This book is well written, but full of things that do not fit a spy story. There isn't even a spy in it, which really is frustrating when the description on the book is "espionage." There is an anarchist who commandeers the story even being a single threaded and dumbly written character.
This is a wild story. Something that I don't think would work these days with the cost of things now compared to even 10+ years ago. I also can't imagine have a friend group so strong that people fly each year to go play tag. Mainly because I have never lived anywhere long enough
Let's start with the acting/writing. I legit felt like I was the 90s of Mortal Kombat. They even call it out with "No one wants to see an old man doing karate poses" when that is all he does. There is even this over the top choreography moment between Johnny and Baraka that looks more like a dance
I think Milly Alcock does a great job in her role though. I don't have an issue with her role or how she plays it, but the writing was miserable. The amount of cliché, tag lines, one-liners that are way off the mark, and just lazy characters is kind of miserable.
I had never thought of Jake Gyllenhaal and Henry Cavill working together, but they were outstanding. They played their roles so well that it did feel like they had been doing movies together for a long time. They have great chemistry together in a brotherly fashion.
What I really found interesting was conversation about the legality of planning said assassinations. Between the code of military ethics, A.K.A. the Liber Code, and NATO's Article 51, the idea of self-defense, there is a lot of weird wiggle room that the CIA and DoD operated in.
With the weight of those moments, I do feel like it is glossed over with these comedic buddy comedy moments that have a much more prominent feature in the show. One that I am not sure was needed over and over again. It makes these moments that are supposed to be so important, brushed aside.
The parkour the changes from Assassin's Creed III, and Assassin's Creed Black Flag, and Assassin's Creed Rogue, which are all really based off the same system to unity is night and day different. You can move up and down with much more fluidity than you ever did
Alec Baldwin is an "ok" Jack Ryan. For sure not my favorite, but there could have been worse choices. I think for the time and how the character is written in the book, he does make a better choice for the studious and almost nerdy version we have from the book.
There are some stellar action and acting here. There is also some terrible acting. I am honestly really surprised by the limited amount of people who can say they enjoyed the movie, because people love high octane movies and this is one of them. At the same time, I can see the argument for it...
The story makes some weird decision. We have magic tricks that bring dead characters to life. There is people who have no business being part of a criminal/non-criminal spy group helping them with full knowledge of what is going on. There are also, so story beats that try and keep Paul W's character
This is at the end of season 3, and I have struggled to enjoy this show. For this season, episode 6 was so boring I stopped caring about the entire show. I wasn't interested in the last 2 episodes so I just waited for them to come out. Speaking to my friends, they have constantly been behind.