A very different Hawk indeed.
Avery Brooks (Commander Sisko from Deep Space Nine) played the lead role in the TV show: A man called Hawk.
A much watered down version of the the character Hawk in the Spenser novels.
Hawk appaered in book four Promised Land.
Possibly his best appearence was in Judas Goat, when Spenser hires him to tag along as a back-up shooter when Spenser is pursuing terrorists across Europe.
The snappy dialogue between Spenser and Hawk was always one of the best things about the novels and Judas Goat in particular.
Hawk was a black man and for my money he was cooler than the Shaft character created by Ernest Tidyman.
The Hawk as described in the novels was a streetwise self-educated hardman for hire. Sometimes employed as an assassin. His normal occupation a standover man for criminal organisations.
He had a shaven head back before the look became popular. He and Spenser were both ex-boxers and lifetime iron pumpers. (Back before working out in a gym to build muscle became popular as well)
Hawk was a snappy dresser and normally drove around in a Jaguar.
A cold blooded killer for hire whose loyalty to his freinds, be they of any colour or race, made him a unique character in modern fiction.
First appearing as Hawk in the TV series Spenser for Hire, Avery Brooks played A man called Hawk in what is probably the best portrayl of a black man in an action TV series. It only ran for 13 episodes, despite being a quality show.