I’m not one to jump on casting news as often as the rest, but by the sounds of it Paramount is doing right by Tom Clancy‘s novels and preparing to give the expansive world Clancy put on the page up on the big screen very much in the way Marvel has envisioned their Avengers franchise.
Things will kick off with a Jack Ryan origin story, the character previously played by the likes of Alec Baldwin (The Hunt for Red October) and Harrison Ford (Patriot Games), with Chris Pine (Star Trek) locked in the lead role and Kenneth Branagh attached to direct and co-star as the film’s villain. Ryan will begin the pic as a financial analyst living in Moscow who uncovers a terrorist plot.
Keira Knightly is currently the top contender for the lead female role and now we learn Kevin Costner will play William Harper, an American idealist who recruits and mentors both Ryan and John Kelly, the latter of whom becomes the CIA operative Clark by the end of Tom Clancy’s Without Remorse, which is currently set up at Paramount with Christopher McQuarrie (Jack Reacher) set to direct. Also now in the mix is Tom Hardy (The Dark Knight Rises), reportedly being sought to play the film’s villain.
Deadline brings the news and adds that after those two Costner could get his own feature as William Harper, being used very much in the same way as Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury in The Avengers, with his cameo performance in films such as Iron Man 2, Thor and Captain America until his breakout in Avengers and now what may potentially become his very own feature.
It’s a smart move considering Clancy’s novels have always been looked at as part of one big world and what better way to keep audiences invested in the sprawling nature of the storytelling than to add an additional layer of familiarity.
