Hawkeye: Blindspot #2(of 4):
Summary: We get started with Hawkeye still trying to run down any leads he can to figure out who killed his mentor, Trickshot. After mopping up some street trash and learning nothing worthwhile, Hawkeye is confronted by his longtime friend/mentor, Steve Rogers. Steve tells Hawkeye that he wasn't fit for active duty, with Hawkeye's impending blindness and all, but Hawkeye naturally doesn't want to hear it. Knowing the only way to get through to Hawkeye was with violence, Steve attacks, and the two longtime Avengers battle. Steve appears to get the upper-hand, after he damages the cowl Iron Man created to compensate for Hawkeye's blindness, but Hawkeye manages to use a tactic he learned from Steve himself way back in the day to put Steve down with an electric arrow... In a word, everything about that battle was AWESOME. From there Hawkeye takes off on his skycycle and gets in touch with Maria Hill to see if she had learned anything new about Trickshot's death. Hill tells Hawkeye that there were traces of Plexiglas and sand that was found around the NYC area on Trickshot, and Hawkeye thinks back to Trickshot's last words about never wanting to step foot in a carnival again, which leads to Hawkeye realizing that Trickshot had most likely been held at Coney Island. Hawkeye starts towards Coney Island when an explosive arrow attaches itself to Hawkeye's skycycle. Hawkeye sees it and leaps free, landing with a thud on top of a train right before the skycycle explodes. As he begins to get to his feet, the mystery archer from earlier approaches Hawkeye and Hawkeye realizes that the archer appeared to be his dead brother Barney(!!!).
Thoughts: Well, this was all sorts of awesome. It seems like this mini-series is a love letter from Jim McCann to all of us Hawkeye fans out there. The flashbacks were flat out awesome as they were last issue, and they took us from Hawkeye's first tentative steps as a hero, to joining the Avengers, to becoming Goliath, to the(apparent) death of his brother Barney. As for the scenes set in the present, anytime Hawkeye and Steve Rogers are together in the same issue I'm beyond happy. Their fight was awesome, with Steve simply looking out for Hawkeye's safety, while Hawkeye, in true Hawkeye fashion, doesn't want anyone's assistance or pity. Hawkeye beating Steve by using strategy he learned from Steve all those years ago was also a great touch. As for the mystery archer apparently being Barney, that caught me by surprise... I'm still not sold that the archer is Barney, I'd still prefer it if it was some unknown child of Barney. With Baron Zemo as the mastermind behind all of this, it is very possible that he took somebody and had them look and act as if they were Barney to play with Hawkeye's mind. So I'm NOT quite sold that this archer is actually Hawkeye's long thought to be dead brother... But who knows, maybe it is! God do I love this mini-series...
Score: 9 1/2 out of 10.
Awesome. Just plain awesome.Booster Gold #42:
Summary: This issue begins with Booster returning to the present after spending 5 years trapped in a jail in the future. From there Booster regales his sister and Rip(as well as us) with a tale of how things went while he was incarcerated. After having the cell to himself for a while, Booster ends up getting a new cellmate, the Perforated Man. Booster tries to make nice with PM, but PM is a certifiable nutjob and just wants to rant, rave and occasionally attack Booster. Booster finally has enough and takes a swipe at PM and is stunned to see that the two of them were no longer in their cell, but were way back in the prehistoric past. Booster spends a few days running from PM and the dinosaurs before he has enough of that and attacks PM, which sends them back to their cell. The guards come in and break up the fight, and Booster wants to know why the guards didn't realize that Booster and PM were gone for so long. The guards tell Booster they had no clue what he was going on about, and Booster realizes that although he had been gone for days, only a second or two passed at the jail. Booster and PM fight on and off and jump back and forth through time until PM has a moment of lucidity and explains to Booster that he was crazy because he a disease known as chronal leprosy, which caused him(or just various parts of his body) to jump back and forth through time uncontrollably. PM tells the shocked Booster that Booster himself also had the early stages of chronal leprosy. Booster wants to know how PM could possibly know this, before he realizes that PM was actually a future version of himself. PM tells Booster that he was doomed to have a hellish final few years, and this issue ends with Booster accompanying PM to the end of time where they could both die in peace.
Thoughts: Well we know Booster didn't take the old dirt nap at the end of this issue since he's narrating the story, no? I also guessed the identity of the Perforated Man pretty early on since Booster was dropping some pretty massive hints about it throughout. Besides those two things, I actually enjoyed this issue a lot. The story was fast paced and interesting. Plus it wasn't dripping with unfunny comedy, which is always a good thing!
Score: 8 out of 10.
Pfft, my hand is always vanishing. I don't freak out about it.
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