Hawkeye, Episode 5: Finally, the head honcho shows up!

Clint Barton aka Hawkeye has made a promise: to protect his protégée Kate Bishop. This time, no one dies. Not like back on Vormir. But the whole thing just got very serious, very fast. Someone hired a Black Widow. Not just any Black Widow. It's Yelena Belova, stepsister to Natasha Romanoff.

Deaf Maya Lopez aka Echo, leader of the Tracksuit Mafia, is probably not behind this. After all, she's being attacked just as much as Clint and Kate. What's more, Yelena isn't technically a Black Widow of the Red Room anymore; since the end of "Black Widow," she's been in the employ of the inscrutable Contessa Valentina Allegra de Fontaine. The noblewoman actually has a bone to pick with Hawkeye. What's going on?

Just a snap of her fingers away

Flashback. 2018.Yelena tracks down female employees of the Red Room, codenamed Black Widow, to brainwash them with a serum. Her target's name in the flashback is Ana. She lives in an old mansion. Not because she's brainwashed into it. But because she makes money doing what Black Widows do best: killing. Yelena is evasive. Wants to splash cold water on her face in the fancy bathroom. But the water - it slips through her fingers. Fingers that were there a moment ago and suddenly turn to dust.

The moment of the snap.

Yelena dissolves into dust. However... this is new. The dust materializes right back into Yelena. Her surroundings, however, change. Instead of fancy walls, there's green wallpaper. Yelena rushes back into the apartment. There is Ana, older, and with husband and daughter: the moment of the blip. Where for others five years have passed, Yelena's absence lasted only a snap of her fingers.

"I have to tell Natasha I'm fine," Yelena says. We viewers know at this point that Natasha is dead. Ice chills run down my spine. What a way to start the second to last episode.

Time to lick wounds

The fight has left its mark. On everyone. Kate and her mother Eleanor get a little closer again in a touching scene. But I still don't really trust Eleanor. Especially because she hardly makes a face when Kate tells her about the mailbox company Sloan Limited, which launders money for the Tracksuit Mafia. Its CEO: Jack Duquesne, Eleanor's fiancé. According to Kate, he may have murdered his uncle Armand Duquesne for threatening her with something we viewers don't know about yet. Which is exactly why my money is on Eleanor as the real culprit.

That would also fit with what happens later in the episode. Eleanor is supposed to have investigated Sloan Limited and had Jack arrested for tax fraud. Jack seems suspiciously unconcerned about it, though. He's sure someone's trying to frame him. You know what? I actually believe him.

Maya's wounds are also tended to by someone familiar - Kazi. He promises to help her hunt down Ronin, her father's killer. But then her quest for revenge has to stop before everything gets out of hand. As we knew last week, Uncle wouldn't like that. And who Uncle is, well... officially, we don't know. Wilson Fisk

Eventually, Clint finds his new hideout. Namely, with Grills, the LARPER firefighter from the second episode. In the comics, Grills spends most of his time on the roof of an apartment building grilling. In the rain. In the snow. No matter what the weather. Hence the name. I wonder if the same fate awaits him as in the comics.

In the series, Grills has nothing to do with grilling. Instead, he watches out for Pizza-Dog, the one-eyed golden retriever - and the new costumes for Clint and Kate.

The Last Supper

The only one in a good mood is Yelena. She doesn't want to have broken into Kate Bishop's apartment. That would require her to have broken something. She didn't. She's a professional. But she did cook delicious smelling macaroni for herself and Kate. Haha. Very good. I really liked Florence Pugh performance as Yelena in "Black Widow".

In "Hawkeye," she picks up where she left off in "Black Widow" with her delightfully succinct I-don't-give-a-shit attitude. First, she makes it clear to Kate that not only is she good at fighting and breaking in, but she's also an ace information gatherer. Finally, she seems to know everything about Kate. Then she opens up to Hawkeye's protégée about her true intentions: Clint Barton must die. He is, after all, responsible for Natasha Romanoff's death. At least, that's what her "employer" tells her. She wasn't there on Vomir, after all.

Yelena's not technically wrong. Although it does take a fair amount of Obi-Wan's "from a certain point of view" bluster here to label Clint as the bad guy in this story. Is Yelena really so naive as to so readily believe her employer - the Contessa - that Clint is indeed evil and must be killed? Sure, his ronin past has flaws. But then, he's never really killed innocents.

Or has he?

A new secret agent?

A new day. I like this scene. The one with the memorial where the Avengers first gathered. Clint standing in front of the engraved names. Talking to Natasha. In the background, Alan Silvestri's score playing on Vormir when Natasha died. First, I choke back a tear. Then I rack my brain. What does Clint mean by "I want to tell you I'm sorry for what I have to do now"?

Evening. Time Square. Clint's on the phone with his wife, Laura. He explains to her that the mess is getting bigger: Maya is tracking down Clint's family, and it's only a matter of time before "the head honcho" gets involved. Very subtle. But what does Laura have to hide that could enrage the head moth?

One possible theory is that Laura is a secret agent. Or was. That would explain why she was able to obtain such easy information an episode earlier. Another is that Tony Stark had already suspected this in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Watch out for minute 00:44 in the video below.

If it were up to the comics, the most likely secret agent candidate would be Mockingbird, real name: Barbara "Bobbi" Morse. There, she was first trained by S.H.I.E.L.D. as a secret agent. Later, under the alias Huntress, she even led an investigation into a Latin American S.H.I.E.L.D. outpost. Too bad her own agents shot her over a misunderstanding. Huntress faked her death, went into hiding, and wasn't seen again for a long time.

Then one day, she started investigating the evil Carl Dalandan. In the process, she met her future husband: the then-head of security for Cross Technological Enterprises, Clint Barton. The two are a perfect match. Clint, because he's always been rebellious and forward. Morse, because she's known for taunting her opponents in battle. From there, she got her new alias: Mockingbird.

The problem: Morse had already made her first appearance in the ABC-produced TV series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.. Until now, that's how Marvel Studios handled television series they didn't produce themselves: The MCU is canon. The series strictly adhere to it. Whether produced by ABC, Netflix, or Hulu. Conversely, however, the MCU movies didn't necessarily adhere to what happens in the television series.

The Darkhold, for example. The story of the mighty book goes all the way back to the creation of Earth. The comics teach us that it contains all the spells and magical rituals of the powerful Old God Chthon. In "WandaVision," it also holds dark prophecies about Wanda's terrible future as the Scarlet Witch. Except that the book was actually already in "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.". That hadn't stopped the series from reusing it.

"Remember, I understand you better than anyone ever could," Laura tells Clint over the phone. A nod to that? Quite possibly, "Hawkeye" will take a similar tack with Mockingbird. Simply that Mockingbird is not Barbara Morse. Unless it would be part of Laura's cover to change her name as well. Still makes sense, actually, now that I think about it.

Enter Ronin

Nightfall. Clint confronts Maya. Not as Hawkeye this time, but as Ronin. This thing has to come to an end. Then Clint drops the bomb: Yes, he killed Maya's father that night because an informant put him on his trail. Except the informant worked for the same boss Maya's father worked for then and she works for now. Who was the informant? Kazi.

And the boss? In the final shot of the episode, we finally get it out loud. Because Yelena lets Kate in on who her real client is: Eleanor Bishop. But more explosive is who Eleanor turned to in order to hire Yelena.

The kingpin, Wilson Fisk.

How did you guys like the episode? Drop it in the comments. The next episode analysis will be next Wednesday, December 22.