Michelle La Bella The first two installments of Hawkeye debuted together on Wednesday, November 24th, 2021, on the streaming platform Disney+.
The first episode, “Never Meet Your Heroes,” focuses more on Kate Bishop, serving as a tiny origin story for the spoiled yet gifted 22-year-old. By sneaking into a black market auction hidden beneath her well-connected mother’s charity event and borrowing Clint’s old Ronin suit from the inventory, she stumbles into the life overnight. Then, after the season opener concludes with Clint and Kate crossing paths for the first time, “Hide and Seek” strikes a closer balance of screen time between the two of them.
The series opens in the middle of the MCU’s Battle of New York, the showdown between the Avengers and an Asgardian trickster god plus his army that served as the climax to the 2012 film, The Avengers. However, the scene begins far away from the fight and even from Hawkeye. It starts in the home of a girl named Kate Bishop.
Kate is living at her parent’s apartment in New York City on the day of the Chitauri invasion in 2012. Before the Bishop family is aware of the chaos happening outside, Kate’s parents are in the middle of a fight of their own. The dispute boils over, but moments after Kate leaves her mom’s side, she finds herself alone, with the building caving in and a group of Chitauri soldiers flying toward her. Her fear diminishes when an arrow suddenly destroys the aliens’ cruiser. Kate sees Hawkeye propel himself down the side of a building with little more than a bow in hand. This is the day that Kate decided to become a superhero.
While Kate’s story begins at the Battle of New York, Clint’s resumes over a decade after it, with the now-retired Avenger watching Broadway actors perform a reenactment of the event on a stage. Only two years from the Blip, Clint is with his three children, as he does his best to give them the New York City holiday experience before they all return home to join their mom for Christmas. Being one of Earth’s greatest heroes, Clint has become a celebrity- with all the ups and downs. However, after years of threats of alien invasions, genocidal robots, and the loss of his best friend Natasha Romanoff, the superhero life has taken a physical and emotional toll on Hawkeye. His dark past comes to light—thanks in large part to Kate—it’s clear that it’s not quite time for a life of normal Christmases with the family.
With the first two episodes already out, we are already one-third of the way through this short 6 episode series. Check back in next week as we continue to recap as the story tracks on.
