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Every superhero needs a villain to fight, and Hawkeye is no exception. And even if said villain doesn't have special powers, it doesn't mean they can't cause a lot of trouble for the hero. Kate Bishop and Clint Barton both have to take on the Tracksuit Mafia (also known as the Tracksuit Draculas) in the comics. While these men don't seem so dangerous, their leader Echo is a different story.
The Tracksuit Mafia is the main villain in the first season of Hawkeye, and Clint and Kate will have to try hard and stop them. While the show did provide some info on their leader Echo as well as the group itself, there are still some things only comic book readers will know about the Tracksuit Mafia.
6 Their First Comic Book Appearance
Despite their prominence in Hawkeye, the Tracksuit Mafia is still a new organization in the comics. It only first appeared in August 2012 in the new Matt Fraction and David Aja Hawkeye comic book series. Just like in the show, both Kate and Clint take on the Tracksuit Mafia together.
However, the whole story is a bit different and the Tracksuit Mafia also have an alternative name in the comics. They're also called the Tracksuit Draculas, which is a name Hawkeye came up with, while in the MCU, Clint just calls them the Tracksuit Mafia.
5 Their Shared History
By the time the audience meets Clint again in Hawkeye, he's already had his run-ins with the Tracksuit Mafia while he was Ronin. A flashback scene shows Ronin killing William Lopez's which sets Echo on her vengeful path. But Hawkeye's history with the Tracksuit Mafia is different in the comics.
They faced him on multiple occasions, such as when they threatened to kill all the residents of one building and Clint went to stop them. The Tracksuit Mafia also hired the assassin called Clown to kill Clint but Clown is one of the antagonists that has yet to appear in the show. Instead, the Tracksuit Mafia just goes after Clint and Kate itself without hiring outside help.
4 Who Is The Clown?
While the assassin Clown has yet to try and kill Clint Barton in the show, the man underneath the mask has already appeared in Hawkeye even though viewers who don't read comic books might not have realized it. The Clown's real name is Kazimierz Kazimierczak, simply known as Kazi, who's Echo's right hand in the show.
Four out of the six episodes of the first season have aired but so far, Kazi shows no sign of transforming into Clown. In the fourth episode, Clint confronts Kazi and asks him to persuade Echo to try and let her hunt after Ronin go. Judging by Echo fighting Clint and Kate in the episode's finale, either Kazi didn't deliver the message or Echo just didn't care.
3 Kazi's Backstory
Other than Echo, Kazi is easily the most prominent member of the Tracksuit Mafia in the show. Echo already got her background story but there's very few details the audience knows about Kazi. His backstory in the comics is much richer. Kazi comes from a circus family but he came to the USA after his family was killed. After the tragic death of his friend, something in Kazi snapped, he started killing people and became a mercenary.
Multiple people used his services and the Tracksuit Mafia hired him to kill Clint. Kazi killed Hawkeye's neighbor Grills (who's the fan of larp who steals Ronin's suit in the show) but later on, Clint and Kate were able to defeat him. It's unlikely all of these details will make it into the show especially since it's already changed the exact form of Kazi's association with the Tracksuit Mafia, made him one of them, not just a hired mercenary.
2 They Threatened Lucky
One of the more disgusting things the Tracksuit Mafia did in the comics was threatening Lucky, the Pizza dog, who's Kate's dog best friend. It happened during the Tracksuit Mafia's attack on Clint's apartment. Luckily for Lucky, the dog managed to survive and it even got back at the attackers by going against the Clown.
In the show, such a conflict has yet to happen, even though Lucky has come in contact with the Tracksuit Mafias before and attacked one of them, the man who was searching for the precious watch.
1 Echo Isn't A Member Of The Team
Even though Maya Lopez aka Echo is the Tracksuit Mafia's leader in the show, she has no such connection to them in the comics. Instead, Echo initially works for Wilson Fisk aka the Kingpin who orders her to kill Daredevil. But when Echo learns the truth about the death of her father (whom Kingpin had killed), she turns against her benefactor and tries to kill him.
She also has a brief romance with both Daredevil and Hawkeye and becomes one of the good guys in the end. It's once again unlikely Echo will undergo such transformation in the show since she not only leads the team but also blames Ronin for the death of her father William.