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The following contains spoilers from the first two episodes of Disney+’s Hawkeye.

Hawkeye’s double-episode premiere (now streaming on Disney+) pairs the titular hero with his No. 1 fan in an expected adventure set at Christmastime.

The first two episodes saw Clint (played by MCU vet Jeremy Renner) visit New York City with his kids to take in the sights and shows — including the Steve Rogers musical, which opened some raw emotional wounds. Still mourning the loss of his friend Natasha, who died in Avengers: Endgame, Clint (who is now deaf in one ear) left the show early, unable to stand seeing his traumatic experience turned into a fizzy song and dance.

Meanwhile, Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld), who picked up a bow and arrow as a kid, after seeing Hawkeye bravely fight in the Battle of New York, stumbled onto a secret auction of black market Avengers souvenirs, including Ronin’s sword, which her soon-to-be-stepdad Jack (Tony Dalton) stole. As you’ll recall, Ronin is the moniker Clint took up after the Snap, as part of a five-year murder spree. The Tracksuit Mafia also crashed the auction in search of a watch from the the Avengers’ compound — which Clint sold years ago — prompting Kate to slip on Ronin’s suit and fight them.

This led to Kate finding a new pal in Lucky the Pizza Dog… attracting a set of enemies in the aforementioned tracksuit-wearing gangsters… and finally meeting her hero, Hawkeye. Seeing on the news that someone is running around in his Ronin garb, Hawkeye sent his kids home with the promise that he’ll be back in time for Christmas, which is less than a week away.

An unlikely pair upon meeting, Kate and Clint were forced to leave the Ronin suit in Kate’s apartment after a fiery confrontation — the Tracksuit Mafia thinks Kate is the vigilante Ronin. Clint later returned only to discover that the suit was stolen by a firefighter who swiped it to LARP (Live Action Roleplay) with his buddies in Central Park. Cue Clint reluctantly suiting up in fake armor to retrieve said suit, but not before kindly agreeing to allow the firefighter to live out his superhero dreams and “kill” Hawkeye in the mock battle.

Elsewhere, Kate interrogated her mother Eleanor’s fiancé, who for assorted reasons she believed murdered his uncle Armand. After catching Jack in a lie during a tense fencing match, Kate brought her suspicions to her mom, who believes Jack to be innocent. But he did steal the Ronin sword and offered Kate one of the same monogrammed, butterscotch candies she spotted at Armand’s house the night he was killed. Hmm.

Upon reclaiming the Ronin suit and checking in with his wife Laura (back home with the kids), Hawkeye let himself be captured by the Tracksuit Mafia so that he could bargain with them to leave Kate alone. Realizing that Clint wasn’t answering his phone, Kate tried to rescue him — only she, too, was taken captive after inelegantly crashing through the ceiling and realizing she brought a bow and quiver to a gunfight.

The second episode ended with a glimpse of Maya Lopez aka Echo (played by Alaqua Cox), who learned from one of her lackeys that they now has both Clint and Kate in her possession.

In Marvel lore, Echo is a deaf Native American martial artist who can perfectly replicate a person’s moves; she was also Wilson Fisk aka Kingpin’s adoptive daughter. She mixed it up with other heroes like Daredevil, Blade and the Avengers (including Clint Barton/Hawkeye) and was the first to go by Ronin before Barton used the alias in Endgame.

Lopez already is set to lead a Hawkeye spinoff, Echo, which was recently ordered to series.

Previewing Maya’s role in Hawkeye, executive producer Trinh Tran tells TVLine. “I love her character in the comics, and I think she is such a cool, badass, strong woman — and Alaqua definitely nailed it. She’s such a hard worker, and she really puts in all the efforts in order to create this amazing, incredible character who can stand against our heroes and be able to fight in such a cool way.”

“I love the fact that she comes from a Deaf community as well,” Tran adds. “When we were casting Alaqua, it was really important that we stay true to the character in the comics and Alaqua was a Native American, and a deaf person, that knocked it out of the park for us.”

What did you think of Hawkeye‘s first two episodes? Grade them below and let us know your thoughts in the comments. 

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