Hawkeye is a superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer Stan Lee and artist Don Heck, the character debuted as an enemy of Iron Man in Tales of Suspense #57 (September 1964) before joining the Avengers in The Avengers #16 (May 1965). Hawkeye has appeared as a regular member of multiple Avengers titles since 1965 and received his first solo miniseries in 1983. A fourth volume of his self-titled series, launched in 2012 by writer Matt Fraction and artist David Aja, brought significant critical reappraisal of the character.

Clinton Francis "Clint" Barton is introduced as an orphan who trains as an archer with a traveling carnival before being inspired by Iron Man to pursue costumed heroism. A misunderstanding leads him into a brief criminal career under the influence of the Soviet spy Black Widow, after which he reforms and joins the Avengers. He subsequently co-founds and leads the West Coast Avengers, marries fellow superhero Mockingbird, and later leads both the Thunderbolts and various other Avengers configurations. He has no superhuman powers, relying instead on world-class archery, a supply of customized trick arrows, and combat training. He has sustained partial hearing loss on two separate occasions during his publication history, which has been depicted with increasing depth since Matt Fraction and David Aja's 2012 run.

Hawkeye stories have explored the psychological tension between the extreme confidence required of a non-powered hero operating alongside superhumans and the deep insecurity that the same powerlessness produces. Early stories established his abrasive relationship with authority and his pattern of quitting and rejoining teams in response to perceived slights. His redemption arc, from inadvertent villain to trusted Avenger and eventual mentor to Kate Bishop, has been described by scholars as among the most developed examples of character rehabilitation in the Avengers franchise. The Fraction/Aja run represented a significant shift in emphasis, foregrounding his vulnerability and engaging seriously with his deafness as both a formal and thematic element. The run's treatment of disability, particularly the 2014 issue told substantially through untranslated American Sign Language, has received sustained academic attention for its shift from the medical to the social model of disability.

Hawkeye has been adapted into a variety of other media, including film, animated series, and video games. A version of the character was portrayed by Jeremy Renner in the Marvel Cinematic Universe from his first appearance in Thor (2011) to his most recent one in Hawkeye (2021).

Hawkeye debuted as a villain in Tales of Suspense #57 (September 1964), written by Stan Lee and illustrated by Don Heck. Heck conceived the character as "almost like a Robin Hood–type character", being a skilled marksman without superhuman powers whose appeal lay in his physical daring rather than any extraordinary ability. In the issue, Clint Barton creates his costume and trick arrows out of jealousy of Iron Man, and his criminal career stems from his susceptibility to the Black Widow, a Soviet spy who manipulates his affections to recruit him against Tony Stark. Comics historian Adam Besenyodi has described this origin as establishing Hawkeye's central contradiction: "the staggering amount of egotism required of a non-superpowered superhero to be successful in the world he inhabits is repeatedly contradicted by the overwhelming insecurity resulting from that same set of circumstances."

Hawkeye appeared twice more as a villain in Tales of Suspense before joining the Avengers. By early 1965, Stan Lee's insistence on maintaining continuity across all Marvel titles had created what Sean Howe describes as an unmanageable choreography problem. Thor, Iron Man, Giant-Man, and the Wasp were each starring in their own ongoing series, making their concurrent membership in The Avengers a scheduling and continuity burden Lee could no longer sustain. His solution, introduced in The Avengers #16 (May 1965), was to replace the founding members with three reformed former villains: Hawkeye, Quicksilver, and the Scarlet Witch, led by Captain America. No superhero team in American comics had previously undergone such a comprehensive roster overhaul. Writer Kurt Busiek later suggested that Hawkeye's elevation from disposable antagonist to permanent Avenger was unplanned, and that Lee "saw Hawkeye's potential was too good to waste" only after receiving Don Heck's original art boards.

The new lineup, quickly dubbed "Cap's Kooky Quartet" by readers and eventually by the characters themselves, proved durable. Hawkeye's inclusion showed his confrontational relationship with Captain America's authority and his persistent, unrequited romantic pursuit of the Scarlet Witch. Roger Stern, who wrote The Avengers in the early 1980s, later characterized this behavior not as deliberate sexism but as an expression of the character's self-centeredness. Hawkeye was, in Stern's assessment, "not so much a sexist as an all-purpose butt-head." Writer Roy Thomas, who took over The Avengers from Lee in the late 1960s, tailored his scripts to John Buscema's richly illustrative style, resulting in a succession of mythological and cosmic adventures in which Hawkeye, Quicksilver, and the Scarlet Witch functioned primarily as ensemble members rather than protagonists. Hawkeye briefly adopted of the Goliath identity in The Avengers #63 (April 1969), when, feeling inadequate alongside his powered teammates, he secretly took Hank Pym's growth formula and snapped his own bow in two to signal the abandonment of his Hawkeye persona. Philosopher Christopher Robichaud later identified this act as telling of Clint's "need to live up to the example of his peers and earn their acceptance as well as his own."

The direct-market revolution of the early 1980s created demand for limited series as both collectible commodities and low-risk tests of characters' solo viability. Direct-market sales increased 46 percent in 1982 and a further 32 percent in 1983, and Marvel responded with a wave of four-issue miniseries for characters outside its top tier. Among those greenlit was a Hawkeye miniseries, published from September through December 1983, written and penciled by Mark Gruenwald with inks by Brett Breeding. The series introduced Mockingbird as Clint's professional partner and romantic interest, and ended with their marriage. This development Gruenwald compressed into the final issue at a pace critics noted as premature. The series also introduced Hawkeye's partial deafness as a permanent character trait. By using one of his own sonic arrows to counter the villain Crossfire's mind-control weapon, Clint was left with significant hearing loss requiring hearing aids in both ears. Wizard Magazine later cited the issue directly: "To override the sonic mind-control device of the villain Crossfire, Hawkeye put the head of one of his sonic arrows in his mouth, drowning out the machine... Unfortunately, it cost the archer part of his hearing."