For 60 minutes, Hawkeye was a dud. Then something happened that turned it around. Today’s review discusses what that was!
Genre: TV Show – Superhero
Premise: After a college archer steals the suit to Hawkeye’s nemesis, Ronin, Hawkeye must protect her from a growing list of villains who want to kill her because they think she’s the infamous villain.
About: This is the FOURTH proper Marvel show to premiere on Disney Plus. The series is led by creator Jonathan Igla, who most notably was a writer on Mad Men. The principle director is Rhys Thomas, who teamed up with Seth Meyers to make Documentary Now. The show stars Jeremy Renner and Hailee Steinfeld.
Creator: Jonathan Igla
Details: 60 minutes (review covers first two episodes)
Hawkeye is a reminder that when it comes to telling stories, the more generic your setup, the harder it is to create any sort of original execution. You are drawing from the exact same well that hundreds of thousands of writers before you have drawn from.
This is why, when it comes to the four shows that Marvel has aired, Wandavision and Loki have a leg up on ‘Falcon and Winter Soldier’ and Hawkeye. The Wandavision setup was so unique that it had no choice but to give us unique situations. Ditto, Loki, with its wacky time-traveling parallel universe setup.
This is the dilemma Marvel is finding itself in by having so many stories. Where do you find the originality anymore? How do you give us stuff we haven’t seen already? Remember, the whole reason Marvel became the most successful franchise in history is because it was giving us stuff we’d never seen before. It was incorporating cutting edge special effects into a genre that hadn’t gotten that treatment, giving us pulse-pounding sequences like the airport battle in Captain America: Civil War.
But, these days, we’re so used to special effects in superhero movies, we need something else. Something new to excite us. And Marvel hasn’t been giving us that lately. I suppose the conversation in the Hawkeye pitch room was, “What about Christmas?” Is Christmas enough of a differentiating factor to make this show feel fresh? Let’s find out.
Kate Bishop is a 22 year old girl who’s really good at archery, something we see with our own eyes when, at college, she shoots an arrow at the college bell and, in doing so, destroys the bell tower. Why she did this, I have no idea.
Kate need not worry about that tower. Her very rich New York mother will pay for it. Yes, Kate has a trust fund bigger than the GDP of Moldavia. When Kate comes home for the holidays, her mom informs her that she’s marrying someone new, a sleaze-ball named Jack Duqensue. Kate doesn’t trust this guy and follows him to a rich people auction. When robbers arrive at the auction, Kate grabs this really cool looking suit that was supposed to be up for auction and starts running through New York City in it.
What she soon finds out is that this is Ronin’s suit, some notorious evil bad guy who used to terrorize New York. Because Ronin had a lot of enemies, people start coming after Kate. When Clint (Hawkeye) sees the suit on the news, he leaves his family, who’s heading to their cabin to celebrate Christmas in five days, to settle some past beef he has with Ronin.
Once he realizes it’s just a girl, he prepares to rejoin his family. But, by that point, too many people have seen Kate/Ronin and are coming after her. This thrusts Hawkeye into the protector role, which is great as far as Kate is concerned. Hawkeye is her favorite Avenger! Clint will have to solve this growing problem quickly less he not make it back to his family in time for Christmas. Will he succeed? Or is this going to yank him back into the world he so defiantly retired from?
There are actually a lot of solid screenwriting lessons in Hawkeye, the first of which is the value of an urgent storyline. We don’t typically see that in a TV show because it’s hard to keep a fast pace going episode after episode. But there are only six episodes here so it’s a little easier.
By establishing the need for Clint to get back to his family in time for Christmas, you give the story an energy it wouldn’t have otherwise had. Every setback puts more doubt into our minds that Clint is getting back to his family. When you do this well – build an urgent storyline around an emotional plot beat – it pays major dividends.
The question is, how do you do it well? You can’t just scream “I NEED TO GET BACK HOME FOR CHRISTMAS” and expect the viewer to get on board. You have to set these things up. So what we get is several scenes of Clint hanging out with his family before their flight, the most prominent of which is going to the “Rogers” musical together. If you want us to care about people rejoining each other, you must show us those people together and convince us that there’s a connection there. Too many writers ignore this. They think as long as the ticking time bomb is technically in place, that’s all that matters. No, you need to set up the emotional side of things.
The other smart move they made was understanding the limitations of the Hawkeye character and coming up with solutions for them. Let’s be honest. Hawkeye is the least interesting Avenger. Not only are his powers lame (he shoots arrows) but he’s got no personality to boot.
So here’s what the writers did. First, they LEANED INTO the lameness of the character. In an early scene, Kate Bishop chastises Clint for being boring. She encourages him to up his profile and think about marketing more. It’s done in a cute way and results in a fun little conversation. But, more importantly, it establishes that the show isn’t running from its weaknesses. It’s leaning into them. That’s always the better choice, in my opinion. If you ignore the elephant in the room, he only gets bigger.
The second more impactful choice is to give Kate Bishop gobs of personality. She’s fun, she’s self-deprecating, she’s a fangirl. They understood that two personality-less characters teamed together would’ve spelled doom for the series. They needed as much contrast as possible between these two and, therefore, went all in with “Fun Kate Bishop.”
And it works! The first episode of Hawkeye was barely watchable. But the second she meets Hawkeye, the series goes from a 3 out of 10 to an 8 out of 10. Let this be a lesson about the value of character pairings. If you can figure out the right chemistry between the two characters who have the most screen time together in your script, that can be the difference between an average and good script, or a good and great one.
That approach extends beyond the pairing as well. One of the clever realizations the writers had was that Clint is boring in a vacuum. However, if you can find situations where he’s uncomfortable, you can get fun moments out of him. One of the scenes in the second episode requires Clint to get the Ronin suit back from a guy. That guy happens to be fighting in a “Viking Reenactment Battle” in Central Park. Clint must reluctantly sign up for the battle and participate in order to get the suit back. It’s a funny scene.
And, finally, I have to give any screenwriter who says, “I’m not just going to save the cat. I’m going to save the cat with one eye” major props (It’s actually not a cat in Hawkeye, it’s a dog). In order to make Kate Bishop excessively likable, they didn’t stop at her rescuing a normal dog. This dog only had one eye. The craziest thing about this is that, despite being so transparent, it works. It amazes me, sometimes, what we writers can get away with.
Hawkeye is the most feel good show on the Marvel lineup. If you’re looking for a pick-me-up, look no further.
[ ] What the hell did I just watch?
[ ] wasn’t for me
[x] worth the stream
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: “Put your character where they don’t want to be” may be one of the most powerful pieces of screenwriting advice there is. Again, the last place Clint wanted to be was at that Viking reenactment battle. Which is exactly why you wanted to put him there.
What I learned 2: Bring the villain closer. A villain inside the family (as is the case here, mom’s new fiancé) can often be more terrifying than a villain out in the wild.
