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Roughly thirty years after the Cold War ended, tensions between the U.S. and Russia are escalating after Moscow launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine more than a month ago.
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For a time, CIA analyst-turned-man-of-action Jack Ryan looked like the perfect role for actors looking to flex their leading-man muscles. Playing Ryan requires a performer commanding enough to plausibly interact with movie presidents; restrained enough to assume an action hero’s faux humility; and confident enough to accept easy replacement when the job inevitably fails to work out. It’s the part that everyone wants and almost no one is willing to keep.
Ryan is the most famous character created by the late novelist Tom Clancy, in part because he has appeared in blockbuster movie adaptations and has been brought to life by the likes of Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford, and Ben Affleck. It’s easy to imagine Clancy satisfied with this arrangement, given his admiration for actor-turned-president Ronald Reagan. Yet somehow, this steady stream of star-powered, big-budget thrillers has failed to produce a viable long-running film series for long-time distributor Paramount.