I know what some of you are thinking. "Oh look, another super-hero title from Marvel Comics. And it's Hawkeye. Haven't they already tried this? We've seen this all before."
Wrong.
Fabian Nicieza was one of Marvel's go-to guys when it came to super-heroes in the 1990s, yes. His name was synonymous with the X-Men as one of the guys who carried the torch onward down the path first explored by Chris Claremont. But this isn't the same Fabian Nicieza, at least, not in spirit. He proved himself to be a fascinating horror/conspiracy theory writer on Dark Horse's The Blackburne Covenant, breaking out of that super-hero mold. He does so here again. This first issue of Hawkeye is no super-hero story. It's a Western. Honest.
Haunted by the choice he made years ago to turn his back on his brother Barney, Clint Barton wanders the roads of America. Maybe he's looking for Barney, but he always ends up finding trouble. Example: Clint sees a stripper named Peppermint being harassed by a rahter beefy thug. After a convenient distraction, she ends up slipping away, and when Clint tracks her down, he learns her story. That leads him to the thug's rather gruff boss, and a whole new revelation.
Stefano Raffaele's artwork here captures the gritty, rough tone of the story and the main character quite well. His art puts me in mind of the styles of Tony (Jonah Hex) DeZuniga and Charlie (Codeflesh) Adlard. The artist's depiction of Hawkeye's skills make for an unusual but exciting splash page that shatters the quiet tension that was building up to that point. I also love Dimagmaliw's colors. He brings a stark quality to the art that reinforces the tension and adds a dreary, downtrodden tone to the story.
A handsome but mysterious loner drifts into town, and within minutes, he saves a damsel in distress from a brute in a saloon. Sounds like the beginnings of a classic Western story, doesn't it? There are no white hats or horses, but the core elements are there. Instead of Clint Eastwood, we've got Clint Barton. I'm also pleased to find that the plot isn't as straightforward and conventional as one might expect.
Nicieza offers a new take on the Avenging Archer here. He's no wise-cracking super-hero. There's a quiet, methodical tone to the character here, but Nicieza hasn't ignored his personality altogether. There's still a flirty playfulness to him here that tempers the harder edge that's been added, and it maintains the title character's charm and likability.
