His robotic features looked nothing like his human ones, and it was not established until later in Captain America #249 (Sept. 1980) that Machinesmith and Starr Saxon are the same character.

Barry Windsor-Smith has stated that the character was supposed to be presented as gay in Daredevil #50; however, the early art was not good enough to get the point across.

Starr Saxon was born in Memphis, Tennessee, but his family was living in Queens, New York, by his teenage years.

At some point during this period, he constructs a facsimile of Magneto and a variety of robotic "mutant" drones who went on to battle the X-Men.

[5][6] Deciding to confront Daredevil directly, Saxon murders Zoltan Drago and steals the man's costume and weaponry.

[9] Machinesmith is hired into the Red Skull's exclusive employ, for whom he served as his primary scientist/machinist and member of the Skeleton Crew.

[16] Machinesmith later appears in Madripoor, having captured Captain America and deactivated the Super Soldier Serum in his foe's body.

Captain America is able to regain the enhanced physique and defeats Machinesmith, trapping his consciousness inside a robotic body that he could not wirelessly transfer himself out of.

[17] But Machinesmith is resurrected a year later by Sharon Carter to discover how Captain America was consistently reverting to a weaker form, bargaining for his freedom.

Machinesmith agrees on the condition that Lang gets him a job at Ant-Man Security Solutions as stable employment will help keep his parole officer off his back.

[20] During the "Secret Empire" storyline, Machinesmith and Grizzly join up with the Army of Evil during Hydra's rise to power.

[21] After the fall of which, Saxon would turn his attention towards attacking a tech symposium in Nagayo, Japan; held in honor of King T'Challa and students of Wakanda's illustrious science academy by advocates of professor Takumi Ito and his protege's amongst the Takumi Masters.

Tech geniuses whose invention they call the Shareware, which pools both the collective consciousness and thoughtscape of everyone plugged into it at the symposium via the cyber world, Machinesmith would seek to use in order to gain access to Wakanda's data processing center to spread a biotechnical plague that will cybernize whole civilizations across the world.

After Ghost in the Machine sends a message to Mark One about Arno Stark's project that involves putting an end to the A.I.

Machinesmith is entangled in wires that work to place the submission code in him as he begs for Awesome Android to help him.

Army that Quasimodo is deactivated and Mark One is facing off against Iron Man, he runs into Awesome Android who is carrying a tablet that Machinesmith transferred his consciousness into as they flee the Baintronics guards.

He implores every machine from combat drone to coffee makers to join the fight as he states that Mark One is a flesh A.I.

After breaking his neck, his consciousness began to occupy a robot duplicate of himself, programmed with his complete brain patterns, and capable of self-motivated, creative activity.

Machinesmith has also created a vast arsenal of weaponry, defense systems, and surveillance devices, whose specifications are constantly upgraded.

Enabling him to physically, mentally or spiritually commandeer any and all forms of mechanical redistribution like metals, plastics, silicates and circuitry mostly.

[31] A technique he has perfected to the point of transforming himself into a techno-organic virus, using himself as a nanite conversion algorithm to roboticize and convert living tissue into replicas of his own A.I.