Hawkeye: Some Reflections

The season has wrapped on Hawkeye, a Disney+ plus series featuring Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner), the most human of the Avengers. The character has come a long way from an

uncredited cameo role in Thor (2011) and an enslaved lackey for Loki in The Avengers (2012). He evolved into a key member of the team and my favorite (next to Steve Rogers—Captain America).

In the series, Barton is coming off a tough patch. He lost his family for five years in the blip (half of all the life in the universe destroyed) and became a vigilante assassin known as the Ronin during that time. He rejoined the Avengers to bring all of humanity back but lost his best friend Natasha Romanoff (Black Widow) in the process.

As the series opens, his family has been back for a year, and he has taken his three children on a Christmas jaunt to New York City (where they see Rogers, a musical version of the Avengers which is wildly satiric). In addition to trying to reconnect with his family and overcome his Ronin gig, he is losing his hearing. While there, he meets Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld) who has modeled herself after her hero, Hawkeye, and wants to follow his path as a superhero.

I won’t go into plot details, but I enjoyed the way that it played out. Renner has a “lived in” kind of face that evokes the person you see on the street every day. He has a wry and self-deprecating sense of humor that shows he does not take himself too seriously. The only Avenger with a complete family, he has endured their loss and now has a second chance at a good life. He struggles with his hero status and seems to hunker down a bit when people thank him for “saving the world.” The series is not epic but plays out on a human scale, heavy on relationships. (And I am not even going into Kate Bishop’s family dynamics.)

Several things come out of this series. First, Barton accepts that being a hero is not just being egocentric. He is an inspiration to others; we really need that right now. Second, he comes to some peace with his vigilante period but still grieves the loss of his best friend. Third, he accepts the role of mentor and passes the bow and arrow on to a worthy successor.

The most human of Avengers, he finds himself dealing with age, grief, and legacy. I think many of us can identify with those challenges.

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