That Kate Bishop girl

Some good news for fans of the Kate Bishop Hawkeye. Maybe.

You have to squint your eyes really hard, read between the lines, and hope your little heart out, but it looks like maybe Marvel just might be letting Kate defend her title as Hawkeye from Bullseye after all.

First we have this scene from New Avengers #50 letting us know that yes, someone remembers there's another Hawkeye running around out there besides the Dark one.



Thanks to Lady, That's My Skull for that scan. And you simply must click there to see why he posted it and what he does with it. It's even more hilarious than Mockingbird and Ms. Marvel's poses - though related to them - and that's saying something.

Anyway, if you take that meager acknowledgment and marry it with this statement from a recent interview with Dark Reign: Hawkeye writer Andy Diggle...

NRAMA: With Bullseye posing as Hawkeye—a showdown between these two weaponry experts can't be far off, can it?

AD: You'll be seeing Bullseye versus Hawkeye, but maybe not the way you expect.

...you could maybe just possibly be excused for getting your hopes up that the Hawkeye Diggle's talking about isn't Clint Barton. Hmm?

Where's Hawkeye?

Not the Hawkeye in the picture there. That's actually Daredevil-villain Bullseye pretending to be Hawkeye. What I'm wondering is if Marvel's at all planning to address the issue that there's already a superhero calling herself Hawkeye out there. And doing it with the blessing of the original hero to use that name.

I'd hoped for a while that this would be addressed in Dark Reign. After all, the Young Avengers were going to appear in Mighty Avengers, but that turned out just to be Stature and the Vision. There's going to be a Dark Reign: Hawkeye mini-series, but that's all about Bullseye. And even the Dark Reign: Young Avengers mini-series sounds way more excited about introducing the Young Masters of Evil than about pitting Kate Bishop against Bullseye in a Battle for the Quiver or whatever.

On the other hand, DR:YA writer Paul Cornell says that he "just loves Hawkeye completely," so maybe he's planning to address it and it's just not part of the publicity. I'm really hoping that's the case.

Why I'll be reading Dark Reign

It looks like Dark Reign intersects my interests in two areas, with a third on the periphery. I've already talked about Namor's involvement in it and it also looks like there's some sort of untold story between him and the White Queen that's going to be revealed in Uncanny X-Men Annual #2.




I've also mentioned that it'll be the base off which Namora and the new Agents of Atlas ongoing are spun.



Those are my main points of interest, but my favorite Young Avenger, Kate Bishop, might also play at least a small part in it. For one thing, the Young Avengers are going to appear in Mighty Avengers #21.



While I've got zero interest in the new Mighty Avengers line-up, putting the Young Avengers in an issue will at least get me to pick it up and look at it. If Kate features prominently in it, I'll buy it.

What makes me think that maybe she will - even though there are numerous ways the Young Avengers could be involved in whatever story they're telling - is that Kate is currently fighting crime under the name Hawkeye and it looks like she may have some competition for that title from one of the new, "dark" Avengers.



Marvel's not really saying yet, but this sounds like a team that Norman Osborne has put together that he thinks he can control. I don't know who that is in the Hawkeye costume, but chances are it's not the original Hawkeye. He's apparently still dressing like a ninja and calling himself Ronin. (Besides, he's already given his blessing for Kate to carry on the Hawkeye name.)



So, it's just possible that there will be some conflict over who gets to use that name. If there is, Kate should be right in the middle of it.

Secret Invasion: Runaways/Young Avengers

Two of my newest favorite characters are Molly Hayes, the super-strong little girl from Runaways, and Kate Bishop, the new Hawkeye from Young Avengers. Which means that I really like the regular Runaways/Young Avengers team-ups Marvel keeps doing every time there's a new event mini-series. It's like teaming up Wonder Woman and Black Canary.

Unfortunately, Secret Invasion: Runaways/Young Avengers focused on neither of my favorites. I understand that Secret Invasion is all about the Skrulls and that since both the Runaways and the Young Avengers have Skrulls on their teams that those characters are naturally going to get the focus. But did writer Chris Yost have to go so far out of his way to sideline Molly and Hawkeye?

Hawkeye spends the mini-series in a battle in Times Square that's sort of being covered in the main Secret Invasion book (as much as that book's covering anything, which isn't much), so even though I don't like it, I understand Yost's not wanting to recover it here. Although I would've welcomed some scenes fleshing out the Young Avengers' contributions to that battle.

But Molly... the way Yost gets Molly out of the way is horrible. She's the Runaways' most powerful member and seriously, how cool would it be to see a twelve-year-old girl kicking Skrull butt? Very cool, says I. But no. Instead, we get this.



That's right. Speed from Young Avengers zooms Molly and her friend Klara right out of the fight. And not just to the sidelines either. The "Mister President" Klara's talking about?



Lame.