I really enjoy Hawkeye so far. Marvel’s latest Disney Plus live-action show is basically a six-episode Christmas special about Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner) and his young protégé, Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld).
I recapped and reviewed episode 1 already, and I’m late to the party getting to episode 2 but better late than never. With episode 3 landing later today, I wanted to get a short review on this episode out beforehand.
At the end of the first episode, Clint Barton/Hawkeye tracks down Kate, who has his Ronin suit, and saves her from a beating. He doesn’t realize a girl is in the suit and when he tears off her mask, fist poised to strike, and sees her face he exclaims “Oh come on!”
She’s shocked to see her lifelong hero standing in front of her, but before we get anywhere the credits roll. In episode 2, we pick right back up where things left off.
With police sirens approaching, they hurry back to Kate’s apartment where the dog has made a bit of a mess, though not too bad of a mess because he’s a good dog—just a little rambunctious, stray that he is.
Things go fine until the thugs show up and toss some Molotov cocktails through her window. Apparently they followed her before. The pair, along with the dog, make good their escape. Alas, Kate’s super rad apartment is toast. They also leave the Ronin suit behind.
From here they go get some first aid supplies and then head to her aunt’s apartment to get patched up. Realistically, after all the hits she took, she should probably go to a hospital—especially some of those gut punches—but this is the MCU so we can suspend our disbelief. Here, we learn that while Kate is a master at archery and martial arts, she is a terrible artist. Her drawing of the Tracksuit Mafia looks like a child’s. Her “notes” read: “Doughy faced, very white.”
Hawkeye heads back to her pad where emergency crews have arrived, snags a firefighter disguise and heads up into the aftermath of the burn. The suit is nowhere to be found, but as he leaves he spots a sticker on the fire truck that reads: NYC LARPERS. The clue leads him to a LARPing event where he gets his first taste of dressing up like a character and pretend fighting.
Well, maybe not first taste.
A Storm Of Swords
This is my favorite part of the show so far. It’s hilarious to see Hawkeye’s discomfort with all of this. They give him a helmet which he doesn’t wear—I wish he’d tried it on at least!—but he costumes up and takes his big foam sword and heads out to look for the suit.
Pretty quickly you can see that he’s having fun. The following slow-motion fight scene is hilarious. Hawkeye walks coolly through the LARP battle, slicing and slashing his way past his costumed foes, unleashing his fighting skills as one by one they fall, theatrically, to the earth.
When he gets to the firefighter who stole the Ronin suit, the guy recognizes him. Hawkeye tells him he can hit him with his fake sword and take the suit, or punch him for real and take the suit. It’s his call. The guy, who goes by Grills, has a third option: “Let me kill you!” He’ll give him the suit if they fight and Hawkeye let’s him win.
Grudgingly, Hawkeye agrees. The LARPers all gather around for the epic battle—one that Grills insists needs to look real—and the fight commences. One onlooker makes “cling” noises every time their blades cross. Hawkeye let’s Grills win, and there was much rejoicing. Grills happily hands over the suit, telling Barton that this was the best day of his life, which is cute.
Back at her mother’s apartment, Kate and Jack—her soon to be stepfather—engage in a duel of words that eventually leads to an actual duel. Kate is a trained fencer and can tell that Jack is holding back, disguising his skills with a blade. As far as she’s concerned, it’s just another act of deception from a man she doesn’t trust. When the fight is over—Jack having clearly let her get all three hits—he turns to Eleanor and Kate lunges without warning, aiming her foil at his face.
He parries it deftly, disarming her in one swift motion. But Jack is a cool cucumber and doesn’t really let any of her relentless accusations phase him. He goes to change and Kate tries to convince her mother that he’s up to no good, but she tells Kate to apologize.
“I’m sorry for scaring you into telling the truth,” she says with a smirk. Jack laughs it off.
When he offers her a butterscotch—one of the monogrammed candies from Armond III’s apartment—she pales and quickly makes her exit. We’re meant to see this as a clue that Jack was in Armond’s place and could be his uncle’s killer, but I’m not so sure. This could be a clue, but it could just as easily be a red herring. Jack is Armond’s nephew after all. He would have visited him many times in the past and could have picked up the candy another time. Or he could be the killer! We’ll find out soon enough.
Echoes Of The Past
Hawkeye, looking to get to the bottom of what exactly is going on, allows himself to be captured by the Tracksuit Mafia goons. When Kate leaves her mom’s penthouse she tries to call him but one of the thugs answers instead, so she tracks the phone using Bishop Securities tech and races over to the rescue. Or, well, to the “rescue” as it were.
Of course, Barton doesn’t need rescuing. He’s there on purpose. He wants to talk to the boss, throw them off her scent and get back to his family. As the thugs interrogate him, rather poorly, he pretends not to know Kate Bishop and insists that she isn’t Ronin (she’s much too young for one thing)—until she clumsily breaks through the glass ceiling and crashes to the floor in front of them. So much for a rescue.
We get a glimpse of the boss at the very end of the episode. We don’t learn anything about her but she’s Maya Lopez, aka Echo, and she’s played by Alaqua Cox. Both Lopez and Cox are deaf. The credits roll before we can find out who she is or what fate is in store for our heroes. We’ll learn more about all of that in Episode 3 which I will be reviewing shortly.
All told, I’m enjoying Hawkeye a great deal. It’s not as weird or unique as WandaVision but I’m enjoying it much more than either Falcon and the Winter Soldier or Loki. It’s fun and action-packed and sweet and funny and both Renner and Steinfeld are perfect, and work really well opposite one another.
What do you think of this show? Let me know on Twitter or Facebook. And check out my video review below:
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