Hawkeye

Clint Barton was orphaned young, raised in a carnival by the criminals who trained him, and taught archery by the Swordsman and Trick Shot, two men who both tried to use him. He debuted as an Iron Man villain, framed by circumstance and Natasha Romanoff's manipulation, and then walked into Avengers Mansion and asked for a job. Stan Lee and Don Heck built him as a working-class loudmouth in a team of gods, geniuses, and millionaires, and that friction has been his role ever since.

He has no powers. He has a recurve bow, a quiver of trick arrows, and the most reliable aim in the Marvel Universe, and the character works because writers take that seriously. Clint calculates windage, ricochets, and target priority in real time; he can throw anything with the same accuracy as an arrow; and he has beaten opponents who could kill him instantly by hitting a two-inch target under fire. He is also the Avenger most likely to lead the team, having chaired it repeatedly.

The definitive take is Matt Fraction and David Aja's 2012 Hawkeye, which asked what Clint does on his days off and answered with a run about a bad landlord, a stolen tape, Russian gangsters who say bro, and a dog. It also made his deafness canon and central, culminating in an issue told largely in American Sign Language. Clint has been Goliath, been Ronin, died and come back, led the Thunderbolts, and mentored Kate Bishop, and none of it has made him less of a mess.

Clint joined the Avengers in issue #16 as part of Cap's Kooky Quartet, spent years as the team's designated malcontent, and briefly took Hank Pym's growth serum to become Goliath. He founded and led the West Coast Avengers in 1984, married Mockingbird, and lost her in the Great Lakes-era fallout of Avengers West Coast.

He was killed during Avengers Disassembled in 2004, taking a Kree soldier's jetpack with him, then resurrected by the reality-warping fallout of House of M. Brian Michael Bendis brought him back as Ronin in New Avengers, wearing the identity Maya Lopez created, before restoring the Hawkeye name. He also led the Thunderbolts from 1998, converting a team of disguised villains into something approaching heroes.

Matt Fraction and David Aja's Hawkeye (2012-2015) is the run that reframed him permanently: a street-level, design-forward book about Clint's apartment building, his partnership with Kate Bishop, and his hearing loss. Issue #19, largely wordless and told in ASL, won an Eisner. Kelly Thompson's West Coast Avengers and Matt Rosenberg's Old Man Hawkeye extended the tone.