Comic Book / Hawkeye

"To successfully make a shot, you gotta follow and master basic steps. Your stance is the foundation. Where you draw your strength. Nock the arrow and grip. Realize you are wielding a weapon. Mindset. Focus solely on your goal, regardless of your surroundings. Be in the now. Set up and draw. Inhale and prepare for what you are about to do. Anchor and hold. There is no going back. Aim. All that remains is you and your target. Release and follow through. Master those and you hit every time. One last step. Feedback. Basically...take responsibility for the outcome. For every shot."

— Hawkeye

Hawkeye is a Marvel Comics character created by Stan Lee and Don Heck. Making his debut as a reluctant villain in Tales of Suspense #57 (September, 1964), Hawkeye quickly turned his back on that life and joined The Avengers after a chance meeting with Edwin Jarvis.

Raised in a broken home, Clinton "Clint" Barton and his older brother Barney had a difficult life. After his parents died in a drunk driving accident, Clint and Barney were sent to an orphanage for 6 years. Hungry for a better life, Clint and Barney ran away until desperation forced the brothers to join up with the Carson Carnival of Traveling Wonders. Years passed, during which Clint caught the attention of the Swordsman and Trick Shot, two talented circus performers. Under their tutelage, Clint gained the sharpshooting skills that would allow him to become a hero.

As Swordman's assistant, Clint was happy until the day he found out that his mentor was embezzling from the carnival. About to turn in the Swordsman, Clint was brutally beaten by his mentor until Barney and Trick Shot intervened. Trick Shot became Clint's new mentor while Barney grew tired of carnival life. Having condemned Clint for his perceived disloyalty to the Swordsman, Barney prepared to enlist in the Army. Asking Clint to join him, believing the two needed a fresh start, Barney was disappointed when his younger brother declined.

Jealous of the fame the then-new hero Iron Man was getting, Clint decided to use his skills to become a superhero as well, The Hawkeye. Unfortunately, his weakness for pretty women got him involved with Black Widow, who at the time was a spy working for the Russians against Iron Man, and she tricked him into attacking the hero. He soon realized he'd been duped however. Given a chance to redeem himself, Hawkeye joined the Avengers and has been affiliated with the team ever since, even leading its spin-off, the West Coast Avengers. Ironically, the Widow would later end up doing a Heel–Face Turn herself and becoming a superhero, and even joined the Avengers, having made her peace with Clint.

Years later, Clint fell in love and married Mockingbird, though they had troubles after she killed a man who had raped her. She appeared to have been killed by the Demon Lord Mephisto for a long time, until it was revealed that it was actually a Skrull spy in her place during the Secret Invasion. The real Mockingbird and Hawkeye have since reunited.

Clint was one of the casualties during the rampage of Scarlet Witch in Avengers Dissasembled. Due to the events of House of M, he came Back from the Dead, took up the mantle of Ronin with permission of the original Ronin (Maya Lopez), as the name Hawkeye at the time was being used by Young Avenger Kate Bishop, and eventually joined the New Avengers, leading to the events of Secret Invasion (and also reunited with the real Mockingbird in the aftermath). During the Dark Reign, he was appointed as the leader of the New Avengers and was doing a fair job (aside of one Leeroy Jenkins moment), until the return of Captain America. After Dark Reign, Clint became a mainstream Avengers member, once again donning the Hawkeye alter ego. However, shortly after this he and Mockingbird got divorced.

He had his own title under the Marvel NOW! line, which can best be described as an indie comic set in the Marvel Universe, and focused on Clint as well as the other two Hawkeyes, Kate Bishop and Clint's brother Barney, to varying degrees. After he assisted Kate Bishop in Los Angeles, Kate realized that there were more supervillains than she could handle alone and enlisted Clint in the new reformed West Coast Avengers.

Jeremy Renner portrays him in the Marvel Cinematic Universe since 2011. His first appearance was a cameo in Thor.

Oh, and he's the only character in comics to be a member of both Marvel's The Avengers and DC's Justice League of America.

If you're looking for the second, female and young adult version of Hawkeye, go here.

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Tropes seen in these series include:

• Abled in the Adaptation:
  • Zigzagged. In alternate future stories where he goes blind (there are more than you might think) his partial deafness is conveniently left out so his hearing can make up for his lack of sight.
  • In the MCU his hearing was fine well into adulthood, but cumulative hearing damage caused by close proximity to explosions in the movies led to him becoming hard of hearing.
• Abusive Parents: Hawkeye's father was an alcoholic and his mother did nothing to intervene.
• The Ace: Hawkeye was this during the early run of West Coast Avengers. In a scene in which he's fighting to keep the Quinjet he's piloting from crashing, the narrator comments that many Avengers get praise for doing one thing well, but not Hawkeye—because he does MANY things well.
• Action Girl: Kate Bishop as Hawkeye II.
• Actually a Doombot: In an issue of The Avengers written by Brian Michael Bendis, Hawkeye goes to Transia in search of the Scarlet Witch, finds that she has Identity Amnesia, has sex with her and goes home. In Avengers: The Children's Crusade, Hawkeye learns that this woman was actually a robot Doctor Doom created to throw people off Wanda's trail. (Though it's not 100% clear. A more plausible reading was that Clint met up with the real Wanda in Transia before Doom replaced her with the Doombot, but either way the humor works, since Clint isn't sure if he slept with the real Wanda or the Doombot.)
• Adaptational Wimp: His film counterpart lacks his acrobatics and skill with other weapons, and uses a much more Boring, but Practical arsenal of arrows which limit his range. A great source of controversy for fans as his Out of Focus nature pretty much leaves him the least impressive Avenger. This gets averted later on as Clint gets to whow off more of his arrows and proves to be an amazing swordsman as well, capable of going full One-Man Army on the Yakuza.
• Adaptation Dye-Job: Ultimate Hawkeye... sometimes... has darker hair than classic Clint. Similarly, Jeremy Renner's dirty blond/brown hair in the films looks far more different than Clint's classic Golden locks.
• Alternate Company Equivalent: To DC's Green Arrow.
• Always Someone Better:
  • Hawkeye is this to Green Arrow in an alternate universe where the Justice League and Avengers co-exist. Leaving the Marvel Universe to join the Justice League, Hawkeye completely overshadows Ollie, landing an impossible trick shot to defeat Doctor Doom at the Source Wall. Clint was even dating Black Canary, Ollie's girl.
  • Also, occasionally, to Kate Bishop. As far as Clint is concerned, Kate is the best archer he's ever met. However, while she's skilled enough to be on the Young Avengers, he's just that much better that, occasionally, she expresses slight jealousy over it.
  • As the comics have shown, Clint can casually land the Robin Hood shot (piercing an arrow with another arrow from behind) which Kate can't do at first, but she can tell Emperor Domitian to suck it by loosing five arrows at once (and have them all be non-lethal). However, Clint can fire three arrows and hit his targets before you can say "That's cool", making it a case of Technician vs. Performer, and Kate eventually managed to land the Robin Hood shot in Hawkeye #10, published 5 years later (in real-world time) after her first attempt in Young Avengers Presents #6.
  • Mockingbird is this to him. She was a far better fighter and effortlessly beat him in a fight when they first met, and the only reason he won a fight when she was being forced to kill him was because she was brainwashed to fight without thinking and he was able to use that and his strength against her.
  • For Clint, the one man whom he'll forever (begrudgingly) consider to be better than him is Captain America.

• Amazon Chaser: Clint tends to have a taste for women who can handle themselves in a fight. Case in point: When he first met Mockingbird, she kicked his ass. They married nine days later.
• Ambiguously Bi:
  • Clint Barton himself; though he is unambiguously into women (being that he was married and all, and is still in love with his ex-wife), he's made a near-constant habit of playfully hitting on other men, lampshading Homoerotic Subtext between himself and others, and gets very jealous of anyone who threatens his place as Steve's "best friend" (and this is without getting into the way his history with Steve comes off as a romantic arc). He also notably spent years wearing a costume that corresponded to the colours of the Bisexual Pride flag, and when he didn't wear that, his other costume choices (such as the miniskirt suit) were quite campy.
  • Kate Bishop herself, not only does she have a Pseudo-Romantic Friendship with America Chavez and Cassie Lang, but it's became a Running Gag that the men she's attracted to are always bi guys.
  • Clint's ex-wife Bobbi Morse, though ostensibly into dudes, is also shown openly admiring other women, particularly Black Widow, and jokes about her Pseudo-Romantic Friendship with The Wasp.
• American Accents:
  • Sometimes, Clint is written with a midwestern Phonetic Accent. Regardless, it's apparently noticeable he sounds like a carnie from Iowa.
  • Used nontraditionally, in Volume 4 Clint's neighor Grills has an accent that keeps him from hearing the difference between Hawkeye and Hawkguy.
• Amicable Exes: With Bobbi. Clint is ready to rip the city apart when he finds out she's been shot, and she beats up some goons when they're watching Clint's apartment building in Hawkeye. The last one is followed by her taking a shower at his place and, smilingly, handing him their finalized divorce papers (...that were already finalized before she was abducted by Skrulls).
  • Also Natasha. They didn't date long, but they're still so close that the two have been jokingly referred to as each others "Work Wife/Husband".
  • And again with Jessica Drew, to some extent at least. So much so he was invited on a "Girl's Night Out" with her and her superheroine friends.
• Anachronic Order:
  • Volume 4, #6 takes place mid-December, but #7 is an issue about Hurricane Sandy, which occurred in October 2012. The second trade paperback instead opts for straight chronological order, with the issues ordered 7, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11.
  • Volume 4, #6 itself is also in anachronic order, jumping around one week of December and presenting the reasons for certain situations as they come up: December 18, 13, 17, 14, 15, 19, 15, 16, and 19.
• Anti-Hero Substitute: Bullseye during Dark Reign. His brother Barney continued this after, though then he retired.
  • Inverted with Kate, who is much more The Cape then Clint is; Clint's brashfulness and backstory as a (reluctant) costumed criminal is definitely more "anti" then a good-natured Riches to Rags girl who just wants to help people.
• Arc Words: "Okay... this looks bad." The phrase starts just about every issue of the Matt Fraction run, and it usually involves Clint falling to his doom or in some other horrible situation. Eventually there's an issue that starts with him being held at gunpoint with his pants around his ankles, and the phrase becomes, "Okay... this looks... completely ridiculous."
• Arch-Enemy: Probably Trickshot or Crossfire, depending on who you ask. Once Barney inherited the Trickshot mantle, he and Clint had a Cain and Abel dynamic. Hawkeye and Crossfire have the competition one would expect from rival marksmen (with different weapons), but Crossfire has kicked a lot of dogs in an attempt to break Hawkeye's spirit.
• Archer Archetype: Hawkeye is an arrogant ace. He notably averts the "lower strength" trope, observing in at least one unarmed brawl how all the years of archery have paid off in terms of upper body strength and on another occasion disparaging Crossfire attempts to shoot Hawkeye with his bow (which has a 250 pounds-force (1,100 newtons) draw weight) and can't even draw the string back far enough to use it.
• Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: He's got the trash talk and the skills to back it up. Except where Kate is concerned.
• As Lethal as It Needs to Be: His arrows and his way of using them. Though traditionally Hawkeye abhors killing, in later years he has become a victim of the "darker and edgier" trend of superheroes (particularly noteable when he unhesitatingly killed Bruce Banner during Civil War II). In his most recent appearances, however, Hawkeye tries to avoid killing people, but doesn't flinch at leaving his enemies paralyzed, perhaps for life.
  He'll live. Not well but he'll live.
• Back from the Dead: Hawkeye died during the events of Avengers Disassembled, only to still be alive after reality is shifted to the House of M. Following a Heroic Blue Screen of Death after his memories of his original life are restored and he learns that he's supposed to be dead, Clint is then killed a second time and resurrected for real when reality is returned to normal.
• Badass Biker: Has a custom built motorcycle nicknamed "Lightning." He also has his trademark flying motorcycle, the "sky-cycle", allowing him to take this to the next level.
• Badass Normal: Clint is a skilled marksman, martial artist (he's considered Captain America's best student), able to wield several different weapons as Ronin, and aside from his archery, he can throw objects with such skill and precision that he rivals Bullseye, meaning that, in Clint's hands, anything can be a lethal weapon. He's also an expert technician, tactician, trainer, pilot, and leader, which gives him a lot more utility than most of the other Avengers.
  • In a list of the most dangerous 'normal human beings' in the Marvel Universe, Clint could easily be in the top five. It's important to note that his closest contenders are likely Black Widow and Bucky Barnes a.k.a. the Winter Soldier, both of whom have had enhancements to their abilities, while Clint has zero such advantages. He is a baseline normal human being fighting on par with Thor and The Hulk.
  • In an issue of Avenging Spider-Man, Clint confides in Spider-Man that there is an enormous amount of pressure on him as a Badass Normal on the same team as Captain America, Thor, Iron Man & the Hulk, and subsequently he has to train constantly in order to make sure his accuracy is superhuman, in effect meaning he cannot miss.
  • In the Marvel Ultimate universe, his Improbable Aiming Skills border on the superhuman. In the recent Ultimate Comics: Hawkeye miniseries, it's established that he has subtle enhancements. Ultimate Hawkeye has increased musculature around the eyeballs, which allows him the ability to change his focal length. He also has many more rod cells and fewer cone cells in his eyes, leading to high-contrast, mostly black and white vision and better detection of motion. He's also immune to most attempts to trick the eye, such as camouflage or one-way mirrors.
• Battle Couple:
  • Hawkeye and Mockingbird.
  • Hawkeye (Clint) and Hawkeye (Kate Bishop), in a non-romantic sense.
• Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Commonly averted with Kate, who gets beaten up or otherwise disheveled just about as much as Clint does, and often has bandages patching her face.
• Berserk Button: Doesn't matter if Hawkeye's relationship with her is going strong or not: hurt Mockingbird, and there will be hell to pay. This works both ways as well, so in short, don't fuck with them. Deconstructed in that Clint is well aware of how he gets a murderous rage on when Bobbi is threatened, and this terrifies him. As he's against the idea that heroes should kill, the fact he becomes willing to when she's endangered has lead to many My God, What Have I Done? moments.
• Blasting It Out of Their Hands: Sometimes with lethal results, as when he shot Egghead in his pistol, which then backlogged and exploded.
• Bow and Sword in Accord: As Ronin, he mostly relied on melee weapons but he was also known for breaking out the ol' bow every once in a while if he felt like taking things seriously. Marvel's Avengers ran with this idea, and used a sword as Clint's melee combat option.
• Broken Pedestal: Hawkeye thought of the Swordsman as a father figure until he learned of his mentor's criminal activities. Something similar with Trick Shot too. One of the many proposed reasons for Clint's tendency to play The Lancer is that, until he met Captain America, he lacked a real father figure he could trust who didn't, ultimately, become an enemy.
• Brick Joke: Kate Bishop criticizes Clint for keeping a boomerang arrow, only for her to use it to disable a gangster who was holding a gun to Clint's head.
• Cain and Abel: Barney Barton was always jealous of the attention given to Clint during their time with the circus. After taking up the mantle of Trickshot, Barney and Clint became bitter enemies.
• Call-Back: In Freefall, Bryce shows Clint footage of him in Chernaya the previous year, which is to say Tales of Suspense: Red Ledger.
• Carnival of Killers: Bullet Biker, Swordsman, and both Trickshots got their start performing at the Carson Carnival of Traveling Wonders alongside Clint. The Saving Throws also play this trope fairly straight.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: Putting aside the sheer implausibility of some of his shots, he can loose a quiver full of arrows with speeds comparable to machine gun fire, and each one hits his target. Then there's his acrobatic feats, which are genuinely superhuman but things he gained through circus training alone.
• The Chew Toy: He was killed off in Avengers Disassembled, came back and got killed again in the following year's big event, and got burned alive halfway through Avengers vs. X-Men. If you see a big Marvel Crisis Crossover, expect bad things for Hawkeye.
• Chick Magnet: Black Widow lampshaded this in Widowmaker: Despite having absolutely nothing remotely attractive about his demeanor (he spends a lot of time making an idiot of himself) women seem to fall for him.
• Choice of Two Weapons: Preference for bows notwithstanding, Hawkeye is actually something of a weapon's master... not even limited to just two, actually, but his most used weapons are a bow and arrows and a sword.
• Circus Brat: Clint picked up his skills with the Carson Carnival of Traveling Wonders. In some adaptations and Elseworlds (such as the Ultimate Imprint, the Iron Man: Armored Adventures cartoon, and Chuck Austin's AU War Machine run), this is modernized into him being an Olympic hopeful...for some reason.
• Clark Kenting: Clint just wears some shades. He doesn't make a real effort to conceal his identity, though he finds it more convenient if people don't realize that he's the Avenger Hawkeye. As a running gag, everyone in his apartment know who he is, to his annoyance when they loudly call him this, though everyone else needs him to actually tell them this because, frankly, they don't even know of him.
• Color Motif: Strongly associated with purple, to the point of it being the dominant color in general.
• Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: The Ultimates redesigned Hawkeye with the likeness of Bruce Willis.
• Continuity Snarl: Several in issue 9 of Hawkeye volume 4, mainly in relation to his and Bobbi's relationship. They sign divorce papers despite being considered divorced as early as New Avengers The Reunion and Jessica claims that he ran away when things got tough, but they had made multiple attempts at getting back together and the last one failed due to a combination of them both suffering from severe PTSD and them both feeling that they couldn't be together at that point. But, the last one may just be poor research on Jess's part.
• Cool Bike: The Sky-Cycle.
• Crazy-Prepared: Hawkeye carries target-specific arrowheads for almost any occasion. In JLA/Avengers, Hawkeye locks down Captain Atom with a lead foil containment arrow meant for the Radioactive Man. He claims to have an arrow custom made to defeat every single one of his Avengers teammates. During his time with the Thunderbolts (in the arc when Moonstone goes nuts as her power increases), after taking out The Vision with a specialized arrow:
  You know I got an arrow for every single one of you. Don't think for one second that I didn't come here prepared to take down both teams if I have to!
• Darker and Edgier:
  • During the period Clint operated as Ronin, he jettisoned his "No Killing" rule and even briefly used firearms. And of course in a literal example, he had started wearing a black costume rather than his purple outfit.
  • Ultimate Hawkeye is made of this trope, what with being a Comedic Sociopath and all. He got even edgier after his family died during The Ultimates 2.
  • The MCU version zigzags this, as he's a family man with a pretty neutral personality, but he also has no rule against killing, his first full film appearance had him spend much of it as a brainwashed pawn who killed many, and thanks to Black Widow (2021) it's confirmed he took active part in assassination missions that involved collateral damage. Avengers: Endgame took this a step further when it adapted his tenure as Ronin; while in the comics this only lasted three years in-real-time (in Comic-Book Time, less than a year) and the only people he killed were Skrulls during an active war, in the MCU he spent five years brutally hunting, murdering, and mutilating the bodies of members of various criminal organisations. Conversely, even despite that he was portrayed as a somber and depressed Hurting Hero rather than the raging jerkass he was during that time in the comics.
• Dating Catwoman: He had a fling with Meteorite/Moonstone during his tenure with the Thunderbolts.
• Deadly Dodging: A talented acrobat, Hawkeye uses his agility against his enemies, especially when he's outnumbered. In a training session with the Thunderbolts, Hawkeye uses this technique against Jolt and Moonstone to demonstrate the importance of teamwork.
• Deadpan Snarker: Quite possibly his most defining personality trait, and by far the most notable among the Avengers (pre-MCU, which promoted Iron Man to the snarker). He was so snarky in fact it actually spread to others, as his influence caused even Captain America to learn how to make a snarky comment.
• Decomposite Character: Within in the MCU, it seems aspects of Hawkeye's character have been given to Lance Hunter in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., primarily his relationship with Bobbi of being exes with a tendency to bicker and snark but still care a deep amount for each other and be a serious Battle Couple when in a fight. Hunter is also similarly a Jerk with a Heart of Gold Deadpan Snarker Badass Normal, making him fairly similar to Clint's comic counterpart.
• Dented Iron: He's the Avengers' primary Badass Normal who's a One-Man Army, but his adventures have left him with more than a few permanent injuries, most notably costing him his hearing. The Fraction run had him almost permanently wearing bandages, he's shown having surgery a handful of times to deal with severe injuries, and he casually mentions suffering chronic pain.
• Depending on the Artist:
  • His hair, length and style, and in the Ultimate Universe, how dark it is.
  • There's also his costume's sleeves. IE, if he has any sleeves at all, if he has one sleeve, short sleeves, or bare arms. With his new costume, this includes what are his glasses like (are they like any normal pair, do they look like Mockingbird's, do they look more stylized, are they just solid purple glass, etc), if he's wearing any glasses at all, does he wear wrist guards, how big or how detailed his logo is, how many pouches does he have, does he have a second quiver on his waist, is he wearing cargo pants or superhero tights, does he have any more purple on his costume, etc.
  • Lastly, his bow. Is it a stylized Longbow, a fancy recurve, a compound, some kind of custom one-of-a-kind bow, does it lean towards more fancy looking, or is it more futuristic and practical, does it fold up or come apart, does it have any attachments, etc. This also extends to his arrow heads: Do they all have little metal cylinders on the end holding whatever trick implements are inside, or is it a a more realistic, though bulky, sharp and pointy arrow head. Due to his nature, its entirely possible that he has a mix of both.
  • One notable discrepency is also his height. Officially, Clint is 6'3, making him an inch taller than Captain America, however quite often he's drawn to be shorter than Cap. Likewise, Kate is officially 5'5, but sometimes the two are drawn either the same height, or only a few inches apart, when Clint should be nearly a foot taller than her.
• Depending on the Writer:
  • Recently, Clint's view on killing. Previously, Clint was so against killing that he refused to listen to his wife's plea after she killed a man that raped her. Next minute, he's willingly firing arrows into bad guys boy parts without caring if they'll survive, then he's lecturing Anti-Heroes why they should let bad guys live, then he's killing Skrulls. Addressed in New Avengers The Reunion, where he admits that he now understands why someone would want to kill another.
  • Clint's social skills too. He's either a childish and occasionally snarky Nice Guy, or he's a complete Jerk with a Heart of Gold that has a mouth too big for him. When written by Brian Bendis, he also tends to be FAR more of a jerk than he is usually, and tends to be the one itching to just kill the villain and making other rash decisions.
  • And, strangely, Clint's knowledge of TV pop culture, and his interest in it in general. In a Team up with Spider-Man, Clint claims he doesn't watch TV (and doesn't even own one; given his later confession about the amount of pressure he has to live up to as a Badass Normal it's possible he was lying to look good), but in The Reunion and his new ongoing, he makes references to Grey's Anatomy and owning a TiVo. In issue 6, he's terrified of getting the ending of Dog Cops spoiled, and throughout his series TVs can be seen, though this could be explained by the fact he received a large amount of money before the series started.
  • Clint's knowledge of languages. In Hawkeye, he struggles to tell languages apart, while in Infinity he manages to speak another language.
• Did You Just Scam Cthulhu?: He can punch them out too, mind you, but he's not above scamming them either.
• Disability Immunity: His first fight with Crossfire left him deaf in one ear. Has a hearing aid. It gave him some kind of detection, as he could dial it up and tell if someone was secretly a robot.
  • For a while, at least. Clint's hearing was fixed post-Heroes Reborn'.
    • As of the most recent issues of Fraction's Hawkeye, Clint is once again deaf after Clown stabs him in the ears with one of his own arrows.
  • It's worth noting that Clint's deafness has never made it into adaptations outside the comics, to the disappointment of quite a few deaf fans who enjoy the representation he gives them.
• Discard and Draw: A few incidents has seen Clint abandon the bow-and-arrows in favor of Pym Particles, taking up the identity of Goliath, most notably in Operation: Galactic Storm.
• Distaff Counterpart: Kate Bishop.
• Epic Fail: Loki: Agent of Asgard #1 has Clint somehow falling out of the sky in an airplane with no health and the cops chasing him while playing a fishing simulator.
  Clint: I KNOW! It just... it just happens!
• Evil Counterpart: Swordsman, Trick Shot, and Barney Barton as Trickshot. Bullseye & Barney Barton both served as Hawkeye in Norman Osborn's Dark Avengers teams.
• Evil Mentor: Trick Shot, who taught young Clint archery so he could have an accomplice while he committed crimes. Clint broke off their arrangement after he was forced to shoot his brother Barney.
• FBI Agent: Clint's brother Barney was an undercover FBI agent.
• Face–Heel Turn: Hawkeye, despite starting off trying to be a hero, was manipulated by Black Widow and was a villain before joining the Avengers.
• Family Man: Seen more in his version for Marvel Cinematic Universe where he cares for the family he formed in the movies, but in the comics is also seen a bit by the way he cares for his brother Barney and the long relationship he had with Bobbi. While with the Thunderbolts, he formed a surrogate family unit with the team, him as Team Dad next to Moonstone's Team Mom, and was even (illegally) acting as a foster-father to Jolt and Charcoal.
• Fastball Special: Has one with Ant-Man & the various other size shifters in the Marvel Universe, where the shrunken down hero is fired on one of Clint's arrows and proceeds to increase in size whilst flying at the enemy. Also serves as Clint's Level 3 Hyper in Ultimate Marvel Vs. Capcom 3.
• Fight Magnet: The Tracksuit Mafia.
• Foil: To Daredevil. Clint acts like a goofy idiot while Matt is almost always serious. Clint was almost deaf (prior to Heroes Reborn), but has the best eyes in the Marvel U, while Matt is blind, but has super-humanly good hearing. Hawkeye works best in teams while Daredevil prefers working alone. It's worth noting that both were love interests for Black Widow.
• Gadgeteer Genius: It's often forgotten that, since his first appearance, Clint was depicted as making all of his own Trick Arrows himself. Though he lacks any formal education, he's a skilled self-taught engineer who can come up with insane ideas for arrow heads that work surprisingly well. He might not understand the science behind Pym Particles, but he knows how they work and is more than capable of combining that with arrow ideas.
• The Gimmick
• Genre Deconstruction:
  • Much of Matt Fraction's run was about the realities of a non-powered Badass Normal superhero, particularly what their life would entail when not saving the world. The result: Clint is near constantly exhausted, bruised, and in some degree of pain during the series because his "day job" has him constantly getting tossed around and hurt.
  • Part of the reason for the infamous "incompetence" in the series is just showing the realistic outcome of one man fighting a much larger group of people. They don't use lasers or super powers, they just Zerg Rush him and jump him when he's not expecting a fight, and thus doesn't have his arsenal of Trick Arrows to take them down without doing serious damage. This also effects Kate later, who not only has the disadvantage of being outnumbered, but is also a very tiny woman who lacks Clint's physical strength. She can take down a guy twice her size without a problem, but fighting several is going to be a problem.
  • In issue #7 (the Hurricane Sandy issue), Grills asks Clint why he isn't out with his fellow Avengers. Clint responds by stating that his archery skills would be rendered useless thanks to the hurricane's winds.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Inverted. Clint's weapon of choice is a bow and a quiver of arrows, while Bobbi prefers to beat people with her battle staves or kick them.
• Handicapped Badass: He's deaf, borderline illiterate, and has mentioned having chronic pain and shown obvious signs of depression. He's also a One-Man Army who's on-par with Captain America.
• Heel–Face Turn: Clint started out as a normal guy trying to be a hero, but after he was mistaken for a criminal Black Widow picked him up and convinced him to help her. Barney Barton becomes the second Trick Shot.
• Idiot Hero, Good Is Dumb and Book Dumb: Clint's not stupid, he's a fairly smart man and has a wide range of talents/skills, but he's uneducated, doesn't plan too far ahead, isn't particularly good at understanding others, and can sometimes come off as incredibly dense. He can also be childish in more light hearted comics, like disagreeing with the team leader for the sake of it, cracking jokes about She-Hulk because he had a crush on her, and in general trolling villains and teasing teammates. He also demonstrated that, while they have their purposes, the main reason for all his trick arrows is simply because they're fun.
• I Have Many Names: Clint has used the names Hawkeye, Goliath, Golden Archer, Captain America, and Ronin. What's notable is that every one of those names have been adopted by someone else, or belonged to someone else before he picked it up.
• Improbable Aiming Skills
• Improbable Use of a Weapon: He's more than capable of using his bow as a close-quarters weapon, and can even throw arrows like darts if his bow is broken or out of reach.
  • Improbable Weapon User: Not as much as Bullseye, but Clint has, in recent years, been shown to be able to weaponize anything from plying cards to pennies. He notes in #3 that when he walks into a room, he looks at everything and makes a mental note on its use as a weapon, something he also notes is a completely insane thing to do.
• Indy Ploy: As he explained to Moonstone at one point during the original run of Thunderbolts, Clint prefers to walk into a situation without having a plan. As he sees it, you fight harder when you know you don't have a safety net.
• Inertia Is a Cruel Mistress: Hawkeye's weapon of choice against speedsters and agile opponents is to predict their next move and put an arrow in their path. Batroc the Leaper found himself stuck to the floor by an adhesive arrow after Hawkeye correctly deduced his landing point.
• Informed Attribute: Officially, Clint is 6'3", which makes him an inch taller than Captain America (who's billed at 6'2") and taller than most other characters. Despite this, he's rarely drawn any taller than Spider-Man (who's not a particularly tall guy), and is almost never depicted as taller than Steve.
• Intergenerational Friendship: Clint and Kate. While they don't appear to be that far apart in age (going by what's said, Kate is about 20 now, while Clint's age is probably only ten years older at most), they did first meet when she was about 16.
  • To a lesser extent, Clint and Songbird too became very close when on the Thunderbolts; it's not clear how much younger than him she is, but it is clear there's a gap.
• Irony: In Dark Reign, Clint was highly suspicious at Spider-Woman/Jessica Drew, considering she was the face of the Skrull Queen during Secret Invasion. They were afterwards in a somewhat complicated relationship (even though they were only in this state of affairs because she unknowingly manipulated his pheromones).
• Jack of All Stats: Played With since he does specialise in archery and ranged weapons and is the worlds greatest marksmen; still, outside of archery, Clint is a master at any weapon, but it's clear he's not the greatest master at any said weapon. Bobbi notes, while Clint is a high-skilled staff fighter, she still bests him because that's the weapon she specialises in, and it can be assumed that similar would happen if he fought katana-to-katana against Colleen Wing or longsword-to-longsword against Black Knight. When unarmed, he can still fight ten guys on his own and win, but he also once fought a Brainwashed and Crazy Shang-Chi while unarmed and got utterly wrecked. Basically, he himself avoids Crippling Overspecialization, anyone who doesn't will probably beat him in said specialization, unless it's archery.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Depending on the Writer how much one side wins out.
• Katanas Are Just Better: As Ronin. Fridge Logic comes when one notes that he was trained by Swordsman, who used longswords, not katanas, and the two weapons are note interchangeable.
• Killing in Self-Defense: In The Trial of Yellowjacket, Clint saves Hank Pym from Egghead by firing an arrow into the blaster the villain was using. However, as he did so as Egghead was pulling the trigger, the feedback caused an explosion that killed the villain. He was horrified that happened since he had no intention in actually killing him and both the courts and the Avengers deem that he did no wrong-doing in doing so.
• Knife-Throwing Act: Clint used to be part of one with the Swordsman.
• Lampshade Hanging: As it is written by Matthew Rosenberg, this trope happens a lot during Freefall.
  Bryce: It's kinda amazing that you stole a time machine and your first thought was "I'll go back in time and beat myself up to confuse my friends".
• The Lancer: To Captain America.
• Legacy Character: Clint Barton took up Ronin's mantle with her blessing. He also served as the second Goliath after Hank Pym adopts the Yellowjacket persona. After the death of Captain America, Clint had a very short stint as the new Cap until Kate Bishop (Not knowing it was Clint) pointed out the hypocrisy in him wearing Cap's costume whilst he called her out on using the Hawkeye. This convinced him to give the costume and shield back to Tony Stark (he'd never really been comfortable with being the replacement Cap anyway; Tony had pressured him into it because Clint was the only one he could find who could pull off Cap's shield toss tricks). While he was Ronin, Clint gave Kate Bishop his blessing to continue serving as the second Hawkeye after testing her skills. Barney Barton became the second Trick Shot, renaming himself Trickshot.
• Like Brother and Sister:
  • Clint Barton and Kate Bishop have made it clear they're exceptionally close, but have zero interest in ever dating the other. A lot of their dynamic actually seem like what you'd see between siblings, particularly with how Clint is both a source of inspiration and frustration for Kate.
  • Before Kate, Clint and Melissa Gold/Songbird, from their time together in the Thunderbolts. They became incredibly close friends, probably the closest among the team besides their individual love interests, and Clint saw himself as a Big Brother Mentor to Mel.
  • Similarly, Kate herself is pretty much Billy and Teddy's closest friend, with the couple viewing her like family and likewise she seeing them in this manner in return.
• Love Makes You Stupid: In his very first appearance he becomes smitten with Black Widow the moment he sees her. Because of this he just goes along with whatever she tells him to do without question.
• Made of Iron: Only as Goliath II.
• Martial Arts Staff: As Ronin, Clint used one, created by locking together both of his nunchakus. He learned how to wield a staff in honor and remembrance of his wife, Mockingbird, who he thought was dead. Still not as good as her as it is her weapon, but still.
• Master Archer: Clint Barton is the canon's foremost archer. His accuracy is nigh-superhuman due to much training, and he achieves things an average human can only dream of. In addition to being a Master Archer he is also skilled with several other weapons (among other things, he's just about the only person other than Taskmaster who can throw a shield as well as Captain America; even Bucky can only do it thanks to cyborg enhancement, but Clint pulls it off with just marksmanship) and is a highly-trained martial artist.
• Master Swordsman: The Swordsman, naturally. Hawkeye is also an expert with a sword, his use of it as Ronin is in honor of the Swordsman, one of his mentors, who taught him everything about swordsmanship.
• McNinja: As Ronin; prior to this, Clint was styled more like a modern day European warrior.
• Middle Name Basis: Barney's real name is Charles Bernard Barton.
• Mondegreen Gag: "Hawkguy" is what Matt Fraction's son kept calling Hawkeye. It eventually shaped the character's portrayal in the new series, made its way into issue 6 and has become the unofficial nickname of Vol. 4.
• Movie Superheroes Wear Black: One of the most famous and visible examples. In the MCU movies, the creators ditched his purple costume and mask for more practical looking black leather, which eventually found its way back into the comics.
  • His outfit in the first Avengers movie (which became the basis for his new look in the 616 Marvel universe, was actually an exact copy of his costume from the first Ultimates series.
  • Prior to that, he'd worn a black costume as Ronin. The Ronin outfit ended up being the partial basis for his new costume in Avengers: Age of Ultron.
• Mr. Fanservice: His original miniseries had him spend a chunk of it in just a pair of briefs. The Fraction run spent a chunk of an issue with him naked, and this became a short Running Gag in other comics. He's sometimes worn Stripperific costumes, including once wearing a tunic with no pants and a plunging neck line.
• Multi-Melee Master: In addition to his bow and arrows, Hawkeye is a master of martial arts and a weapon master, being excellent at using a sword, nunchakus, bo staff and even straight up throwing projectiles. Along with using arrows as melee weapons.
• Multishot: One of his more notable skills. In Hawkeye #2 he notched three arrows, pulled back the string, took aim at a target, and hit the target in the head, stomach, and groin in the time it took Kate to say "that's so cool."
• Muscles Are Meaningless: A mild version of it is used for him. Hawkeye is obviously not as musclebound as Captain America or the Hulk, but he is plenty strong himself as a villain finds out when he tried using Hawkeye's bow against him and finds he can't pull back the string, considering to do so means he would have to pull back the equivalent of 250 pounds with three fingers, which Hawkeye does all the time without effort. With that in mind, Clint is, usually, drawn with an impressive build.
• My Greatest Failure: New Avengers: The Reunion and Hawkeye & Mockingbird revealed that Clint has regarded his failure to support Bobbi letting the Phantom Rider fall to his death (he raped her, but Clint used to have a much stronger hatred of killing) as his greatest failure for years, and it has constantly haunted him. He also considered her "death" one, telling her that he saw her everywhere while she was missing.
• No "Arc" in "Archery": Employed on occasion when Hawkeye uses his trick arrows.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed:
  • Will Bryson in Hawkeye #16 is a very unsubtle one for Brian Wilson.
  • His music band, 'The Greyson Brothers', and a pic from their (not updated) website is mostly a pastiche of The Everly Brothers.
• "Not So Different" Remark: Played for laughs during Freefall, when Clint informs the Hood that without his magic cloak he's just another loser with delusions of grandeur, just like himself.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: In Secret Avengers, neither Jessica nor Natasha think much of him, seeing him as a goofball. Maria Hill tells them that's precisely why he's so dangerous — no one thinks much of him.
• Oh, Crap!: See Roaring Rampage of Revenge
• One-Man Army: Though he prefers to work in teams, Clint is incredibly dangerous on his own, especially so long as he's armed.
• One-Steve Limit: The 2010s era with both Clint and Kate using an unmodified "Hawkeye" identity was the first Marvel work to unambiguously break the publisher's long-term rule of not having two characters use the same costumed identity simultaneously.
• Only Mostly Dead: Barney Barton, until he was placed in one of Egghead's healing chambers.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: A major part of the reason the character has developed a negative reputation among mainstream audiences. He was the only Avenger not to have their own solo movie or a significant supporting role in another movie prior to The Avengers, which meant his big film debut was mostly overshadowed by the spectacle of seeing Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, and the Hulk teaming up. Exacerbating this situation was that his subsequent two appearances were in Avengers: Age of Ultron and Captain America: Civil War, where he was now sharing screentime with other impressive superheroes like Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver, Black Panther, and Spider-Man. Tellingly, his increased role in Age of Ultron largely focused on his family life and his status as The Heart of the team, rather than his usefulness in battle. Not helping matters, the film version suffers horribly from Movie Superheroes Wear Black, resulting in a pretty forgettable costume next to the brightly coloured and distinctive Thor, Captain America, and Iron Man, and his Trick Arrow arsenal is pretty much reduced to Boring, but Practical (exploding arrows, etc), and his role as the "funny guy" is already covered by Iron Man, there's little for him to do that makes him nearly as memorable.
• Painting the Medium: One of the main running themes of Volume 4.
  • Foreign languages go untranslated; instead, they're replaced by whatever language Clint thinks they're speaking in.
    Maynard Tiboldt: Ladies and gentlemen. (French stuff.) (Wait, maybe some Italian, too?) ... (French!)

    Clown: (Curses in Polish)
  • Several sound effects aren't onomatopoeiae, but instead descriptions of the actual sound—for example, "(Roar of blood in head transmutes to smudgy backwards talking in a cup or something I dunno)". If there are Written Sound Effects, half the time they're Unsound Effects like "KGLASSSSS" for a shattering window.
  • The recap on the credits page berates the reader for reading it, as they should already know the information presented.
• Parental Substitute: Swordsman and Trick Shot in his youth, Captain America as an Avenger. Seems to be trying to act as one for Kate...success is arguable.
• Pinball Projectile
• Platonic Life-Partners: with Kate Bishop.
• Popularity Power: Mainly to do with Kate Bishop as her role in Matt Fraction's Hawkeye has gained her a significant following. A following so large that it contributed to her character joining the Ultimate Universe as a love interest to another popular, but controversial character, Miles Morales. This is significant because most Marvel Superheroes who are adapted in Ultimate at least have been in Marvel continuity for decades. Kate is the only relatively recent addition to the Marvel in general that has an Ultimate counterpart who will also be significant.
• Promoted Fanboy: It's been established that Clint had a childhood love for cowboy fiction, which made the tenure he spent time-travelling to the Wild West and having bromantic adventures with Two-Gun Kid a dream come true. Sadly, this is largely what lead to his wife then getting raped by another cowboy superhero, and the breakdown of their marriage.
• Rain of Arrows: In Hawkeye/Mockingbird he unleashed special trick arrows, the heads of which are filled with dozens, if not hundreds, of regular arrows shrunken down with Pym particles, leading to this trope. Hawkeye has a smaller-scale version of this attack in Ultimate Marvel Vs. Capcom 3 called the scatter shot.
• Really Gets Around: He gradually grows into his reputation as a womanizer. Beside his ex-wife, he had been with Black Widow, Scarlet Witch, Moonstone, and Spider-Woman (Jessica Drew).
• Real Men Wear Pink: His primary colours are typically blue, purple, and pink, though recently he's swapped blue for black. He also once wore a costume that amounted to a minidress and a headband. His time in the circus essentially gave him a flare for flamboyant outfits.
• Right Through His Pants: Inverted; the aftermath of a sexual encounter has him completely nude and her being the one half-dressed.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: In The Ultimates continuity after his family is murdered and he is taken captive, he takes out one of his captors with a fingernail he's pulled from his own finger, then proceeds to single-handedly take out the entire strike force sent to take him down. He then looks into one of the security cameras and simply says, "Run."
• Rogues Gallery: Surprisingly, yes. Crossfire, Bobcat, Razor-Fist, the Tracksuit Mafia, Trickshot, the Clown, the Bullet Biker, Swordsman, Bullseye, Oddball and the Death Throws, the Circus Of Crime, and The Griffin.
• Rule of Fun: Some of his earlier adventures, and his new ongoing. Surely, a boomerang arrow makes no sense at all, but it works, 'because...boomerangs'.
• Running Gag: Most of the issues open with Clint in a compromising situation (such as falling from a building or waking up in bed with a woman) and saying, "Ok, this looks bad."
• Sarcastic Devotee: Clint is one to Captain America, and anyone else he's on a team with. Kate Bishop is one to Clint.
• Shout-Out:
  • Clint calls a cummerbund a "Cumberbatch".
  • A page looks eerily like a screenshot from the Captain America and the Avengers arcade game, except it has current Hawkeye, Spider-Man, and Wolverine vs a bunch of AIM mooks.
  • In the Matt Fraction run, we get to see the moment when, as a kid, Clint learned that there'd been an accident and he was an orphan now. Just like Walter from ''Watchmen, Clint has nothing to say in response except "Good."
• A Simple Plan: Several of the stories in the Matt Fraction run.
  • Firstly, all Clint wanted was some tape to label his trick arrows with, but then he ends up buying a car, sleeping with its owner, and getting into a shootout with his former landlord's gang, and ends up in a hostage situation. Secondly, he was tying to go to Madripoor to reclaim a tape of him killing a dictator. Instead, he gets detained at the airport, robbed in the cab, loses his money and Avenger ID, then gets kidnapped by Madame Masque, only for this to be Kate pretending to be Masque. The second half they manage to Indy Ploy their way out though.
  • Issue 8 doesn't work out too well for him either. Clint and Cherry manage to steal the Red Safe, but Clint gets arrested and they end up losing the combination.
• Simple Solution Won't Work: In All New Hawkeye, the arc The Tape revolves around Hawkeye's mission to retrieve a VHS tape owned by a criminal organization that has several SHIELD secrets. Why the heck does a videotape even exist, you wonder (and Hawkeye asks Captain America) when everybody and their dog would just upload it to a computer? Because in the post-Civil War world, with Tony Stark's Extremis-given super-Hollywood Hacking capabilities being well known, criminals have had to go extremely low-tech to maintain their secrets (with some success, to boot).
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Most of the time, the reason his love interests are attracted to him is in-part because he's a good natured guy. Black Widow defected largely because of his influence, and Moonstone's Character Development was in-part triggered by falling in love with his good nature and wanting to be a better person for his sake.
  • With Mockingbird, it's a bit more complicated. She fell in love with him while they were working together and she proposed because he sacrificed his hearing to save her, but they developed relationship problems because of his Holier Than Thou attitude about killing. At the same time, she finds him particularly attractive next to other Avengers specifically because Clint is a brash Anti-Hero Jerk with a Heart of Gold and she finds his wild nature much more her speed. When Domonic Fortune calls Clint a "boyscout", Bobbi laughed because he is probably the only person who'd think that, and also finds Fortune's own unscrupulous nature, though useful, a complete turn-off. Essentially, she likes that Clint is a good man, but also likes that he's not a boy-scout, yet doesn't want to see him lose his good nature.
• The '60s: Despite being set in 2012/2013 Volume 4 has undertones of Sixties style to it in. The Tracksuit Mafia drive original Minis, Kazimierz Kazimierczak/Clown wouldn't look out of place in The Italian Job, all the women wear Sixties dresses, and Kate might as well have joined a different Avengers.
• Sizeshifter: Clint's stint as Goliath II gave him the ability to change size at will thanks to the Pym Particles.
• Small Reference Pools: In-universe in vol. 4 #6; Hawkeye says his line of work is like being in the NFL year-round. Wolverine compares him to Mel Hein, which Spider-Man scoffs at. "Mel Hein? What are you, a hundred years old?" Wolverine is, of course, actually a bit older than that.
• Something Something Leonard Bernstein: How human dialogue sounds to Clint's dog.
• Stock Ninja Weaponry: As Ronin: Katana? Check. Nunchaku? Check. Kunai and/or Shuriken? Sure, in a pinch. Hell, even his trademark bow and arrow qualifies. And those melee weapons? Yeah, he'll dual wield them for added badass Ninja points.
• The Straight and Arrow Path
• Super Strength: Only as Goliath II.
• 10-Minute Retirement: Clint has had moments where, fed up with disrespect, bailed on the Avengers in frustration, coming back a few issues later.
• That Came Out Wrong: In Hawkeye, vol. 4, #15, Bobbi asks Clint about the strip club he busted up. He is surprised that she knows about that and attempts to defend himself:
  Clint: I wasn't there for the girls. I was there for the guys. No. Wait."
• There Are No Therapists: Clint's suffered the death of his brother, his wife, his own death at the hands of his best friend, recovering his memories in a world created by said friend and discovering that he is dead in the real world, his resurrection by the same friend, but no one has ever recommended that he sees a therapist—not even when the death of his wife led to him staying in the wilderness until his old mentor convinced him that Bobbi wouldn't want him to live like that.
  • Ultimate Hawkeye's family was killed and he's still working with the Ultimates, despite it being pretty obvious that he has PTSD.
• Trick Arrow: Hawkeye has special arrowheads that can carry acid, fire, Pym Particles, nets, Knockout Gas, grappling hooks, sonic stunners, electricity, ice or explosives. Other specialized arrows include the Adamantium arrow and the Vibranium arrow.
  • And the boomerang. Don't forget to respect the boomerang. It comes back to you in the end.
  • These are even just the ones we see him use; he's referenced even crazier ideas in the past even if never outright using them. Doubling as a Shout-Out, the concept of a Boxing Glove arrow has been mentioned,
• The Trickster: Has elements of this. With the fate of the world in the balance, he challenges the Grandmaster to a final game of skill and chance: Guessing which of the two arrows he's holding has an arrowhead. Grandmaster picks the wrong one, and the universe is saved. The kicker? Hawkeye cheated, using slight of hand from his Carnival days. The fact he saves existence with such a trick gets a laugh from Death itself.
• Trouser Space: During "The Tape", Clint stuff his "Amex Black" credit card with no credit limit down the front of his pants. While interrogating him Madame Masque is disgusted to hear this but is the only one willing to reach in and get it and then it turns out Masque is actually Kate Bishop in disguise.
• True Love Is Boring: After several years of marital bliss, the Phantom Rider incident happened, and Clint and Bobbi broke up. Right after they made up and were on track to getting back together, she was killed. And now that she's Back from the Dead, they find out they're now technically divorced. When they reunite as a couple, they find out they're both going through hard times and aren't ready to stay together.
• *Twang* Hello: Except for him barely missing his targets isn't an issue. His arrows blow up.
• Underdogs Never Lose: He lacks superpowers or any kind of enhancement and intentionally specialises in a weapon that's highly outdated. He's still one of the best among Earth's Mightiest Heroes, and it's notable he's often been the one to save the day. When he confronted the Thunderbolts, not only did he single-handedly save them while not even using his own gimmick, but he then proved his qualification to lead them via Asskicking Leads to Leadership — bare-in-mind, the entire team had superpowers (Abe Jenkins/Mach-1 was the only non-powered member, and even he used Powered Armor) and he still kicked their asses for 15 minutes without a single one of them landing a hit on him. He then went on to apply this to the Thunderbolts themselves, helping them become an effective super-team after spending months on the run from everyone and getting their asses kicked.
• Underestimating Badassery: Villains, and in some cases some fans, usually underestimate Hawkeye because he fights alongside Thor, Iron Man, and Captain America. He soon reminds them why he fights alongside Thor, Iron Man, and Captain America.
• Undying Loyalty: Clint has shown over the years that, if he works alongside you or considers you a friend, he will stick by and trust you no matter what. A perfect example would be the Greg Pak War Machine run, where Clint and other former WCA members were called to rein in Rhodey's increasingly violent Blood Knight tendencies. While Mockingbird seemed to think Rhodey had gone off the deep end, Clint was sure that Rhodey had a perfectly good reason for his actions, simply because of the time they spent together previously^note Technically, they were both right on this one; Rhodey had gone off the deep end, but only because he was being forced to witness every recorded war crime constantly and was trying to clear up the world; they both decide to help Rhodey with his mission, albeit while staying away from his murderous actions.
• Uptight Loves Wild: Outside of Mockingbird, most of Clint's love interests tend to be comparatively more serious women, who none-the-less find his brash, Deadpan Snarker Idiot Hero persona charming and attractive.
• Verbal Tic: The Russian gangsters who harass Hawkeye throughout volume 4 say "bro" in virtually every sentence, usually at the end.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Hawkeye and Green Arrow in JLA/Avengers.
  • Clint and anyone, really. He'll call out and argue with Cap, but there's no one he holds more respect for. He'll patronize Kate Bishop and treat her like a child but considers her the best archer he's ever met, he'll tease Bobbi but she's the love of his life, he makes fun of Spider-Man yet he's got no problem confessing his insecurities to him and considers him a good friend, etc.
  • Him and Bucky have taken this to new levels after Tales of Suspense, being an effective duo who also can't stop annoying each other, but have slowly morphed into best friends (who hate each other).
• Villain Episode: Matt Fraction gave Clown an issue from his viewpoint.
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: Struggled with this prior to the Avengers; his father was physically and verbally abusive, so Clint did everything he could to try and make his father like him in the hopes he'd get beaten less. At the orphanage, Barney would take out his anger on Clint, so Clint became a doormat in the hopes Barney would be nicer to him, which included running away with Barney when the latter decided to leave. At the circus, Clint did everything he could to please Swordsman and Trickshot, who had taken him under their wings but both constantly negged and gaslighted him. By the time he joined the Avengers, the reason he was so hostile to Steve was, largely, that Clint had realised this was the case and decided he'd stand up for himself this time, ironically against the one mentor figure who wasn't an asshole.
• Wham Episode: Issue #11 is Lucky the dog's perspective on the goings on of the apartment building. It ends with Kate and Lucky leaving Clint for California.
• Wire Dilemma: Parodied. One issue of the Matt Fraction run starts with Hawkeye standing over a bunch of wires, thinking carefully, and finally cutting the green wire over Tony Stark's objections... and then it turns out they're the wires to all the electronics in his apartment, which have gotten hopelessly tangled.
• What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?: He uses a bow and arrow, not even a crossbow. He's on a team that at times features The Mighty Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, Scarlet Witch and many other juggernauts. Despite this he makes it work. It's often forgotten that
• World's Best Warrior: Specifically, he's the World's Greatest Marksman, but he's also more-or-less the greatest weapon user in the world. He's not the greatest at unarmed combat (still good enough), but if he has access to weapons there's very few who can beat him.
• You Remind Me of X: Steve Rogers notes that Kate Bishop, the second Hawkeye, reminds her of Clint in the way she called him out over his treatment of Patriot & gives her permission to use the Hawkeye name. Clint himself notes that she reminds him of himself at a young age.

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