Jack Ryan (franchise)
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.
Jack Ryan
1990–present
United States
English
Total (5 films):
$265 million
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[edit]
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]
Home media[edit]
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[edit]
Video games[edit]
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[edit]
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.