A pair of archers stumble into each other.
I hope everyone has had a good first
month to 2022. I know that’s probably unlikely now that we’re in year 3 of a
Pandemic, but what are you going to do? Let’s talk about last month’s MCU studios
show, Hawkeye. Hawkeye, released on Disney plus from November 24-December 22, is
the first solo MCU project for Clint Barton aka Hawkeye, and it’s in part here
to introduce us to his successor and mentee, Kate Bishop. He just can’t avoid
working with others, it seems. Let’s get to it, shall we?
 |
| Hell of a day. |
We open in a ritzy apartment in New
York in 2012. We’re introduced to a young Kate Bishop as she eavesdrops on her
parents. Said parents are arguing about their financial situation. It seems
like they’re in dire straits, and Mrs. Bishop, Eleanor, wants to sell their
penthouse to get some liquid cash but Mr. Bishop, Derek, is dead set against
it. Kate knocks something over, alerting her parents to her snooping. Derek
goes up to her room and gives her a reassuring speech. He tells her to eat
lunch with mom while he works in his office. Eleanor and Kate try to lighten
the mood between them, which seems to work, but as Kate goes to get the
checkers board… Loki opens his interdimensional portal and Chitauri start attacking
New York. Whoops. Kate frantically looks
for her parents as the Chitauri soldiers and their massive wyrms fly by. The apartment
shakes and Kate finds a massive hole in one of their walls. As she watches, a
Chitauri gunner almost gets to her, but an arrow from the sky hits and destroys
it. She sees Hawkeye take out a bunch of Aliens before jumping away to save other
people. Eleanor grabs Kate and they run. Unfortunately, her father is killed in
the chaos.
At the funeral, Kate asks her
mother what happens if the aliens come back. Eleanor says they won’t, as the heroes
showed them what happens if they mess with Earth. Kate wants to be able to
protect herself and her mother and asks her mom for a bow and arrow.
In the opening credits, we’re shown
an animation of Kate’s growth as an archer over time. We see her go from
missing most of her early shots to being a champion markswoman, her work in
judo, fencing, gymnastics and her dabbling in parkour. Girl does a lot in, like
ten years.
We cut to the present day, where
now 20 something Kate Bishop break into one of her school’s buildings after hours
on a dare. She climbs to the highest point of the building and readies her
equipment. She aims and fires, hitting the side of the bell in the nearby
clocktower. It lets out a weak clang. Kate, not wanting to let the dare end
like that, readies a special arrow, fires, and hits the bells clinger, causing
the bell to ring. But then the bell drops, destroying it and the clock tower. Whoops.
OH, and a guard catches her. Well, at least this night failed spectacularly, am
I right?
Meanwhile, Clint Barton and his
three kids are watching Rogers: The Musical, a musical reimagining of the
attack on New York. Well, his kids are watching, Clint is more… looking at it
as he turned his hearing aide off. He seems to start having a PTSD flashback as
he watches the actress playing Natasha dance, but his daughter Lila pulls him
out. Clint tries to play it off, complaining about the musical as it has Ant
Man in it despite him not being there. He gets up and goes to get some air.
While in the bathroom, a guy comes in and asks for a selfie, but Clint isn’t
super up for it. He goes outside and tries to relax. Shock of shocks, the covert
ops guy is weirded out by people recognizing him. Lila comes out to reassure
him, and their joined by Nathaniel and Cooper a moment later. They go to have
dinner.
Just a goofy, goofy man.
Kate makes it to New York and is
asked by her mother to meet her at her place to see her and her boyfriend Jack.
She arrives to see her mom just before Eleanor was about to head out for a charity
auction. She starts scolding Kate for destroying the clock tower, telling the
younger Bishop that her credit cards have been cancelled and that she’s in for
a much more thorough scolding when there is time. Eleanor offers for Kate to
join her at the charity event to start making up for her screw up. Kate notes
that there are more swords in the apartment than she remembers, and they’re
joined by Jack, her mother’s somewhat eccentric boyfriend. There’s obvious
awkwardness between Kate and Jack, but he and Eleanor leave before they can really
get into it.
A hawk and his chicks.
The Bartons, meanwhile, are having
dinner at a Chinese restaurant. They’re going to go see the big Christmas tree
after dinner, and then Laura calls. They have a sweet family moment as they talk
to her, expositing that Clint and the kids are in New York alone so he can have
some quality time with them. Clint promises that they’re going to do all the Christmas
stuff they love in the six days to Christmas. Hey, that means this episode is
on the 19th, sweet! What? I enjoy the idea that Clint had fun before
being wrapped up in shenanigans on my birthday. Nathaniel wants to build gingerbread
houses, Lila wants to do a movie marathon, and Cooper wants to wear ugly
sweaters. He promises that this is the best Christmas ever. There’s an awkward
moment when the waiter tells him that dinner is on the house, again, he’s not used
to being recognized.
At the party, Kate decided to go
with a black suit rather than the red dress her mom picked out for her, which lead
to some confusion with the waitstaff as that’s their uniform. She watches her
mom and Jack from a distance. She meets Armand Duquesne, a family friend that
she hasn’t seen in years. They have a nice chat, until Armand accidentally
drops the bomb that Jack and her mom are engaged. Whoops. Armand claims that he
has tried to convince Jack from marrying her, he’s Jack uncle, but couldn’t
convince him. He, I guess, isn’t a fan of Eleanor. Weird thing to tell Eleanor’s
daughter, but what are ya going to do. Kate is saved from awkwardness by Armand’s
grandson, Armand. Old man is Armand III, the kid is Armand VII. They leave and
Kate goes to talk to her mom. Jack leaves to handle his own engagement and they
talk. Kate is clearly not super jazzed by this but tries to be happy for her
mom. She goes out for some air, where she sees a dog with one eye before it
runs off. How odd.
Back inside, she sees Armand and
her mother arguing about something. He is giving Eleanor an ultimatum of some
kind or another before storming off. Kate tries to talk to her but gets brushed
off. Kate follows Armand to the back. She uses her tux to help her slip into
the back area, posing as a waiter. Armand and Jack are in a wine cellar where
an auction of some kind is going on. Armand expresses exasperation with Eleanor
as Jack joins him and the auction begins, with a triceratops skull. Kind of
random. Kate is almost found out by the waitstaff, but she claims that “Gary” a
name she overheard earlier sent her back there. Gary is brought down to yell at
her, but Kate dramatically “quits” to allow her to escape. She slips into a
back part of the wine cellar and hears some guys through a door.
Something about the hood makes her look real short.
The auction moves onto a special
item, Ronin’s (Clint’s) sword, recovered from the wreckage of the Avengers
compound. The sword is retractable and is neat. Oh, and we learn that Clint’s
identity of the Ronin is still hidden. Jack and Armand fight over the sword.
Armand claims Jack doesn’t have that much, but he rather cryptically says he’ll
inherit it, one day. Armand wins the sword, and they wheel out the next item,
Ronin’s suit, just as a truck crashed in and cuts the power. In the confusion, Jack
grabs the sword and runs off. A group of goons come out of the truck and state
that they are looking for a watch. Kate finds the box with the suit and puts it
on. The goons collect a bunch of items from the auction and start threatening
guests. Kate runs up and knocks out one of the goons. She dodges gunfire as she
tries to distract the goons. Kate uses her martial arts skills and the
environment to dodge around men in tracksuits. She almost gests caught but
starts beating them up with wine bottles. Damn. Topside, Eleanor is looking for
Kate, can’t find her but meets up with Jack. Kate gets thrown around by the
last few goons but can escape. One of the goons finds the watch they were
looking for, but the one-eyed dog attacks him. The dog runs and Kate chases
after it, saving it from being hit by a car. Kate escapes, but the Jacksuits
and their leader Kazi sees her run off.
At the Barton’s Hotel, the family
comes in as the news plays the video clip of Kate flipping over the car to save
the dog. Clint sees someone in his suit and is immediately freaked out. He has
a flashback to when he was killing basically every organized crime boss he could
find.
Kate brings the dog to her
apartment. She grabs a bag and feeds the dog cold pizza. She looks up Armand’s brownstone
and heads for it, telling the dog to not destroy her apartment. She makes it to
Armand’s, finding Armand III dead on his floor with a slash in his side. Damn. She
escapes before the maid sees the body. Kate runs for it but is cornered by the
Tracksuits. The thugs rather cryptically saying they have eyes everywhere. They
start attacking her. Kate does well, but it’s six on one odds, without superpowers
those are damning odds. She knocks a few of them aside before getting into an
unlocked car to protect herself, locking herself in. The tracksuits start
beating on the car, and one shatters a window to get at her. The tracksuits are
then attacked by a Clint in his own DIY costume. He beats them up and escapes
with Kate. In a nearby alley, they both are unmasked, with Kate immediately
starting to geek out at seeing Hawkeye, and Clint asking who the hell she is.
I liked this starting episode a
lot. The opening scene was well done in setting up Kate’s desire to be the best
physical athlete she can be to be like the man that saved her life. Her stunt
with the belltower showed us her skill, ingenuity, and the fact that she can be
kind of dumb at times as well as unlucky. The scene at the party was great just
for the bit about using the fact that she was dressed like a waiter to infiltrate
the auction. I question her ability to put on the Ronin suit and start kicking
ass in the 90 second time frame that the goons were apparently working with,
but that’s a nitpick. The whole fight in the wine cellar was brilliantly done.
And I liked how they set up how Hawkeye is doing. Clint is largely retired, it
seems, enjoying an outing with his kids but is constantly being reminded of his
dead friend, of the fact people know who he is, and that he kind of was an
unstoppable killing machine for roughly five years. That last one is a doozy. I
also like that they brought in his hearing impairment. Yeah, that’s canon. Hawkeye
of the comics is about 80% deaf and gets by with hearing aids. Fun fact, Deadpool
is canonically the only character to speak to Clint with his mask off his mouth
and with sign language to help Clint better understand him. Yeah, Deadpool is a
surprisingly nice dude. I liked how they made it clear that Clint is not
adjusting well to being recognized. Sure, the bathroom guy asking for a selfie
was very weird, but even the more normal ‘meal on the house’ was met with a
grimace and clearly uncomfortable Clint. It seems clear that he preferred being
the least known member of the Avengers instead of a household name. Having him have
a full flashback to his Ronin executioner days was also a good indication of
how he feels about that suit showing up again. He and Kate are in for an… odd
ride. My one negative is that I think they were a little too vague on what
happened to the Watch. That was what the tracksuits were after, and we saw one
of them find it, but I don’t really know what happened to it between the dog
biting the guy and running off. Was it knocked away? Grabbed by someone? I’ve
no idea. So… yeah, I liked the first episode. Have a good night, everyone.
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/posts/61661287
Twitter: @BasicsSuperhero
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