Hawkeye Was Almost in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER

By Justin M on Tuesday, September 2nd, 2014

After watching Captain America: The Winter Soldier, aka my favorite Marvel film (I’m watching Guardians of the Galaxy tonight so that could change) five months ago, my biggest question was ‘Where the f@#$ was Hawkeye!?’ With the movie pretty much centered on S.H.I.E.L.D, I’d figure Clint Barton would make an appearance since he is one of their agents in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It’s bad enough he did nothing in his first appearance in Thor and then was a mind slave for most of The Avengers. Thankfully, he’ll get more spotlight in next year’s The Avengers: Age of Ultron. There’s even talks that he might even be Captain America’s new partner in his third solo flick in 2016.

With The Winter Soldier being released on DVD/Blu-ray next week, directors Joe and Anthony Russo have been discussing the film and some of the little-known facts about it: particularly stating that Hawkeye was originally supposed to make an appearance in the film. Unfortunately, scheduling prevented Hawkeye actor Jeremy Renner from participating, and the scene eventually got cut. Too bad, cause the sequence they planned sounds pretty bad-ass. Joe Russo stated:

“What it was going to be, we were trying to complicate the relationship between Cap and his S.H.I.E.L.D agent friends. If Hawkeye got a call from S.H.I.E.L.D saying Captain America is a fugitive, would he listen to that call or not listen to that call? That sequence actually was heartbreaking for us to cut it. I think it ultimately might have been a conflict with Renner’s schedule. But there was a great sequence where Hawkeye was chasing Cap through Washington D.C. there was an awesome sequence where they confronted each other in a ravine on the outskirts of D.C. and Hawkeye was shooting a series of arrows closing in on Cap, Cap closing in on him. And then Cap took him down and he realized for the first time that Hawkeye was trying to trick S.H.I.E.L.D, where he whispered something into Cap’s ear that Cap had a tracker on his suit and to punch Hawkeye to make it look real, because there was a Quinjet hovering above where they were watching the feedback back at S.H.I.E.L.D.”

A sequence like this would fit into the film perfectly. Hawkeye is known for being loyal to his friends, particularly Captain America. They have a sort of ‘bro’ bond in the comics, similar to how Tony Stark and Bruce Banner are portrayed in The Avengers. Barton has acknowledged this multiple times in comics and states it outright in a victory quote in Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3. I get that he’s not as popular as Iron Man or Thor, but little cameos from other characters in movies are what make the Marvel movies fun (such as Cap being a Loki illusion in Thor: The Dark World).

Jeremy Renner definitely wants the Hawkeye in more projects. He has shown up in many Age of Ultron-related photos online, and he recently appeared on Larry King Now to confirm that Hawkeye will not die in the anticipated sequel. Well at least that’s one more Avenger counted for. Hopefully we’ll find out where Hawkeye was during S.H.I.E.L.D’s collapse before Ultron destroys everything.