Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan: Ghost War

Jack Ryan is reluctantly drawn back into the field when a covert mission uncovers a conspiracy involving a rogue black-ops unit, forcing him to reunite with his old team and a new MI6 partner in order to stop them.

Because apparently America just can not get enough of the bland suit that is the "character" Jack Ryan, Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan: Ghost War is the sixth film, and the third reboot, in the Jack Ryan series. John Krasinski is the fifth actor to play the character, after Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford, Ben Affleck, and Chris Pine. In some circles–circles I assume is mostly made up of dads–there are people who refer to these various films as the "Ryanverse" probably because no one has told them to stop it.

Anyway, Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan: Ghost War is a film, but it's also the fifth, and most likely, final season of the Amazon Prime Video tv series Jack Ryan, that ran from 2018–2023, and upon hearing this, and I can guess what you're probably thinking...

"Oh no, should I watch the previous four seasons before I watch this film? I should, right? Because how else will I know what's going on, Jon?"

I'm just gonna say "no" because honestly... who cares?

Meanwhile, in Dubai...

An MI6 mission to extract intel is being run by Nigel Cooke, but it fails when his men are killed by Liam Crown. No, this isn't the latest fight by the brothers in the band Oasis, this is an international incident. Jack Ryan, now working as a civilian on Wall Street, because it was either that or a lobbyist, I assume, is approached by his old friend James Greer, who is now CIA Deputy Director. Greer gets Ryan to reluctantly agrees to collect a package from Cooke while he is on a business trip in Dubai, accompanied by Ryan's former colleague Mike November, which for all you pogs out there, is a very sly way of showing that Mike November is actually a code name and not his real name, that's how bad ass he is. Anyway, Ryan meets with a distressed Cooke, who hands him a crumpled cigarette pack like Ryan is his maid or something, and the fact that Ryan didn't just look at the crumpled pack and be like "the fuck you hand me this trash for?" and then throw it away, should tell you that there is more to this crumpled cigarette pack than meets the eye. But not in a Transformers kind of way, obviously, in a spy kind of way, although, probably not in a "James Bond" spy kind of way. I doubt that the cigarette pack will turn into an explosive, or a laser, or a jetpack, or anything like that, no. But he's probably gonna need some lemon juice, I bet, so he can read the message written in invisible ink. Anyway, Cooke cryptically warns Ryan–in that way that you know he's about to be killed–that Greer needs help, but before he can explain why, Cooke is killed. Ryan and November pursue the assassin, but the assassin is killed by Crown before Ryan and November can get him. Crown gets away, but Ryan and November do not. They are taken into custody by MI6 officer Emma Marlow.

Meanwhile, in Washington D.C....

Crown tells Greer that he will kill Ryan unless Ryan returns what Cooke gave him. And Greer is like "fuck you, buddy, we don't negotiate with terrorists!" but not out loud, just with, y'know... his facial expressions.

Meanwhile, in Dubai...

Marlow informs Ryan that Crown is part of Project Starling, a black-ops program created by Greer and Cooke after 9/11, which was believed to have been disbanded, but it turns out... it wasn't. Gasp!

Meanwhile, in London...

Marlow briefs Deputy Chief Andrew Spear of her plans. Ryan meets with Greer at MI6 Headquarters, who justifies creating Starling, but still claims that he shut it down, and that it was Crown who resurrectted it, and then went rogue after he was burned (not with fire, but with government policy). MI6 and the CIA then figure out that Starling plans to bomb the Tower Bridge, recreating an attack he'd foiled 20 years prior. Why? Because he's the bad guy.

Meanwhile, in Whitehall...

CIA Director Elizabeth Wright meets with Chief of MI6 Arnold. Police find bombmaking materials in an old Starling safehouse, but Ryan determines it is a distraction. Crown detonates a car bomb, killing Wright, and escapes again, after a shootout with Greer. Along with Ryan, November, and Marlow, they all determine that Crown (the bad guy, not the King and/or government of England, but I can see how that explanation might still be unclear) is reactivating terrorist groups. He is doing this in order to prove the need for off book programs like Starling, a plot that was done best in that fantastic example of a Christmas movie, The Long Kiss Goddnight, starring Geena Davis and Samuel L. Jackson. Crown demands that Greer return the intel Cooke obtained on Starling, because unlike in The Long Kiss Goodnight, Crown is a dick, not a duck. Ryan lies to Crown and says he left it in Dubai, which is so tricky, right? That's gonna be my go-to lie from now on: "Oh, shoot... I left it in Dubai." What are they gonna say? Go get it? It's a 15 hour flight, buddy! Who's got the time? Anyway, Ryan and Marlow then determine that Cooke was trying to transmit information on Starling live from a server on the night he was killed. Gasp! To be fair, I'm not sure why this was important, as my attention had drifted somewhat at this point, but needless to say, Ryan and Marlow were upset... big time.

Meanwhile, I've lost track of where everyone is...

Doesn't matter. Because Spear is revealed to be working with Crown, that traitorous son of a bitch. Who, you ask? I think he was Marlow's boss. Anyway, Ryan, Marlow, and that perenial third wheel, November, all return to Dubai and, with help from a former CIA colleague Patrick (first name? last name? unclear), they all determine where Cooke plans to transmit. Ryan then connects Patrick to the server, which holds data on the entire Starling network, including Spear, and he downloads it. They are attacked by Crown while downloading, which means we get to watch the download bar slowly fill! So exciting! Will it get done in time? The answer is yes, of course, but Marlow is injured in the process, but is then rescued by Greer and SAC reinforcements. Crown is wounded, and then Ryan shoots him dead when he tries to go for his sidearm.

Justice, American-style!

In the end, Greer is becomes the new Director of the CIA, and he recommends to the President, who was presumably at a monster truck show the whole time, that Ryan should be his Deputy Director. This means Ryan will need to quit his new job on Wallstreet, but honestly, since he hasn't been to work in days at this point, they've probably fired him already.

The End.

Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan: Ghost War is the perfect film to nap on the couch to on a quiet and cool sunday afternoon. Honestly, is there a better metric for a "dad film" than that? But maybe you're asking, "what the heck is a dad film, Jon?" Well, I'm no expert, but I'd suggest that any film made in 2026 that is still using 9/11 as a plot point is basically the dictionary definition of a “Dad Film.”

Anyway, I'm pretty sure I’ve watched every season of the Jack Ryan show, but for the life of me, I couldn't tell you any specifics about that copy of a copy of a copy of the later seasons of 24, that freezer-burned piece of Cold War leftovers that missed its window for cultural relevance oh so long ago, and the movie version is basically in the same boat. Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan: Ghost War is a low rent version of the "serious" James Bond era, with a heavy emphasis on a lack of fun, gadgets, or sex. It is both a distant, uninteresting cousin of Jason Bourne, a franchise that almost knew enough to quit while it was ahead, and also a deluded pretender to Mission Impossible’s crown, a franchise that definitely overstayed its welcome.

Bottom line, it’s no Slow Horses.

Not that Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan: Ghost War is all bad, or boring, or generic, it just mostly is. Theres a brief flair of action now and then, usually where one guy is tailing another guy, who is actually being tailed by another guy, and who is being monitored the whole time by another guy, but then... shit gets real, and suddenly, everyone is running and jumping and shouting orders and shooting! And sure, this is usually followed by long scenes of walk and talks, and ride and talks, and sit and talks—each featuring an interchangeable coterie of world weary Agent Last Names, turned cynical from the dark reality of a life lived too long in the shadows, and yet, they're still here, fighting for freedom wherever there's trouble, resigned to their own dark fates, and yet nobly soldiering on all the same, the unheralded protectors of colonialism and capitalism, who find themselves once again faced with another public kerfuffle due to some Iran/Contra type of government secret, the kind that was previously believed to have been buried long ago, but is now coming back to bite everyone in the ass, all of which is usually being discussed as the result of at least one flag-draped coffin, meant to remind us all of the price of freedom.

But then a bomb goes off! Oh no!

Everyone is running and jumping and they're shouting orders again, and it’s time for the final showdown! Will the sins of the past finally take down our hero, or will Team America triumph once again?

Sometimes that shit is fun.

Or soothing. Or at least, non-intrusive as you lay on the couch, not mowing the lawn and doom-scrolling. Have you seen all of this before, done better in better movies? Yeah. Definitely. I mean, the plot of this film is just some generic world-hopping, with appropriately official-looking labels to tell you where the characters are, so that Jim from The Office can run through a crowded "foreign" street while looking harried and holding a pistol pointed upwards, and all because of a "rogue black ops unit" run by a former agent–probably trained by one of the heroes–who was probably betrayed by their government, and now they’re one step ahead of the heroes (until the climax), using their skills and head full of secrets to exact revenge on their former government in the name of themselves and all the men and women that their former government left to die in some bush war on the other side of the planet, patriots all, betrayed by the very cause that they swore their swords to. The only difference in this film is that, for a decent chunk of the run time, Jack is a lot like Dante from Clerks: “I’m not even supposed to be here today!”

It's fair to say that this film, due to the fact of its basic existence, is a commentary on the legacy of “western” imperialism across the world. Yes, it's obviously somewhat inadvertantly done, and without any examination of the idea that the film's heroes (the ones who win in the end) are responsible for ensuring that legacy endures, but still... even if the film doesn't mean to say that at all, it definitely still says it, so there's that at least.

In the end, my biggest takeaway is, as a "realistic" espionage action film, Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan: Ghost War does not deliver. There's just something about the action and the spy stuff– the way they move, the way the action scenes are choreographed, the way they discuss things even–that really gives the feeling that this production did not actually hire any technical advisors at all, and instead they just watched a few Bourne movies, and maybe some 24. This film has all the basic trappings of the “realistic” spy genre, and is even peppered with some of the tropes from the more fun “nonsense” spy genre, but it lacks thought, heart, excitement, a good hook, or really, any intriguing characters. This is a dull film, the cinematic equivalent of pleated khakis, it's the Pete Hegseth of war movies, all bluster and blather and bullshit and wannabe posturing.

Pass.