Action-Adventure Jack Ryan series (Amazon Prime)

[TheVileOne]

Can anyone explain the storyline with the dude at the air force base? IMO worst part of the show.

IMHO the show meanders around a lot. And a lot of dumb contrivances to make the good guys look like idiots. Like they have a GPS and satellite locked into a guy and they have only two cards tracking him.

For starters, they know this guy is dangerous. He infiltrated a military base as a dead body and rescued the terrorist behind everything. And they only put two cars with some inept local French officers on it? Both of whom are really mouthy. Who the hell is this person mouthing off to Jack Ryan about texting women, a woman he only just recently met. "Lady, I don't even ****ing know who you are. You don't get to order me around about my dating life."

Show is good for the most part. It's a lot like an updated 24. But like 24 it still has tons of writing flaws.

I don't care for all the precious Hollywood apologism either. Like Jack Ryan justifying to the French cop about working for the CIA knowing all they've done. And Jack's like "Oh I can change it from the inside."

First of all, Jack was never giving any indication like that in the previous episodes. Second of all, what about what the French government has done? Because their hands are totally clean in all of this I guess.

Spoiler

I don't need to see the drone pilot get all emotional and going to Vegas to have some weird tryst with rich sexual deviant guy and his wife. That was all totally pointless. I get that the dude feels guilty and hates being a drone pilot and he's trying to punish himself. But why is the rich guy some sexual deviant who wanted to beat him up and then let him keep his money? Just feels like the writers wrote out way too much when it needed to be scaled back.

 

[flickchick85]

Can anyone explain the storyline with the dude at the air force base? IMO worst part of the show.

Yeah what was THAT? I don't even care if they tie it into the rest of the story somehow, that storyline still sticks out like a sore thumb.

 

[TheVileOne]

That storyline was getting into borderline David Lynch territory there with the deviant husband beating up the drone operator after watching him schtup his wife.

Can anyone explain that? Is that just how the husband gets his rocks off? Has his wife seduce a high roller, beats him up, and then leaves him lying there a drunken mess after he roughs him up a little? So bizarre. Like he didn't even take the guy's money and he was begging him to take the money. After all that happened, I wanted to throw my tablet across the room. I was literally so angry. It was a real huge "WTF is this?!" reaction.



EDIT:

For clarification, I get that the drone operator is feeling guilty and is looking for some sort of cosmic punishment for his actions. That's why he goes to the casino. He's desperately trying to lose all that money, but he keeps winning. And he wants that guy to steal it. He feels guilty and wants punishment. He wants redemption. But why like why is the older husband like taunting him with that? It makes no ****ing sense. I guess that couple has tons of money and they just like doing weird ****, but it's almost too weird for me it for that to be in this kind of show. This is Jack Ryan not ****ing Twin Peaks.

 

[flickchick85]

Yeah for a minute I thought they were gonna rob him and it was gonna become some sort of national security issue, but nope, just an interlude of weirdness.

 

[Kaleb]

Hopefully they can fix all those minor issues in season 2.

 

[TheVileOne]

Hopefully they can fix all those minor issues in season 2.

Get someone to proofread the scripts and tell them to cut out the junk.

 

[Marvolo]

Can anyone explain the storyline with the dude at the air force base? IMO worst part of the show.

IMHO the show meanders around a lot. And a lot of dumb contrivances to make the good guys look like idiots. Like they have a GPS and satellite locked into a guy and they have only two cards tracking him.

For starters, they know this guy is dangerous. He infiltrated a military base as a dead body and rescued the terrorist behind everything. And they only put two cars with some inept local French officers on it? Both of whom are really mouthy. Who the hell is this person mouthing off to Jack Ryan about texting women, a woman he only just recently met. "Lady, I don't even ****ing know who you are. You don't get to order me around about my dating life."

Show is good for the most part. It's a lot like an updated 24. But like 24 it still has tons of writing flaws.

I don't care for all the precious Hollywood apologism either. Like Jack Ryan justifying to the French cop about working for the CIA knowing all they've done. And Jack's like "Oh I can change it from the inside."

First of all, Jack was never giving any indication like that in the previous episodes. Second of all, what about what the French government has done? Because their hands are totally clean in all of this I guess.

Spoiler

I don't need to see the drone pilot get all emotional and going to Vegas to have some weird tryst with rich sexual deviant guy and his wife. That was all totally pointless. I get that the dude feels guilty and hates being a drone pilot and he's trying to punish himself. But why is the rich guy some sexual deviant who wanted to beat him up and then let him keep his money? Just feels like the writers wrote out way too much when it needed to be scaled back.

That is straight from the books. In Patriot Games Jack spends a large portion of the book fretting over whether he should join the CIA full time or remain a teacher. He ultimately decides to join the CIA because while it's far from perfect it's what they've got and he can affect more changes and protect his family and loved ones better if he is on the inside with resources.

 

[Marvolo]

Spoiler

So they find a single unidentified enemy combatant in a compound. He's injured and unable to resist. He has potential intel that the CIA and DOD could use...and some rando soldier puts a bullet in his head and leaves the body without even asking for permission and the CIA doesn't even say a damn thing about it.



Idk for sure how things are done, but I'm pretty sure that was incredibly stupid.

 

[Kaleb]

Can't believe it's taken me so long to realize that the actor playing 'Matice' is the guy in all the Bud Light' ''Dilly Dilly'' commercials (he was also in the final season of Colony)

 

[Manasrepublic]

I started to watch the first episode but after seeing alot of the mixed reactions it seems like it’s not worth watching! The first 25 mins I have seen looked really good so far. I was surprised they set this in present day. I was hoping for more of a period setting like the early 80s

 

[TheVileOne]

Spoiler

So they find a single unidentified enemy combatant in a compound. He's injured and unable to resist. He has potential intel that the CIA and DOD could use...and some rando soldier puts a bullet in his head and leaves the body without even asking for permission and the CIA doesn't even say a damn thing about it.



Idk for sure how things are done, but I'm pretty sure that was incredibly stupid.

Everything the CIA does in this show is stupid. This CIA is dumber than 24's CTU.

 

[Marvolo]

It's worth watching. It's only 8 episodes, after all. Greer and Jack are great. And it maintains tension pretty well for most of the season. But those last 2 episodes dropped the ball big time. It felt like they ran out of budget and time. Everything is compressed and wrapped up way too neatly with very little payoff. And the Jack and Cathy relationship is severely underdeveloped.

Spoiler

in the finale she is in the hospital where the attack is happening. Jack is trying to warn her. She ends up in an elevator with one of the terrorists. Greer saves her and that's the last we see of her. There's no scene of Jack and her together after that attack. No mention of her. Greer doesn't even tell Ryan that he had to save her. It's like the showrunner forgot about that plotline and the character and didnt give it any sort of closure for the season.

Even the last scene doesn't make much sense. Greer is off to work in Moscow and it implies Jack is going there to work with Greer. But Jack just spent part of the season wooing Cathy and when he finally gets her and after she is in extreme danger from a terrorist attack he gets excited about leaving her and going to work in Russia. What sort of sense does that make?

I'll definitely be watching season 2, because I like Jack and Greer and the franchise, but they have to do better. Much better. This didnt come close to matching something like Homeland or the old Jack Ryan movies.

 

[Kaleb]

It's worth watching. It's only 8 episodes, after all. Greer and Jack are great. And it maintains tension pretty well for most of the season. But those last 2 episodes dropped the ball big time. It felt like they ran out of budget and time. Everything is compressed and wrapped up way too neatly with very little payoff. And the Jack and Cathy relationship is severely underdeveloped.

Spoiler

in the finale she is in the hospital where the attack is happening. Jack is trying to warn her. She ends up in an elevator with one of the terrorists. Greer saves her and that's the last we see of her. There's no scene of Jack and her together after that attack. No mention of her. Greer doesn't even tell Ryan that he had to save her. It's like the showrunner forgot about that plotline and the character and didnt give it any sort of closure for the season.

Even the last scene doesn't make much sense. Greer is off to work in Moscow and it implies Jack is going there to work with Greer. But Jack just spent part of the season wooing Cathy and when he finally gets her and after she is in extreme danger from a terrorist attack he gets excited about leaving her and going to work in Russia. What sort of sense does that make?

I'll definitely be watching season 2, because I like Jack and Greer and the franchise, but they have to do better. Much better. This didnt come close to matching something like Homeland or the old Jack Ryan movies.

Cant help but think that this played a part in why it took so long for the series to be released

 

[Tanin]

The French/English auto translation had me laughing.

 

[Man in the Suit]

They are really playing fast and loose with the source material. I wouldnt even call this an adaption. It's more like a reboot of the character. Some of the familiar infrastructure is the same but the little details are changed. For example, Greer is transferred to Langley to head the finance department because he screwed up in the field. He doesn't seem to be an Admiral. Ryan has been at the CIA for 4 years and has never met Greer. Cathy works in Infectious Diseases instead of being a surgeon. Jack is at the CIA full time before he meets Cathy and doesn't seem to be teaching at all.

Anyone else about puke when that guy started digging around in that corpse's abdomen and scooping out his intestines? I had just finished eating when I saw that scene.

It sounds like Carlton Cuse is kinda doing the same thing here as he did with The Strain.

 

[MadderMaximus]

Yeah for a minute I thought they were gonna rob him and it was gonna become some sort of national security issue, but nope, just an interlude of weirdness.

So they don't come back around to that? I'm only on episode 5 and I haven't even seen the guy come back.

 

[MadderMaximus]

Nevermind, minutes later, "Tombstone" showed up.

 

[KRYPTON INC.]

Got around to ep 1 today and... I liked it fine. So far no complaints and I rather like the update to Ryan. It still fits the basics of the character while getting the ball rolling in getting him involved with the modern world of Intelligence. Are things different than the books? Yeah, but I don't think you could do say, a season of PATRIOT GAMES to give us a more in line with the source "origin". I'll have to see if the rest is as good as the first ep.

 

[TheVileOne]

I never read the books so they are not sacred cows to me at all. At the same time, I definitely have issues with some of the writing.

IMHO the whole drone pilot subplot is pointless bad storytelling and should be cut from the show.

TV seems to be doing a lot of this these days. Going on weird tangents with weird characters. I notice it in Marvel Netflix as well. Like these writers are trying to be like David Lynch and Twin Peaks.

 

[SPO2 Dalisay]

That storyline was getting into borderline David Lynch territory there with the deviant husband beating up the drone operator after watching him schtup his wife.

Can anyone explain that? Is that just how the husband gets his rocks off? Has his wife seduce a high roller, beats him up, and then leaves him lying there a drunken mess after he roughs him up a little? So bizarre. Like he didn't even take the guy's money and he was begging him to take the money. After all that happened, I wanted to throw my tablet across the room. I was literally so angry. It was a real huge "WTF is this?!" reaction.



EDIT:

For clarification, I get that the drone operator is feeling guilty and is looking for some sort of cosmic punishment for his actions. That's why he goes to the casino. He's desperately trying to lose all that money, but he keeps winning. And he wants that guy to steal it. He feels guilty and wants punishment. He wants redemption. But why like why is the older husband like taunting him with that? It makes no ****ing sense. I guess that couple has tons of money and they just like doing weird ****, but it's almost too weird for me it for that to be in this kind of show. This is Jack Ryan not ****ing Twin Peaks.

I'll take a shot. The woman was saying thank you to the Lieutenant for your service as they played out the porn scenario of 50% of amateur sex tapes on the porn sites. The only difference was then the boyfriend beating up the Lieutenant. The we get to hear Sheikh Suleiman's story of how he met Hanin. That her father picks the Sheikh up as he is stranded while returning from fighting in Iraq. He feeds the Sheikh and offers his daughter as a thank you for your service. But the Sheikh being a devout man took the 16 year old Hanin as his wife and not as a prostitute.

The rest of the story only makes sense if he returns in a latter season either as an Islamic convert/terrorist. Or as a vet coming off of PTSD and gets in Ryan's orbit and is redeemed.

Spoiler

So they find a single unidentified enemy combatant in a compound. He's injured and unable to resist. He has potential intel that the CIA and DOD could use...and some rando soldier puts a bullet in his head and leaves the body without even asking for permission and the CIA doesn't even say a damn thing about it.



Idk for sure how things are done, but I'm pretty sure that was incredibly stupid.

I agree one of the best of the best, chosen man, proven in combat and working for an intelligence gathering agency. It was one of the bigger WTF moments.

 

[TheVileOne]

I'll take a shot. The woman was saying thank you to the Lieutenant for your service as they played out the porn scenario of 50% of amateur sex tapes on the porn sites. The only difference was then the boyfriend beating up the Lieutenant. The we get to hear Sheikh Suleiman's story of how he met Hanin. That her father picks the Sheikh up as he is stranded while returning from fighting in Iraq. He feeds the Sheikh and offers his daughter as a thank you for your service. But the Sheikh being a devout man took the 16 year old Hanin as his wife and not as a prostitute.

The rest of the story only makes sense if he returns in a latter season either as an Islamic convert/terrorist. Or as a vet coming off of PTSD and gets in Ryan's orbit and is redeemed.

That still doesn't make sense. It still doesn't explain why he beat the guy up.

 

[KevTravels]

Can anyone explain the storyline with the dude at the air force base? IMO worst part of the show.

IMHO the show meanders around a lot. And a lot of dumb contrivances to make the good guys look like idiots. Like they have a GPS and satellite locked into a guy and they have only two cards tracking him.

For starters, they know this guy is dangerous. He infiltrated a military base as a dead body and rescued the terrorist behind everything. And they only put two cars with some inept local French officers on it? Both of whom are really mouthy. Who the hell is this person mouthing off to Jack Ryan about texting women, a woman he only just recently met. "Lady, I don't even ****ing know who you are. You don't get to order me around about my dating life."

Show is good for the most part. It's a lot like an updated 24. But like 24 it still has tons of writing flaws.

I don't care for all the precious Hollywood apologism either. Like Jack Ryan justifying to the French cop about working for the CIA knowing all they've done. And Jack's like "Oh I can change it from the inside."

First of all, Jack was never giving any indication like that in the previous episodes. Second of all, what about what the French government has done? Because their hands are totally clean in all of this I guess.

Spoiler

I don't need to see the drone pilot get all emotional and going to Vegas to have some weird tryst with rich sexual deviant guy and his wife. That was all totally pointless. I get that the dude feels guilty and hates being a drone pilot and he's trying to punish himself. But why is the rich guy some sexual deviant who wanted to beat him up and then let him keep his money? Just feels like the writers wrote out way too much when it needed to be scaled back.

I do wish they went further deeper. Did Ryan believe in the CIA or simply wanted to enact some changes?

 

[KevTravels]

A few episodes in, enjoying it so far. It's hardly re-inventing the wheel, but it's competently written, well-cast, well-shot and entertaining. Krasinski makes for a good everyman action hero, but Wendell Pierce is the highlight so far, imo.

I agree. Pierce made this show. I was kinda worried he'd bite it by the end of the season.

how expensive was the budget for this show?

 

[TheVileOne]

I do wish they went further deeper. Did Ryan believe in the CIA or simply wanted to enact some changes?

To me the deeper thing is he believes the work is vital and important. Case in point his little sanctimonious monologue in the first episode about stopping the next Bin Laden, which he believes is Suleiman. Also, that sort of contradicts the dumb apologist "I want to enact change from the inside" garbage.

He joined the Marines. He later left what was probably a cushy blue blood career on Wall Street. Obviously, he feels a greater calling to serve his country and protecting innocent civilians. It's not "enacting change from the inside" BS.

 

[Marvolo]

But it is exactly that. The changes Ryan speaks of is the kind that will better protect people, stop terrorists, make the CIA a better more effective organization. He believes he can do that better from a place of influence on the front lines. The front lines is the CIA and DOD and NSA. Ryan chose the CIA.

Idk why this is even up for debate. It's obvious why he does what he does and its plainly stated in the show.

In his very first meeting with Greer he shows a motivation to get his bosses at the CIA to pay attention to things they hadn't considered and tries to get Greer to listen to what hes found out. The whole season he goes far beyond his job's mandate and refuses to accept Greer's cynical views and ideas. He pushes to save the boy when the others just want to bomb the terrorsts. He wants things to change.