“Lucky”
Writer: Matt Fraction
Atist: David Aja
Colors: Matt Hollingsworth
[rating: 5/5]
When you hear about a Hawkeye ongoing, you tend to cringe. Writers have some trouble writing the brash archer outside of his Avengers stories, focusing on stories which put Hawkeye in the thick of a bow and arrow centric adventure where he’s never really out of his element and over his head.
Matt Fraction, thankfully, has no such qualms, and it’s these sensibilities that have made Hawkeye #1 a successful first issue. The book probably shouldn’t have been called “Hawkeye” for starters, as the focus of the story is clearly on Clint Barton. We in fact only see Clint in costume on the first two pages of the book. The rest of the issue, told mostly through his own narrative, focuses on his relationship with his neighborhood and his overwhelming desire to make everyone safe and happy.
The down to Earth, street level approach really works with Hawkeye, a character out of place in the world of super powered heroes, but it’s in this issue that Matt Fraction shows us Hawkeye’s appeal. He truly comes across as the every man, one of us, a genuinely nice guy who wants to do right. The end result is an exciting, down to Earth story with real weight and emotional attachment to the characters.
In a week full of alarmingly good books, it’s a breath of fresh air that “Hawkeye” is the stand out of the bunch, a story with heart and action. For fans old and new of the character, this is definitely the pick of the week.
