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Movie trailer: Jack Ryan: Shadow RecruitMovie trailer: Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit
Weird that this trailer should emerge just after news of author Tom Clancy's death emerges.
The Jack Ryan character first came to life in Clancy's debut novel, The Hunt for Red October, a cracking thriller which led to a better-than-average movie. Since then the connection between Clancy's best-selling books and the movies they spawned has become gradually looser, and now we get what looks like a cliche-riddled, by-the-numbers Hollywood spy actioner which claims only to be 'based on the characters' Clancy created. There's barely a hint of the geo-political and military-strategic themes Clancy focused on, and which his readers seemed to love.
Clancy was never a great writer, but he took world politics and military strategy seriously, and audiences responded. A shame Hollywood has not followed.
Sam Roggeveen
About the author
Sam Roggeveen
Sam Roggeveen is Program Director of the Lowy Institute’s International Security Program. He is the author of The Echidna Strategy: Australia's Search for Power and Peace (Opens in new window), published by La Trobe University Press in 2023.