Jack Ryan (franchise)

Last updated

Jack Ryan
Jack Ryan franchise logo.jpg
Official home release artwork, for the film series.
Based on Jack Ryan novels
by Tom Clancy
Starring See cast below
Distributed by
Release date
1990–present
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
BudgetTotal (5 films):
$265 million

The Jack Ryan franchise consists of American action-thriller installments, based on the fictional titular character from a series of novels written by Tom Clancy. Various actors have portrayed the role.

Contents

Despite inconsistency with its lead actors and crew members, the series has been distributed solely by Paramount Pictures since its inception. Mace Neufeld has produced every film in the series, with producing partner Robert Rehme co-producing Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger, and Lorenzo di Bonaventura co-producing Shadow Recruit. With a combined unadjusted worldwide gross of $788.4 million to date, [1] the films constitute the 57th highest-grossing film series. [2] The films have been nominated for four Academy Awards, winning one for Sound Effects (now Sound Editing) in The Hunt for Red October (at the 63rd Awards). [3]

The continuity of the films does not follow the established timeline of the novels. In the book series, Patriot Games occurs before The Hunt for Red October, but the order was reversed in the film adaptations. Additionally, The Sum of All Fears departs significantly from its source material, with the events of the plot shifted from 1991 to 2002. Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014) was a reboot, and intended first film in a new film series. A sequel was planned, but was never made. The franchise continued with a television series titled Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan , on Prime Video until 2023. [4]

Development

After viewing galley proofs of Tom Clancy's 1984 novel The Hunt for Red October , producer Mace Neufeld optioned the rights to the novel in 1985. Despite the book becoming a best seller, no Hollywood studio was interested in purchasing the film rights because of the high cost of trying to condense the book's massive content into a two-hour film. "This book doesn't condense well into two or three pages", said Neufeld. "I read some of the reports from the other studios and the story was too complicated to understand. Fortunately, I was able to get a major executive at Paramount to read the book and he said: 'I think this can make a great movie. Let's see if we can develop it'". [5]

Films

FilmU.S. release dateDirectorScreenwritersProducer(s)
The Hunt for Red October March 2, 1990 John McTiernan Larry Ferguson & Donald Stewart Mace Neufeld
Patriot Games June 5, 1992 Phillip Noyce W. Peter Iliff & Donald StewartMace Neufeld & Robert G. Rehme
Clear and Present Danger August 3, 1994 John Milius, Donald Stewart & Steven Zaillian
The Sum of All Fears May 31, 2002 Phil Alden Robinson Daniel Pyne & Paul Attanasio Mace Neufeld
Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit January 17, 2014 Kenneth Branagh Adam Cozad & David Koepp Mace Neufeld, David Barron, Mark Vahradian & Lorenzo di Bonaventura

The Hunt for Red October (1990)

During 1984, Central Intelligence Agency analyst Jack Ryan (Alec Baldwin) must track down the Red October , a technologically superior Soviet nuclear submarine heading to America's east coast under the command of Captain Marko Ramius (Sean Connery), and prove to the American government his theory that the sub's mission is to defect rather than attack the American coast. Upon successfully boarding the vessel, Ryan is to signal the American submarine USS Dallas to assist the Red October in escaping from attacks by the Soviet submarine V.K. Konovalov so that it may be brought safely into U.S. waters. [6]

Patriot Games (1992)

Former CIA analyst-turned field operative Jack Ryan (Harrison Ford), is now a professor at the U.S. Naval Academy after previously receiving serious injury while intervening in an attack on the British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland in London and successfully killing one of the assailants. Because the remaining attackers were able to escape, the group now seeks revenge including Sean Miller (Sean Bean), the brother of the man Ryan killed. Miller vows to hunt down Ryan and avenge his brother, no matter how long it takes. Eventually, Ryan and his family are attacked in two separate, but simultaneous attempts. Ryan decides to rejoin the CIA, so that he can stop this group of Irish revolutionaries and protect the ones he loves. [7]

Clear and Present Danger (1994)

Jack Ryan (Harrison Ford) is appointed as acting-CIA Deputy Director of Intelligence, as Vice Admiral James Greer (James Earl Jones) has been battling cancer. When a family close to the President is murdered in their sleep, by what appears to be a drug cartel, Ryan is called as investigator. Unknown to him, the CIA sends in a secret field operative to lead an illegal paramilitary force against the cartels in Colombia with the help of John Clark (Willem Dafoe). Risking both his life and his career, Ryan races against time to expose the truth. [8]

The Sum of All Fears (2002)

A contemporary prequel, set during 2002, the plot portrays a younger Jack Ryan. After the President of the Russian Federation dies and is replaced by a man with a mysterious past, the United States goes on a Cold War-like state of alert. CIA director William Cabot (Morgan Freeman) recruits young analyst Jack Ryan (Ben Affleck) and assigns him to the situation in Russia, with the task to determine whether the paranoia is legitimate. Ryan soon discovers that a neo-nazi terrorist group plans to provoke a war between the U.S. and Russia, by detonating a nuclear bomb at a football game in Baltimore. Ryan works to resolve the assignment before it's too late. [9]

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014)

A reboot of the film series, set during 2013. After the events of the September 11 attacks, Jack Ryan (Chris Pine), studying at the London School of Economics, becomes a Marine second lieutenant in Afghanistan. While on military tour he is critically injured after his helicopter is shot down. Twelve years later, Ryan is working undercover as a CIA analyst, and posing in a cover job on Wall Street as a compliance officer at a stock brokerage. He quickly discovers that certain accounts are inaccessible to him as the auditor, which leads him to discover the scheme of Viktor Cherevin (Kenneth Branagh). With the help of Thomas Harper (Kevin Costner), Jack works to stop Cherevin's plot to collapse the US dollar. [10]

Television

Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan (2018–2023)

SeasonEpisodesOriginally released
1 8August 31, 2018 (2018-08-31)
2 8October 31, 2019 (2019-10-31)
3 8December 21, 2022 (2022-12-21)
4 6June 30, 2023 (2023-06-30)

Cast and crew

Cast

CharactersFilms Television series
The Hunt for Red October Patriot Games Clear and Present Danger The Sum of All Fears Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit Season 1 Season 2 Season 3 Season 4
199019921994200220142018201920222023
Jack Ryan Alec Baldwin Harrison Ford Ben Affleck Chris Pine John Krasinski
Catherine "Cathy" Ryan (née Muller) Gates McFadden Anne Archer Bridget Moynahan Keira Knightley Abbie Cornish Abbie Cornish
James Greer James Earl Jones Wendell Pierce
Sally RyanLouise Borras Thora Birch
John Clark Willem Dafoe Liev Schreiber
Domingo "Ding" Chavez Raymond Cruz Michael Peña
Matice Garth / Jeff John Hoogenakker
Mike November Michael Kelly
Others

Crew

FilmCrew/Detail
ComposerCinematographer(s)Editor(s)Production
companies
Distributing
company
Running time
The Hunt for Red October Basil Poledouris Jan de Bont Dennis Virkler & John Wright Mace Neufeld Productions,
Nina Saxon Film Design
Paramount Pictures 135 minutes
Patriot Games James Horner Donald McAlpine William Hoy & Neil Travis Paramount Pictures,
Mace Neufeld Productions
117 minutes
Clear and Present Danger Neil Travis141 minutes
The Sum of All Fears Jerry Goldsmith John Lindley Neil Travis & Nicolas de TothParamount Pictures,
Mace Neufeld Productions,
MFP Munich Film Partners,
S.O.A.F. Productions
124 minutes
Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit Patrick Doyle Haris Zambarloukos Martin Walsh Paramount Pictures,
Mace Neufeld Productions,
di Bonaventura Pictures,
Skydance Media
105 minutes
Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan Ramin Djawadi Richard Rutkowski, Christopher Faloona, Checco Varese, Patrick Murguia, Jeffrey Greeley, and Arnau Valls ColomerPaul Trejo, John M. Valerio, Sarah Boyd, Vikash Patel, Mark Goldman, and Stephen Semel Amazon Original Series,
Genre Arts,
Push, Boot.,
Platinum Dunes,
Skydance Television,
Paramount Television Studios,
Amazon Studios,
Sunday Night Productions
Amazon Prime Video 960 minutes
(1 hour per episode)

Reception

Box office performance

FilmU.S. release dateBox office revenueBudgetReference
United StatesInternationalWorldwide
The Hunt for Red October March 2, 1990$122,012,643$78,500,000$200,512,643$30,000,000 [11]
Patriot Games June 5, 1992$83,351,587$94,700,000$178,051,587$45,000,000 [12]
Clear and Present Danger August 3, 1994$122,187,717$93,700,000$215,887,717$62,000,000 [13]
The Sum of All Fears May 31, 2002$118,907,036$75,014,336$193,921,372$68,000,000 [14]
Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit January 17, 2014$50,577,412$84,933,618$135,511,030$60,000,000 [15]
Total$497,036,395$426,847,954$923,884,349$265,000,000

Critical and public response

Film Rotten Tomatoes Metacritic CinemaScore [16]
The Hunt for Red October 88% (76 reviews) [17] 58 (17 reviews) [18] A
Patriot Games 72% (102 reviews) [19] 64 (23 reviews) [20] A–
Clear and Present Danger 81% (47 reviews) [21] 74 (14 reviews) [22] A
The Sum of All Fears 59% (175 reviews) [23] 45 (35 reviews) [24] A–
Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit 55% (191 reviews) [25] 57 (36 reviews) [26] B

Home media

On February 7, 2003, Paramount announced a box set entitled The Jack Ryan Special Edition DVD Collection, which includes new editions of The Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger as well as the special edition of The Sum of All Fears. [27] Both the set and the individual editions of each film were released on May 6, 2003. [28] While the four films were originally intended to be released in a Blu-ray collection entitled The Jack Ryan Collection, the films were later broken up into separate releases for the high definition format on July 29, 2008. [29] On December 3, 2013, The Jack Ryan Collection was finally issued on Blu-ray.

Other media

Video games

The film series has spawned three video games for various systems. Two side scroller games were produced in 1990 to coincide with the release of The Hunt for Red October, one for computer systems was released by Grandslam Interactive Ltd. while another was released for Nintendo consoles by Hi-Tech Expressions, Inc. [30] In 2002, the video game The Sum of All Fears was released by Ubisoft for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 2, and GameCube. [31]

Domingo Chavez (as Ding Chavez) and John Clark both appear as a member and the leader of Team Rainbow in the older Rainbow Six games, these characters also appeared in the book.

Cancelled projects

A film, based on the novel The Cardinal of the Kremlin , was planned. It was to involve Harrison Ford and William Shatner. [32] It was never released and the idea was most likely scrapped.

Related Research Articles

<i>The Hunt for Red October</i> 1984 novel by Tom Clancy

The Hunt for Red October is the debut novel by American author Tom Clancy, first published on October 1, 1984, by the Naval Institute Press. It depicts Soviet submarine captain Marko Ramius as he seemingly goes rogue with his country's cutting-edge ballistic missile submarine Red October, and marks the first appearance of Clancy's most popular fictional character, Jack Ryan, an analyst working for the Central Intelligence Agency, as he must prove his theory that Ramius is intending to defect to the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jack Ryan (character)</span> Fictional character created by author Tom Clancy

John Patrick Ryan Sr. (Hon.) is a fictional character created by author Tom Clancy and featured in his Ryanverse novels, which have consistently topped the New York Times bestseller list over 30 years. Since Clancy's death in 2013, five other authors, Mark Greaney, Grant Blackwood, Mike Maden, Marc Cameron and Don Bentley, have continued writing new novels for the franchise and its other connecting series with the approval of the Clancy family estate.

<i>Clear and Present Danger</i> Novel by Tom Clancy

Clear and Present Danger is a political thriller novel, written by Tom Clancy and published on August 17, 1989. A sequel to The Cardinal of the Kremlin (1988), main character Jack Ryan becomes acting Deputy Director of Intelligence in the Central Intelligence Agency, and discovers that he is being kept in the dark by his colleagues who are conducting a covert war against a drug cartel based in Colombia. It debuted at number one on The New York Times bestseller list. A film adaptation, featuring Harrison Ford reprising his role as Ryan, was released on August 3, 1994.

<i>The Sum of All Fears</i> 1991 novel by Tom Clancy

The Sum of All Fears is a political thriller novel, written by Tom Clancy and released on August 14, 1991, as the sequel to Clear and Present Danger (1989). Main character Jack Ryan, who is now the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, tries to stop a crisis concerning the Middle East peace process wherein Palestinian and former East German terrorists conspire to bring the United States and Soviet Union into nuclear war. It debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list. A film adaptation, which is a reboot of the Jack Ryan film series and starring Ben Affleck as the younger iteration of the CIA analyst, was released on May 31, 2002.

<i>Patriot Games</i> 1987 novel by Tom Clancy

Patriot Games is a thriller novel, written by Tom Clancy and published in July 1987. Without Remorse, released six years later, is an indirect prequel, and it is chronologically the first book featuring Jack Ryan, the main character in most of Clancy's novels. The novel focuses on Ryan being the target of Irish terrorist group Ulster Liberation Army for thwarting their kidnapping attempt on the Prince and Princess of Wales in London. It debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list. A film adaptation, starring Harrison Ford as Ryan, premiered on June 5, 1992.

<i>Clear and Present Danger</i> (film) 1994 American film

Clear and Present Danger is a 1994 American action thriller film directed by Phillip Noyce and based on Tom Clancy's 1989 novel of the same name. It is a sequel to The Hunt for Red October (1990) and Patriot Games (1992) and part of a series of films featuring Clancy's character Jack Ryan. It is the last film version of Clancy's novels to feature Harrison Ford as Ryan and James Earl Jones as Vice Admiral James Greer, as well as the final installment directed by Noyce.

<i>Patriot Games</i> (film) 1992 film by Phillip Noyce

Patriot Games is a 1992 American action thriller film directed by Phillip Noyce and based on Tom Clancy's 1987 novel of the same name. It is a sequel to the 1990 film The Hunt for Red October, part of a series of films featuring Clancy's character Jack Ryan, but with different actors in the leading roles. Harrison Ford stars as Jack Ryan and Anne Archer as his wife, and James Earl Jones reprises his role as Admiral James Greer. The cast also includes Sean Bean, Patrick Bergin, Thora Birch, Samuel L. Jackson, James Fox, and Richard Harris.

<i>The Hunt for Red October</i> (film) 1990 film directed by John McTiernan

The Hunt for Red October is a 1990 American submarine spy thriller film directed by John McTiernan, produced by Mace Neufeld, and starring Sean Connery, Alec Baldwin, Scott Glenn, James Earl Jones, and Sam Neill. The film is an adaptation of Tom Clancy's 1984 bestselling novel of the same name. It is the first installment of the film series with the protagonist Jack Ryan.

<i>The Sum of All Fears</i> (film) 2002 film by Phil Alden Robinson

The Sum of All Fears is a 2002 American spy thriller film directed by Phil Alden Robinson, based on Tom Clancy's 1991 novel of the same name. The film, which is set in the Jack Ryan film series, is a reboot taking place in 2002. Jack Ryan is portrayed as a younger character by Ben Affleck, in comparison with the previous films: The Hunt for Red October (1990) starring Alec Baldwin as Jack Ryan and the sequels, Patriot Games (1992) and Clear and Present Danger (1994), both starring Harrison Ford in the role.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mace Neufeld</span> American film and television producer (1928–2022)

Morris "Mace" Alvin Neufeld was an American film and television producer. Born in New York City, Neufeld began working in the entertainment industry as a songwriter and production assistant in the late 1940s and then as a talent agent, managing comics, actors, musicians and writers, including Don Adams, Don Knotts, Neil Diamond, and the Carpenters. He began producing for television in the 1970s and in 1981 was nominated for a primetime Emmy for the TV movie East of Eden.

The Ryanverse is a term for the political drama media franchise created by author Tom Clancy centering on the character of Jack Ryan and the fictional universe featuring Jack and other characters, such as John Clark and Domingo Chavez.

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<i>Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit</i> 2014 American action thriller film

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit is a 2014 American action thriller film based on the character Jack Ryan created by author Tom Clancy. It is the fifth film in the Jack Ryan series and the second reboot thereof. Unlike its predecessors, it is not an adaptation of a particular Clancy novel, but rather an original story. Chris Pine stars in the title role, becoming the fourth actor to play Ryan, following Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford, and Ben Affleck. The film is directed by Kenneth Branagh, who also stars alongside Kevin Costner, and Keira Knightley.

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Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan is an American political action thriller television series based on characters from the fictional "Ryanverse" created by Tom Clancy. Replacing the characters of the novels with those set in modern time, it depicts CIA analyst Jack Ryan who is played by John Krasinski. The series was created by Carlton Cuse and Graham Roland. Cuse and Krasinski serve as executive producers, alongside Michael Bay, and Mace Neufeld, among others.

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