Streamin' Meemies: Hawkeye Ep 6, "So This is Christmas"

 

(I'm not putting the "Season 1" qualifier on this because, unlike the finale of Loki, there is no "Hawkeye will return in Season 2" stamp during the credits.)

This episode picks right up where the previous one left off, with Wilson Fisk showing up in the flesh, not just in a picture. This is the same actor who played Kingpin in the Netflix Marvel series Daredevil, which now makes Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, The Defenders and Iron Fist mainstream Marvel canon now? At any rate, we find out right away that Eleanor Bishop has been working for Kingpin to clear away her late husband's debt, and was also instrumental in killing her fiance Jack Duquesne's uncle Armand. She also makes what seems to me the incredibly bone-headed decision to tell the reigning New York City mob boss that she wants out of the life, and has kept copies of everything she's ever done for him in a safe place. I kept expecting a flashing cartoon light bulb warning to appear above her head: "KILL ME NOW PLEASE." Seriously, she should have known better than that...but then we wouldn't have had the final Hawkeye episode. But it's just irritating to see characters do stupid things because the plot demands it. 

I also can't buy that Yelena Belova was somehow able to film this confrontation on her phone and send the video to Kate. Did she have a mosquito cam or something? Honestly. But it does lead to the first of several good character moments for Kate and Clint, when she tells him that this is her mess and he needs to go home to his family for Christmas, and he says: "Kate, you're my partner. Your mess is my mess. I'm not going anywhere till this is finished." 

Kate and Clint prepare for this final confrontation by whipping up a bunch more trick arrows by hand, which solves the problem of where Clint gets them. Then comes another nice scene showing Kate realizing what being a hero means, and stepping up to take the mantle. 

Clint: "You know, you don't have to do this. It's part of the job. It's always inconvenient. It's lonely. You will get hurt. Heroes have to make some tough decisions. So if you're going to do this, I just want to know you're ready."

Kate: "When I was younger, aliens invaded. And I was alone. And I was terrified. But then I saw you, fighting aliens with a stick and a string. I saw you jump from that building, even though you can't fly, even though you don't have superpowers. And I thought, if he could do that, I didn't have to be scared. You showed me that being a hero isn't just for people who can fly or shoot lasers out of their hands. It's for anyone who's brave enough to do what's right, no matter the cost." Long pause. "I'm ready." 

The two of them show up in tuxedo and fancy dress (with purple archer outfits underneath) at the Bishop Christmas party, with the LARPers as backup. Jack's also there with his Ronin sword, having been sprung from jail realllllly fast. Meanwhile, the Tracksuit Mafia, as big and dumb as ever, is bearing down in their silly green vans, and their second-in-command Kazi is positioned in the building across the way with a sniper rifle. He's gleeful when he spots not only Eleanor, but Clint and Kate....and starts shooting rather too soon, shattering glass and spraying bullets. Clint tells the LARPers to clear the area, and Kate spots Yelena in the crowd honing in on Clint and takes after her. 

Most of this episode's runtime is the final fight sequence, with differing shifting combinations of characters slugging it out: Clint and Kazi, Maya Lopez and Kazi, Clint and Yelena, Kate and Clint and the Tracksuits, Jack swinging his sword at whoever, and Kate and Kingpin...but the highlight for me was Kate and Yelena. It's absolutely adorable when Kate follows Yelena into the elevator ascending to the floor where Clint is, and Kate keeps trying to hit the buttons to stop its progress, and Yelena slaps her hand. Then the two of them charge out of the elevator and fight through several offices, throwing things at each other and flipping each other on their backs--but you can see they're both holding back, trying not to hurt the other too badly, because their relationship has evolved to one of mutual respect. As Kate says after Yelena compliments her on a certain move: "Stop making me like you." You hear that, Marvel? I could watch six more episodes of the Kate and Yelena Show. 

The fight that takes the cake for sheer ridiculous fun is the one on the ice rink with Kate and Clint loosing all their newly-made trick arrows into the surrounding hordes of Tracksuit Mafia. Clint says, "All right, Kate, let's give 'em hell," with a wide grin on his face, and you know if this is the moment he's finally going to go down, he's going to go down swinging. At the end of this sequence, the remaining green Mafia silly van barrels towards them, and Kate looses the Pym arrow, which shrinks the thing mid-air to the size of a Tonka truck. It spins to a halt at their feet, and you can hear the outraged squeals of the shrunken drivers with their tiny high-pitched cries. Kate says, "What happens to them now?"

Clint: "I don't know. I'll have to ask Scott about that one." 

Nobody gets a chance to ask Scott anything, however, as an owl flies in, seizes the Tonka truck, and flaps away with it. 

But the most emotionally resonant fight is when Yelena finally corners Clint, and he's trying to tell her what really happened with Natasha even as she's doing her best to beat the shit out of him. 

Yelena: "Before I kill you, I need to ask you one question. I need to know what happened."

Clint: "Look, Yelena, if I told you what really happened, you'd never believe me. But what you need to know is your sister sacrificed herself. She saved the world. I'm sorry."

Yelena doesn't believe this, spitting in his face: "You're lying. You're pathetic." But even as she tosses him around some more, he sticks to his story:

"I didn't kill her. She made a choice. You're not listening to me. She sacrificed herself, understand? And I couldn't stop her."

"Why would she sacrifice herself for you? Why do you deserve it?"

"I don't."

"So she died because you let her."

"I fought for it. But she was better than me."

Finally, as Yelena holds up her gun and prepares to pull the trigger, Clint lets loose with the secret whistle Natasha taught him.

Yelena: "How do you know that?"

Clint: "Your secret whistle with Nat. She talked about you all the time, Yelena."

Yelena pauses, and you can see that despite herself, she's beginning to believe what Clint is saying. "She did? What did she say?"

"She told me about how you guys were separated as kids. And she was flying that plane. I asked her if she was scared. all she could think about is that you were safe. That never changed, Yelena. She loved you. She always wanted you safe."

Yelena begins to lower the gun: "You got so much more time with her."

"Yes, I did."

"It shouldn't have gone this way. If I was there, I could have stopped it. I could have changed it."

"Nothing was going to stop her, Yelena. You know Natasha. She made her choice. We're going to have to find a way to live with that." 

Finally, Yelena accepts the truth and reaches out a hand to pull Clint up. This scene was wonderfully acted by both Florence Pugh and Jeremy Renner. 

At the end, after the bad guys are defeated and Kate's mother is arrested for murder, and Kingpin is maybe executed by Maya (but not really, I'm sure, as the moment the gun goes off the camera pans up and we don't see what actually happened), Clint and Kate and the newly renamed Lucky go back to the Barton family farm for Christmas. Clint gives Laura the watch Kate snatched from Maya's apartment, which she turns over to reveal the SHIELD logo and the number 19 on the back. So Laura Barton was a one-time agent as well? Then Clint and Kate go outside to burn the Ronin suit on Clint's barbeque (which seems like a spectacularly messy way of getting rid of it--who's going to clean off the gobs of melted plastic and other secret superhero suit ingredients?). Kate's trying to come up with superhero names for herself, tossing out "Lady Arrow" and "Hawk Eve" and others, and Clint says, "I have an idea," as the scene fades to the Hawkeye logo, symbolizing the passing of the torch. 

All in all, I enjoyed this series more than I expected to, since I was never particularly invested in the Hawkeye character. But Hailee Steinfeld and Florence Pugh were the standouts in the story, and it's nice that the series dealt with the aftermaths of the Battle of New York, the Snapture, and Natasha's death. It also seems like more of a self-contained story, and while I would be on board with more Hawkeye adventures (and a Kate and Yelena road trip would be wild), I don't think it's necessary to revisit the Jeremy Renner incarnation of the character again. He's earned his rest and fading into obscurity, Marvel. Let him have it. 

Streamin' Meemies: Hawkeye Ep 5, "Ronin"

 

Five episodes in, this show is definitely growing on me. It's not as wonderfully bizarre as WandaVision, or as funny and quirky as Loki, but it has its own brand of charm, especially in the pairing of Jeremy Renner and Hailee Steinfeld. This episode also carries on the tradition of slowing down and examining the characters (there's action and an important reveal, but that's not till the end of the 40-minute runtime), Florence Pugh's Yelena Belova in particular. 

To start, Yelena is centered in the episode's open in 2018, showing that Yelena has continued in her quest to free the remaining Black Widows from their mind control. She finds one, Ana, and sprays her with the red antidote, only to realize Ana has already broken free. They discuss what Yelena will do after this task is finished, which of course includes her reuniting with Natasha. She goes to the bathroom, and as she stands there washing her hands, we get an unnerving insider's view of the Snap--her hands and body turn to dust and reconstitute themselves, all in seconds, as she comes back to life five years in the future and the bathroom's walls change color around her. She charges out demanding to know what happened (fortunately, Ana still lives there; a new homeowner would likely have been shot), and Ana tries to explain and offers her a place to stay. Yelena is badly shaken by the idea of five years of her life being wiped out just like that, and she says she has to find Natasha. The camera freezes on her and the scene cuts off, with the heavy but unseen weight of Ana having to tell her Natasha is dead. (Presumably the after-credits scene in Black Widow, showing Yelena visiting Natasha's grave, happens not long after this.)

Returning to our present time and story, there are two important scenes in this episode. The first shows Kate returning home after the rooftop fight as Clint ordered her to and meeting her mother. Eleanor patches her daughter up and they have this important and well-acted conversation (Hailee Steinfeld continues to do very good work here):

Eleanor: "Does Clint think you're a superhero?"

Kate: "No. I don't either."

"I know it's scary now, Kate. But this doesn't have to change who you are. It just means that what you do might look a little different than what you dreamed of as a child. And" wryly, "preferably a little less reckless."

"I never wanted to be reckless. I just wanted to help you."

"I know, hon. Recklessness is an unfortunate side effect."

Kate looks around her room: "Bet you regret buying me that first bow, don't you?"

"Sometimes. Kidding. You were so cute with that tiny bow."

Kate, sadly: "God, I thought I could do anything. I really thought I could be one of them."

"Don't beat yourself up, hon. Sometimes the paths we're on, they wind around in ways that we never would have expected. All you can do is keep moving forward. Even on days when, honestly, it all just kind of feels like shit." 

"Do you ever worry about me not finding my path?"

"No. I know exactly who you are. And I have a pretty good picture of who you're becoming."

After this little heart-to-heart, Kate tells her mother she and Clint have been looking into Armand's murder (Eleanor's fiance Jack Duquesne's uncle), and they discovered incriminating stuff about Jack. The camera focuses on Eleanor as she says this, and we see she is not one bit surprised, nor does she leap to Jack's defense. Kate begs Eleanor to look into this, and Eleanor says she will (or at least will pretend to, from the looks of it). This leads to a later scene when Kate returns home to find Jack in the middle of being arrested for tax evasion (all the while objecting, "This is all a big misunderstanding. I've never worked a day in my life!" with a deliciously smarmy delivery by the actor). 

The second important scene in the episode is a long, fascinating encounter between Kate and Yelena Belova in Kate's burned, bombed, wrecked apartment. She returned to pick up what she could salvage to take to her mother's, to find Yelena waiting for her (and having cooked up some macaroni and cheese). Kate is understandably stunned by this, and after Yelena's stating that she just wants to talk (and if she wanted to kill Kate, she could have done it before the front door was shut), Kate sits down to listen. Following a bit of forced "girl talk" from Yelena, we get to the heart of the issue:

Kate: "Are you in New York to talk to Clint? Is that why you're here?"

Yelena, matter-of-factly: "No. I'm here to kill him. I have a question for you: What is it? Why do you risk your life for him, Clint Barton? How has everybody forgiven him for his past?"

"He saved the world."

Yelena, leaning forward with an intense, laser-like gaze: "No. My sister saved the world. Natasha Romanoff. She saved the world. Stop pretending like you're not surprised. It does not look cool." 

"You're really Natasha's sister?"

"Yes."

"Wow. I did not see that coming. Thank God, I didn't kill you up there [on the roof in the previous episode]."

Yelena, after a loud bray of laughter: "You kill me? Again, Kate Bishop, you are so funny. That's hilarious. That is one of the funniest."

"Natasha and Clint were friends. Why are you after him?"

"You are so fond of him. It tells me you don't really know who he is."

"He came out here to protect me."

"No. He came here to protect his reputation. Do you know how many people he killed? The trail of blood that follows him, it could wrap around the entire world."

"Okay. Wow. That was very Russian. He's still an Avenger."

"What does that word even mean? Huh? That it holds so much power. You call him a hero no matter what he does?"

"It means that when you choose to spend your life trying to help people, there are going to be things that you lose. When you face the kind of threats that he has, there's going to be collateral damage."

Yelena, dangerously soft: "My sister is gone because of him. She's gone. Is she 'collateral damage'?"

Kate begins to stammer: "No, look, there is no way that is true. He would not let that happen?" (And really, the story of the sacrifice demanded of anyone retrieving the Soul Stone never got out?)

Yelena, driving the point home: "How long have you known Clint Barton?"

Kate, in a very small voice: "About a week."

"It will not be difficult for me to complete this assignment."

"Wait a minute. Somebody hired you to kill him?"

(Yelena doesn't answer, so the answer is yes)

"All I'll say is, if there is someone out there that is telling you Clint is a bad guy, then maybe you should ask yourself what kind of person hired you. He's not perfect. Nobody's perfect. But he is good." 

"However he convinced you about who he is, or how many people think or call him a hero, truth is it doesn't matter. We are defined by what we do. Not by nice words. Like it or not, there is no escaping this."  

After that tense, well-acted scene, the titular character is almost an afterthought. But we do see Clint after leaving Kate on the room, ending up staying with Griggs, one of the LARPers who got his trick arrows back. The next day, he goes downtown to the Avengers memorial site (with a plaque proclaiming their first meeting place at the Battle of New York, with all six names), and he talks to Natasha, or rather her memory:

"Natasha, I really need to talk to you right now. You were the bravest of us all, weren't you? Loyal. Stubborn. You always had to win, didn't you? And for a stupid orange rock. I replayed that a million times in my head, hoping for a different outcome. But I do my best every day to earn what you gave me. Just want to say I miss you. And I'm so sorry for what I'm about to do."

What he's about to do is don the Ronin suit one more time, to try to convince Maya to stop her revenge-seeking. Before he does this, he calls his wife Laura and tells her the situation has escalated, and he's got to stop Maya before "the big guy" gets dragged into the whole thing. Laura tells him she trusts his judgment, and "I'll always understand, more than anybody else ever could. I love you. Go end this." And so Clint sets up a meeting (by skewering a Tracksuit Mafia delivery truck with an arrow bearing a note), demanding Maya meet him "where she first met the Ronin."

There follows a long, well-choreographed fight between Clint and Maya, with Clint finally knocking her down, taking off the Ronin hood and showing his face: "You and I, we're the same. We're weapons. But when you're filled with rage, it makes you blind. It could be used, could be manipulated. Trust me, I know. I was here that night, tipped off by the informant who works for your boss. Your boss wanted your father dead. Now he's using you--"

Maya, still proclaiming that Clint is a monster, charges him. She snatches the Ronin sword out of his hands and is about to behead him with it when an arrow sails through the air and knocks it away from her. Of course, this came from Kate, who we saw earlier sitting up on her bed, looking around her room and deciding she's not going to throw in the towel. She called Clint and left multiple messages that he didn't answer, then used his phone to track him to the meeting place. 

At this, Maya runs away, and Kate hustles Clint into her "getaway car" (an Uber). On the way back to Griggs' place, she tells him she talked to "the woman on the roof" and that she claimed to be Natasha's sister. Meanwhile, we see Eleanor going somewhere across town and Yelena following. A short while later, Kate is sitting talking to Griggs and Clint (and feeding Pizza Dog) when her phone buzzes with a text. It's Yelena, telling her the person who hired her was Eleanor Bishop. This is followed by a picture,  taken by Yelena: Eleanor Bishop meeting someone Clint identifies as "the big guy," Kingpin (Wilson Fisk, from the Marvel Netflix series Daredevil). 

Cue end credits and the soundtrack of "You're A Mean One, Mister Grinch." 

Well. Obviously, this episode is setting things up for the finale, but it's also an absorbing character study of Yelena Belova, who isn't entirely wrong in her hatred of Clint. One wonders if she knows the whole story, or if it would make a difference if she did. At any rate, this series is turning out a lot stronger than I would have given it credit for, and I'm looking forward to the finale. 

Streamin' Meemies: Hawkeye Ep 4, "Partners, Am I Right?"

 

Halfway through its six-episode run, when you'd think the series would be ramping up towards the endgame, this episode slows down for some solid character work. In the process, it delivers the best scenes and one of the best episodes of the series. 

We begin right where Episode 3 leaves off, with Jack Duquesne holding the Ronin sword to Clint's throat. Kate runs over, telling him to stop, and Eleanor chimes in with her own, "There's an Avenger in my dining room?" (Although one wonders if they were already there and Kate didn't just see them, or if they somehow magically poofed into existence just to catch our heroes.) There follows an awkward conversation with the four of them, with Kate asserting that she's working with Clint and she's his partner, and Clint denying it. When Clint gets up to leave, Eleanor follows him to the elevator and gives him a lecture, reminding him that Kate isn't a superhero and saying, "I can't lose her." She asks Clint to drop the case. Clint says he can't, but promises to protect her daughter. After the elevator doors close, Clint texts his wife and asks her to look into Sloan LTD, the company Kate found on Eleanor's laptop, and Eleanor makes a call to an unnamed person, asking said person to call her back and saying it's "urgent." 

(Also, Clint somehow snags the Ronin sword off a table and hides it under his jacket when he leaves. This is another necessary plot bunny that irritated me--we're supposed to think that Jack didn't notice it was gone?)

Afterwards, there's a rather cloying scene of Jack and Eleanor dancing and making kissyface. Kate scowls and blushes and looks away through much of this, but she clearly sees that Eleanor apparently really loves Jack, and at least for the moment Kate drops her objections to him. Which objections are right on target, as we see when Laura calls Clint and tells him Sloan LTD is laundering money "for the Big Guy" via the Tracksuit Mafia and Jack is its CEO. It's brought home that far from being the in-the-dark spouse, Laura knows everything Clint has done and is doing. Laura also asks if anything else is missing from the Avengers' compound and Clint has her start checking for the tracking signal from the Avengers watch, seen in the first episode. 

Clint goes back to Kate's aunt's apartment to rest and tape frozen cranberries on his bruises, and the scene that follows is the heart of the episode. Kate shows up with pizza, Pizza Dog, Christmas movies and a Grumpy Cat sweater for Clint. In the midst of making smoothies, Clint teaching Kate to flip a coin through the air so forcefully it will hit the switch on a TV/VCR and turn the machine off and/or knock somebody out (which will surely come up later), and watching said movies, Clint admits some stark truths. I slowed this scene down to write out the dialogue, and may I say it was masterfully acted by both Jeremy Renner and Hailee Steinfeld. 

Kate: "Best shot you ever took?"

Clint: "The one I never took."

Kate: "What does that mean?" Clint tries to demur, but she presses him: "It'll be a good story, I'm sure." 

Clint's expression sobers instantly: "It's just not a good story, okay? It's about the time I met someone. I was sent to take her out. And when I got there, when it was time, I couldn't do it. I just had this feeling she wanted out. Turns out I was right."

"You mean Natasha."

"Yeah. She was the best there was." 

"I'm sorry."

"It's all right. When you do what I do for a living, it's just a game of managing loss, right?"

A little later, while watching another black-and-white Xmas movie (maybe It's a Wonderful Life?), Kate: "You lost your family in the Blip?"

"Yeah. Like half the world."

"God, that must have been devastating."

"Yeah. There are no words." 

"Is that where you met the Ronin?" Long pause, while Clint stares into space and doesn't answer. Finally, Kate says: "It's you, isn't it?"

"Everybody dealt with the Blip in their own way. I continued doing what I was trained to do."

"Protect people?"

"Hurting people. Investigating first, but in the end, my job has always been to hurt people."

"You were a hero," Kate insists.

"I was a weapon. I was aimed by the right people at the right targets."

"Look, you made mistakes, but those are behind you."

"No, it's tied to me. Tied to my family. That's why I'm here. And I can't go home until I fix it." 

I was a bit surprised that Clint's identity as the Ronin was revealed quickly and without the drama I expected--I thought Kate would flip when she found out. Maybe it's because the final two episodes will indeed have the action ramping up and no time for Kate to have an emotional meltdown, but it also speaks to the relationship these two are developing, that she was able to accept this. The scene also shows, once again, Clint's unresolved grief and guilt over the loss of his family, his actions during the Blip, and Natasha's death, as after Kate leaves, Clint sits in the chair and we're treated to flashbacks from the Marvel movies about all three. 

The next day, Clint dispatches Kate to meet up with the LARPers, one of whom is a cop, and talk them into sneaking his trick arrows out of the evidence locker. Meanwhile, he goes to meet up with Kazi, Maya's lieutenant, and warn her off hunting down the Ronin. When he returns from this errand, the LARPers are in Kate's apartment baking snickerdoodles and showing off their homemade outfits, and Kate talks them into making new uniforms for her and Clint. In the middle of all this, Laura texts Clint to say that she's found the signal from the Avengers watch and gives him the address. The LARPer policewoman comes in with the bag holding Clint's arrows just as he leaves, and Kate (of course) insists on coming along. 

On the building across the street from the apartment where the watch was found, Clint makes an elaborate plan to get inside, which Kate promptly bollixes by walking across the street and following an old man through the door. She goes to the apartment and uses her lockpicks to break in, while carrying her bow and Clint's trick arrows and complaining about it, which leads to a funny exchange: "What do you do with this giant bow problem?"

"I have a collapsible one," Clint replies, perfectly deadpan. 

Inside, Kate finds the watch. She also finds handwritten notes about Clint's family, and Clint tells her to get out, realizing it's Maya Lopez's apartment. Too late: Maya is there, and she lays into Kate. But Clint is also suddenly fighting a masked person on the roof who isn't Maya--who is it? The remainder of the episode is dedicated to this four-person battle, with Clint shooting a zip line for Kate to ride over to the roof, Maya following, and the unknown masked person laying into all of them with expert self-defense and high-tech weaponry. Finally, Kate shoots a sonic trick arrow that deafens everybody (except Maya), and another regular arrow makes Maya run away. Clint rips off the other fighter's mask to reveal none other than Yelena Bulova, Natasha's Black Widow sister who was shown to be coming for Clint at the end of the Black Widow movie. Kate has Yelena in her sights but doesn't take the shot, and Yelena throws down a grappling hook, vaults over the edge of the roof, and vanishes. 

At that point, Kate yells at Clint: "Who the hell was that?" 

"You don't want to know, Kate."

"I cannot be your partner if you don't tell me what's going on!"

At this, Clint lowers the boom. "You're not my partner. Do you understand that? You never were. Someone has hired a Black Widow assassin. This has gotten very real, very quickly. So I'm doing this alone."

"No, you're not. Look, I know that tonight didn't go as planned. But I chose to be here. I understand the risk. I understand all of that." 

"I'm not going to do it," Clint retorts, his voice deadly calm. "Do you hear me? Do you hear me? Go home, Kate. It's over." 

And unable to do anything else (at least for the moment--we know perfectly well Kate isn't going to stay out of this) Kate storms off. 

I didn't expect this show to take the time for such good character work, but I really appreciated it. Now we will see how Yelena fits into all this, and what Yelena and Maya will do. 

Streamin' Meemies: Hawkeye Season 1 Ep 3, "Echoes"

 

This episode pulled back a bit on the character-building storylines of the previous two in favor of action and a long if inventively shot car chase, with the exception of one meaty scene I will get to. It also has the origin of one of the villains (a character who will eventually get her own series), wrapped up in a cliffhanger.

The origin story is Maya Lopez, aka Echo, the leader of the Trackside Mafia. (Though I don't think much of her leadership abilities, since she's overseeing a bunch of idiots.) We see scenes between her and her father, with him explaining why he enrolled the Deaf girl in a hearing school--she has to serve as a bridge between the two worlds. Maya also has a prosthetic foot, but despite this she proves to be a badass at her karate lessons, mopping up opponents by observing them and mimicking their fighting style. Her story comes to  head when she is grown and comes home to none other than the Ronin decimating the previous incarnation of the Tracksides and killing her father, which explains why in the previous episodes and in this one she is so determined to hunt him down. 

Coming back to the present day, Kate and Clint are still tied up at the warehouse and Maya comes out to interrogate them. She demands to know why Kate was wearing the Ronin suit if she isn't the Ronin, and Clint spins her a technically true line of bullshit about the Ronin being dead, killed by the Black Widow. Maya asks how he knows this, and he says, "I was there." Which is again technically true, but it also leaves a large elephant trumpeting in the corner of the room: what will Kate do when she finds out her hero, the Avenger she idolizes, is actually the man who murdered so many people during the five years of the Blip? That revelation does not happen this day, as Clint manages to escape his bonds and he and Echo fight their merry way across the warehouse. Clint finds his bow and arrows and manages to skewer most of the Tracksuits, and even frees Kate with an arrow piercing the duct tape binding her hands. The two of them burst out of the warehouse and steal a car outside. Since in the process of fighting Echo Clint lost his hearing aids (she actually stomped on one of them), Clint is trying to get Kate to drive, but as Echo and the remainder of the Tracksuits burst out after them, there isn't time. Clint takes the wheel and speeds off, leaving Kate to shoot the remainder of his arrows--the "trick" ones--in an effort to stop their pursuers.

This is the aforementioned chase scene, and it's a doozy. For nearly half its length, the camera is sitting in the back seat of the car, pivoting between Kate and Clint in the front and the pursuers barreling after them. I'm sure it was cleverly edited together, and there are some cuts later on, but the first section looks like it was shot in one take. Kate works her way through all of Clint's trick arrows: one spits out purple bubbling Play-Dough that covers and blocks a pursuer's windshield, one blows up a following van, one sticks to the windshield and sends out threads grabbing whatever is nearby (since they're wheeling through a Christmas tree lot at the time, this means the trees are whipped back and bound to the vehicle), and the last one, a one-two punch employed on the last pursuers, sends a normal arrow straight into the air intersected by an arrow marked "Pym", which nicks the first, blows it up into an enormous size, and pierces the truck coming towards Kate and Clint. This takes place on a bridge, and Kate and Clint then jump over the side. Clint shoots a grappling arrow which latches on to the side of the bridge, enabling them to swing to the top of a passing string of subway cars on the tracks beneath. 

After this bit of excitement, Kate and Clint return to her aunt's apartment, where the (as yet unnamed) one-eyed dog was left. Clint is without his hearing aids, and through a good use of sound design, we hear what he can hear--which is almost nothing: voices are muffled and faint in the distance, the words not understandable. Because of this, when Clint's son Nathaniel calls to check on Daddy and ask if he's going to make it home for Christmas, Kate has to write what the kid is saying on a pad so Clint can respond to it. This scene is well acted by Hailee Steinfeld, the expressions on her face showing that she realizes how much Clint cares for his family, and the sacrifice he is making to stay in New York to help her.

Later on, they head to a street doctor Kate knows to get Clint's hearing aid fixed. Afterwards, sitting in a nearby restaurant eating (and feeding the dog more pizza), we get to the meaty character scene I referenced earlier. (This is one advantage of watching this on streaming, that I could pause the scene as it went along and write out all the dialogue.)

Kate: "I know this may sound weird, but I've dreamed of this for as long as I can remember. My dad was fearless, and his whole life was about helping people. When I put that suit on [the Ronin suit], I thought, this is it. This is the moment I become who I'm supposed to be." 

Clint: "I remember the day I thought the same thing. You know, it comes with a price."

"What does?"

"This life you want to live. To really help people. I mean, try to help people, anyway. It comes with a lot of sacrifices, and some things you'll lose forever." (As Clint says this, a shadow passes over his face, and you know he's thinking of Natasha.)

"Well, there's also the things you gain, like trick arrows and cool costumes. Speaking of which, I've been thinking about your branding problem." (At this, Clint shakes his head and looks down in despair, knowing Kate's not listening to a word he's saying.) "You need a more recognizable costume."

"You realize my job for the past 20 years was to be not recognizable, right?"

"Well, you've officially failed at that. Picture this in purple." (Shows Clint a sketch)

"Oh, wow. What's that on his head?"

"It's your head. Wings, like a hawk. That's an H on your forehead. For Hawkeye."

"Well, not happening."

"What if it was all black? All black, with a mask? Maybe a hood?" Since this is essentially the Ronin suit, Kate goes into an aside: "You can't say who Ronin is because it's someone close to you, right? [Ya think?] It's your job to keep their secret."

Clint ignores this: "There are several reasons I'd never wear a flashy costume. My job is to be, number one, a ghost. Number two, my wife would divorce me if I put something like this on. And number three, I'm not a role model. I'm sorry, Kate, I'm not a role model. Never have been."

"What? Yes, you are. You are. You came here. You left your family at Christmas because you thought some stranger was going to get hurt. You stuck around even though I screwed up. And now you're stuck. Whether you like it or not. The Tracksuits have connected us both to Ronin, and it's pretty clear they're not just going to drop this."

"Well, that you are not wrong about."

"Not to mention the fact that my mom might be marrying a murderer." 

"And then there's that."

"As far as I'm concerned, we're in this together." 

Since there's not much else Clint can do at this point, he gives in. Kate insists on sneaking into her mother's penthouse and using the resources of Bishop Security to dig up dirt on the Tracksuits and/or Jack, so they go there (all three of them, including the newly-christened Pizza Dog). Kate inexpertly tries to hack her mother's laptop and eventually gets locked out, but not before discovering something about an organization known as Sloan Enterprises. Clint, meanwhile, wanders around the obscenely luxurious penthouse--and runs across Jack, who flicks out the retractable Ronin sword and holds it to his throat.

Cue cliffhanger. 

This episode really shows off the Kate/Clint dynamic, and it's fascinating to watch. Perhaps Kate is also coming round to the conclusion that she's not as invincible or smart as she previously thought? At any rate, though I don't think this is going to be my favorite Marvel series (WandaVision and Loki jointly hold that title), this show is growing on me. 

 

Streamin' Meemies: Hawkeye, eps 1 & 2

I never paid that much attention to Jeremy Renner's Hawkeye as part of the Avengers. He was just kinda there, one of the only ones (along with Black Widow/Natasha) without superpowers and/or suits. The much reviled Avengers: Age of Ultron did give him a new dimension by introducing his family, which I did enjoy seeing, along with this: 

That was one of the few good things to come out of an otherwise forgettable movie. 

This all changed with Avengers: Endgame. I thought Hawkeye should have been sacrificed instead of Natasha Romanoff to get the Soul Stone, and said so. So I came to this series with a bit of a built-in bias against the main character (also, Jeremy Renner has not exactly covered himself with glory either). I might not have watched the show at all if it had not been for the fact that it's introducing who is apparently intended to be the next generation Hawkeye, Kate Bishop. I own two Kate Bishop graphic novels and enjoyed them very much. Hailee Steinfeld, the actor, has been turning in good performances since True Grit. So I decided to give it a chance. 

The first two episodes dropped yesterday, and are set six days before Christmas, evidently two years after the events of Endgame in the Marvel timeline. This is not long enough for Clint Barton to recover from losing Natasha, as we see in the very first scene. It is, however, long enough for someone to write and stage a Broadway show called "Rogers: The Musical," which I guess is meant to be Marvel's bombastic answer to "Hamilton." It's an over-the-top restaging of the Battle of New York, with the tagline of "I can do this all day." Hawkeye, who is in town with his three children to "reconnect," watches the show until the actor playing Natasha dances across the screen, at which point he can't take anymore. He turns down his hearing aids (he's later shown as needing them due to all the explosions he lived through fighting for the Avengers) to tune out the music, but he finally has to get up and leave, about halfway through the show. He is uncomfortable with all of it, the veneration for the Avengers and his own celebrity, as we see throughout both episodes. Unfortunately, the other main character of the show we and he are about to meet, Kate Bishop, is majorly star-struck on Hawkeye, and that naive hero worship is going to get her (and Clint) in all sorts of trouble. 

Kate does have a good reason for it though: she and her parents were in New York when the Chitauri came through, and an arrow from Hawkeye skewered one of the monsters that was coming straight for her. Later, at her father's funeral, her mother Eleanor asks what a pre-teen Kate wants, and she replies: "A bow and arrow." Jump to the present day when Kate is in college and on the archery team (as well as studying martial arts and fencing, and winning medals for both) and on a dare, she climbs to one of the top floors of her college's buildings and shoots an arrow into a neighboring building's bell tower to ring the bell. She does hit the bell, but then it falls to the bottom of the tower and takes an expensive antique clock with it.

Kate says she is 22 years old, and the way she is characterized fits that age: she is brash, inexperienced, naive, impulsive and reckless. A monologue from her mother in the first episode sums her up perfectly: "Young people think they're invincible, and rich people think they're invincible.  You have always been both. You're not. You will get hurt. Don't go out looking for it." (Trouble, that is, which Kate proceeds to do from the get-go.) She is sent home to her mother in New York in disgrace, where we meet her mother Eleanor's boyfriend, Jack. We see right away that Kate doesn't like Jack (with good reason, as we find out). She accompanies them to a charity gala where she meets Jack's uncle Armand ("third of seven," he pompously informs Kate) and Armand drops the bomb that Eleanor and Jack are engaged. Kate confronts her mother about this and storms out to get some air (where she meets a one-eyed golden retriever that will play a role in the story going forward--and the dog doesn't die, at least not yet). When she comes back in she overhears Armand saying something to her mother that sounds like a threat. Evidently thinking she is a sleuth, Kate follows Armand and Jack downstairs to a hidden room in the basement, where they are attending a secret underground auction.

The auction is selling off superhero souvenirs for bored rich people, including the Ronin sword and Ronin suit from Hawkeye's time as the masked murderer. (Armand and Jack bid on the former, and Armand tells Jack he can't afford it. Jack then makes an ominous crack about the money he's going to inherit one day.) While the auction is proceeding, Kate is discovered, and as she ducks into the back hallways and tunnels to escape the head caterer who knows she's not supposed to be there, she runs on to a group of Russian-speaking guys with guns and ski masks that are obviously up to no good. Sure enough, just as the bidding begins on the Ronin suit, the back wall of the underground room is blown out, and the Russians run through the room, looking for "the watch from the Avengers compound."

In the confusion, Jack picks up the Ronin sword (or rather the pommel--the blade retracts into and pops out of it, so the thing must have been designed by Stark Industries) and shoves it in his tuxedo jacket, and Kate stumbles across the Ronin suit. Since she apparently can't resist the shiny black and gold covering of a villain she knows nothing about, she puts it on. The Russian thugs see her and we realize they have a history with the Ronin, as Kate has to fight her way out. She karate-chops her way through the crowd successfully, although she does have enough sense to run when she realizes she is going to be outnumbered. She emerges on the street above just as another one of the gang finds the Avengers watch--and gets attacked by a dog, the very same dog we saw earlier, for his trouble. 

(And isn't that a coincidence? I haven't read the 2012-2015 Hawkeye comics run much of this story is based on, but one wonders if this "dog" is going to be the equivalent of Goose, Captain Marvel's cat.)

The dog takes off across the street, gets stranded in traffic, and Kate, still wearing the suit, backflips across a line of cars to pull him out of harm's way. This, of course, gets recorded on somebody's cellphone, and the footage is later shown on the evening news--just in time for Clint Barton, who has returned with his kids from visiting the city's Christmas tree, to see.

After dropping the dog at her apartment, Kate sneaks into Jack's place to see just what he is up to, and stumbles across the body of Armand, freshly slain. Escaping the crime scene, she runs into the Russian gang, which either followed her (and if so, that's a helluva big plot hole--how?) or are the ones who killed Armand. She makes a good account of herself again, but this time it's five or six to one. She barricades herself inside an unlocked SUV, I guess trying to find the keys and drive away? when the biggest thug of the Russians punches out the driver's side window. But before he can drag her out, he's yanked away and the rest of the gang is quickly disposed of, by, you guessed it, Clint Barton. Clint pulls her away and down an alley, where he rips off the Ronin mask. Kate gasps, "You're Hawkeye!" and Clint says, "And who the hell are you?"

This ends the first episode, "Never Meet Your Heroes." The second episode, "Hide and Seek," picks up right away, with Clint attempting to bail Kate out of the trouble she has made for herself (and him) with the Russians, the so-called "Trackside Mafia."

(And may I say that these guys are about the most underwhelming antagonists ever? They're shown throughout this episode to be little more than bumbling dumbasses, even if they get to toss a few Molotov cocktails into Kate's apartment in an attempt to burn her out. At the very end of this episode, we meet their boss, a fierce-looking young Latina woman. I hope she makes a better villain than her minions.)

Now that are two characters have met and are interacting with each other, the show picks up a bit. Kate's smart-alecky youth and eagerness is a nice contrast to Clint's tired cynicism--he doesn't want to get back in this game anymore, but he feels he has to do something to help Kate. He takes her back to her apartment so she can change out of the suit and give it to him, only to be followed and surprised (again--how?) by our favorite Russian dumbasses. With the apartment burning, they have to snatch the dog and flee, leaving the suit behind. After stashing Kate elsewhere, Clint returns to the apartment, sneaks a firefighter's coat and hat from one of the engines outside and puts it on, and prowls around, looking for the suit. It's gone, but as he puts the coat away he notices a sticker on the engine window for NYC Larpers and wonders if one of these people has lifted the suit. He visits their website and sees that this is in fact the case, as there is a picture of someone with the suit. The next morning, after hustling his children off on their flight back home and saying he will join them later, he returns to where Kate is hidden. By this time, the report of Armand's murder is also on the news, and Kate refuses to stay where she is (her aunt's apartment) any longer. She says she will be safest at her mother's security company, so Clint drops her off there, after programming his number into her phone "in case of an emergency" (which direction we already know, and he should too, that she will completely ignore). 

There follows the funniest scene in the episode, of Clint going to the LARPer tournament to get his suit back.  He isn't permitted to walk in and talk to the person who's wearing it--no, he actually has to sign up and fight his way to that person. Which he does, in a cleverly filmed slo-mo sequence where he wallops his way through the crowd with his fake plastic broadsword. The guy who has the suit, Grills, recognizes him as Hawkeye and won't give it back unless he can get the ego boost of defeating an Avenger. Clint rolls his eyes but acquiesces to this request. Having gotten the suit back, he stashes it in a locker and calls his wife, telling her he's not going to make his flight. He tells her exactly what is going on, and this conversation is the most interesting one of the show so far, as it reveals that his wife is aware that Clint was the Ronin and what he did during the five years she and the children were gone. (I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for that conversation. How would you cope, knowing your husband was a murderous vigilante for five years?) Clint says he has to take care of the "Tracksuit Mafia," and his wife reminds him he has 5 days to do it. 

After work that evening, Kate has dinner with her mother and Jack. Kate makes several attempts to bait Jack into revealing what he is, and finally talks him into fencing with her. He lets her touch him with the foil several times, condescendingly letting her win, until she finally attacks when he isn't looking and he rips the blade out of her hand. (Which would explain why he was so interested in the Ronin sword.) Kate tries to tell her mother Jack is hiding something, but Eleanor refuses to listen. When Kate leaves, she immediately calls Clint (of course) saying she has "clues," and damned if one of the Russian dumbasses doesn't pick up. He growls, "Clint Barton cannot talk to you right now," but apparently doesn't cut the connection (my God, these people are stupid) which allows Kate to track Clint's location. 

Following through on what he told his wife earlier, Clint has set up a bait-and-switch scam and lets himself be captured by the Tracksuit Mafia. He's trying to talk to their boss, and they're still trying to find Kate Bishop. Which they do without exerting any effort, as Kate, wearing her fancy purple archer's outfit, crashes through the ceiling where Clint is being held in a misguided attempt to rescue him! The last shot of the episode is the both of them tied up, and the Russian dumbasses' boss about to come out to confront them. 

Well. The most interesting character in this show is Kate, but she needs to grow up a bit. Still, Hailee Steinfeld plays her exceptionally well--Marvel certainly nailed the casting for this character. And I'm waiting to see how the one-eyed dog fits into all this. It's a promising start, I think, but they do need a better villain. Hopefully either Jack or the young Latina woman will level up to provide one.