Written by Matt Fraction
Art by David Aja
Colors by Matt Hollingsworth
Published by Marvel Comics
In the penultimate issue of their Eisner Award winning run on Hawkeye, Matt Fraction and David Aja bring all the threads of Clint Barton’s story together as the Track Suit Vampires (who still say “Bro” every other word) try to evict the residents of his Bedford-Stuyvesant tenement once and for all. With such disparate influences as Will Eisner’s Contract with God (sans rain), Die Hard, The Raid, and the comics’ title Rio Bravo, Aja shows that superhero comics have the potential to experiment with different kinds of spaces and layouts and tell a relatively “low stakes” (The emotional stakes are incredibly high though.) story in an incredibly unique way. For example, the first page of Hawkeye #21 features a fifteen panel grid plus a stair shaped panel and a couple inset panels to show how badly Clint needs his brother Barney with him in this final battle. Fraction’s writing is sweet, silly (Anything that the Tracksuit Vampires say.), and painful at times as he shows how much this little Brooklyn tenements means to him. For the most part, Matt Hollingsworth bathes Aja’s art in darkness with plenty of silhouettes and negative space. However, he does change up his scene for integral character or plot moments.
Hawkeye #21 could be called “Die Hard in a tenement”, but the action comes from the setting and character that Fraction and Aja have been building up for their entire run. All those so-called “filler” issues featuring Clint watching cartoons with one of his tenants’ kids or having a long heart to heart with his ne’er do well brother Barney pay off in this issue. Fraction and Aja cut from bit to bit of the tenement as its residents prepare for the siege. Fraction isn’t afraid to portray these people as frightened and occasionally cowardly. Clint and his old neighbor get to rain arrows and other substances on the invaders in a triptych of vertical panels with old school Hawkeye purple colors from Hollingsworth, but Clint also gets the crap beaten out of him as usual, both physically and in his relationships. This kind of everyman vulnerability has been at the core of Fraction and Aja’s characterization of Clint (and Barney) Barton, and it makes him incredibly likable even if he’s a little too incompetent for an Avenger.
As well as making the design and architecture of the building itself integral to his art and the story, Aja also shows Clint’s limitations in creative ways in a manner similar to the famous “sign language issue” in Hawkeye #19. For example, when Clint is chatting with Jessica Drew early in comic, Aja draws the conversation from his POV as he moves his eyes closer to Jess’ lips to read them. Fraction also 
does a nice job making her dialogue a little garbled to show that he is straining to listen to her (or just ignoring her). Hollingsworth adds another layer to this scene by muting all other colors except for red and yellow (Spider-Woman’s costume) to show their intimate, yet inevitably strained relationship. Most of the comic is Clint, Barney, and the tenants’ battle against the Tracksuit Vampires, but Fraction, Aja, and Hollingsworth use scenes like this to continue to show some of Clint’s emotional and physical limitations while showing off their ability to balance dialogue, framing, and color scheme.
Hawkeye #21 is another virtuosic performance from Matt Fraction, David Aja, and Matt Hollingsworth. Aja constructs pages in clever ways to frame an argument, a possible romantic scene, or even a bunch of baddies rushing a building. No page is the same even if the majority of them share some kind of architectural motif, like stair, window, or even fire escape shaped panels. And underneath all of Aja and Hollingsworth’s style, there is substance in both the page layouts and use of color, but also in Fraction’s dialogue as he cements the relationship between Clint and Barney while also giving the major tenants little moments in the spotlight. Hawkeye #21 brings all these elements together into a wonderful smorgasbord of action, relationship miscommunications, humor, bravery, and above all, experimentation in the look and storytelling of a superhero comic.