A Review of “Hawkeye (2021)”

 

Hawkeye to me was always such an underrated Avenger. As hinted at in Black Widow (2021) he fought against her and won while sparing her. Took down Loki from the sky in Avengers (2012), was the only Avenger to not get brainwashed in Age of Ultron (2015), fought a super-powered and armoured Black Panther in Civil War (2016), take down many gangs single-handedly during the Blip, managed to outrun and kill all the Aliens chasing him alone in Endgame (2019). So I was happy that he was finally getting the solo project he deserved. The premise is “Former Avenger Clint Barton has a seemingly simple mission: get back to his family for Christmas. Possible? Maybe with the help of Kate Bishop, a 22-year-old archer with dreams of becoming a Super Hero. The two are forced to work together when a presence from Barton’s past threatens to derail far more than the festive spirit”. So does this show hit the target or fail to hit the mark?

The main leads, Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner) and Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld) have wonderful chemistry. They are phenomenal when together on screen. The whole show feels like a buddy cop adventure for the two and it just works. Clint is the reluctant old person while Kate is the wide-eyed enthusiastic young one. Both of them go through great character developments as well. Clint starts to learn to live with the past and grows more invested in Kate’s problem. Kate learns that superhero life isn’t all sunshine and rainbows with her understanding the consequences and responsibilities with the role. Both have great banter together that can be quite funny but there are some heart-warming moments as well. Examples include Kate helping Clint due to him losing his hearing aids or Clint telling Kate about Natasha.

Those two are not the only ones with great chemistry though. Yelena (Florence Pugh) returns since her prior appearance in Black Widow (2021). She ends up meeting Kate in the show and these two have their special dynamic that is hilarious to watch. They have a frenemy dynamic in which Yelena wants to kill Clint but Kate doesn’t want that, yet they both don’t hate each other. I also love the phone conversations between Clint and his wife Laura (Linda Cardellini) as it is very lovely and I do feel the love between the two. The supporting cast is great as well. Vera Farmiga plays Kate’s mother Eleanor Bishop and feels like a loving mother while Tony Dalton plays the new upbeat but weird stepdad Jack Duquesne. My biggest praise goes to Alaqua Cox performance as Maya aka Echo. She is deaf and never speaks in the show but is still able to give a very badass and menacing performance but also deliver some emotive performance through facial expressions and body language alone. I’m not surprised she is getting her MCU show.

Another highlight has got to be the action sequences. A memorable one is episode 3 with the awesome one v one fight, the Hawkeye bow John Wick sequence, and the amazing car chased sequence with part of the sequence being filmed like it was one take that was quite impressive. There is also a great all-out rooftop fight in episode 4 and an amazing episode 6 action sequence that is an absolute blast to watch. In terms of set design, the Christmas setting livens it up and makes the screen pop out more. The music score is also fine for the most part but the use of Christmas music is utilised well. One problem that Marvel live-action shows had so far is that it starts strong but ends weak. Thankfully, this is not the case in Hawkeye as its final episode is wonderful and is a great ending to the show.

However, the first two episodes are quite slow. It is mostly spent on building up Kate’s character and setting up the mysteries that this show will revolve around. The thing is that it takes a long time for it to build this up and there isn’t much excitement happening. Clint is barely involved in the first two episodes and doesn’t even properly become involved in the plot until the end of episode 2. This causes the show to feel like the Kate Bishop show rather than about Clint. It also doesn’t help that the action scenes in the first two episodes are bad with it being overly edited with quick cuts. There is also an ongoing mystery about the stepdad, Jack, that is so uninteresting and predictable to the point that I was wishing they go back to Clint. Thankfully, there is a mystery concerning who the big boss is that is very interesting. Additionally, the other issues such as action and it feeling like the Kate show is fixed in episode 3 onwards.

Overall, Hawkeye might be one of the best Marvel shows so far. It feels more consistent and doesn’t dip in quality. Each episode of the show feels like it is getting better and better which made for a more pleasant viewing experience. Unfortunately, it feels like people are sleeping on this show just because it is about Hawkeye. I think this is a great show that hits the target and people should give this one a shot.