'Jack Ryan' season 2: Wendell Pierce's preview hints at plot being based on the book 'Clear and Present Danger'
Ahead of 'Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan' season 2's release, Wendell Pierce, who plays Jim Greer, one of the integral characters in the series, previewed the storyline for the upcoming installment. This hint all but confirms that the plot is loosely borrowed from Clancy's bestseller, 'Clear and Present Danger'. The book shows Ryan going on to become acting Deputy Director of Intelligence in the CIA, and discovers that he is being kept in the dark by his colleagues who are conducting a covert war against a drug cartel based in Colombia.
From what we know so far after two trailers, CIA analyst Jack Ryan (John Krasinski) heads to Venezuela to investigate illegal arms sales. While Russia was teased in the final few minutes of season one, the new installment has all the action happening in Columbia, a direct reference to the events that take place in the book. "There's a synergy of what we're both working on, where the two storylines come together," Pierce hinted, according to TV Insider.
Further supplementing this theory was the series' executive producer Brad Fuller. "Jack and Greer assist each other and discover a network of people who don't have [America's] best interests at heart." Venezuela's President Nicolás Reyes (Jordi Molla) might be among them. "He's not beloved by his own people and not totally honest about what he's trying to accomplish," Fuller said.
Season 2 also sees new characters in Caracas' CIA station chief Mike November (Michael Kelly) — "a by-the-book guy," notes Fuller — and German undercover agent Harriet "Harry" Baumann (Noomi Rapace). "We'll [slowly] find out who she is and how she gets involved," said Pierce.
Kelly's November is a relatively new character not seen in the '94 Harrison Ford starrer 'Clear and Present Danger', the spy thriller based on Clancy's novel of the same name. However, we can expect some twists added to the series even if the larger picture in the plot borrowed from the novel.
Season 2's official logline reads: "After tracking a potentially suspicious shipment of illegal arms in the Venezuelan jungle, CIA Officer Jack Ryan heads down to South America to investigate. As Jack’s investigation threatens to uncover a far-reaching conspiracy, the President of Venezuela launches a counter-attack that hits home for Jack, leading him and his fellow operatives on a global mission spanning the United States, U.K., Russia and Venezuela to unravel the President’s nefarious plot and bring stability to a country on the brink of chaos."
'Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan' Season 2 will premiere November 1 on Amazon Prime Video.