultimate Johnny's power sometimes have detrimental effects on his health, specifically causing unhealthy levels of weight loss and exhaustion.

He elects to stay behind and defend a group of younger mutants in the Morlock tunnels while Kitty, Iceman, Jimmy Hudson, and Rogue decide to head to the Southwest to fight off the Sentinels.

In "Pyros", all have the power of the Human Torch; after the team sets fire to what they believe to be an uninhabited area in order to battle a monster, they inadvertently kill the daughter of a woman squatting one of those buildings; the guilt causes them to disband, after which Reed Richards returns to his research, Storm becomes a race car driver and Grimm adopts the Human Torch moniker and joins the Avengers.

Reed Richards returns to his research, only using his powers to aid him in his work, such as handling dangerous chemicals at far range, and Sue marries Ben Grimm, where they live a quiet domestic life free of superpowers.