‘Jack Ryan’ Recap: ‘Inshallah’

Written by John Edward Betancourt 

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I have to admit, that I thought long and hard about how to start off this particular recap of Jack Ryan, because the season one finale of this magnificent series, ‘Inshallah’, outright left me at a loss for words. I mean seriously, season one came to a close, and the story faded to black and I just sat there in silence, in awe of everything I’d just experienced and well, it wasn’t the silence that threw me for a loop, it was the sheer rawness of this episode. Because there was no sense of a greater meaning here, or an attempt to pay homage to a particular spy series or story. This was just a rollercoaster ride of emotion, one that gave the audience everything it could ask for and more.
 
Which means, it’s best we dig into how exactly this particular tale managed to tug at the audience’s feels, because this episode turned out to be quite the master class when it comes to building tension. Because moment by moment you could feel the trouble building in this one and that all started once Mousa bin Suleiman and his son arrived on American soil because this signaled the beginning of a grand and slow reveal of his true master plan and all that we were able to assess early on is that he had a bigger attack planned, one that involved blowing Cesium into a public place so that people would perish in brutal fashion from radiation poisoning, further creating chaos and panic in our country.
 
But while a nuclear related attack within the borders of the United States of America is terrifying enough, the show was more than happy to take that kind of terror one step further, because I made mention of the fact that this was a slow burning scheme and we eventually came to learn that Mousa’s big plan was to fire off the Cesium into the ventilation system of Washington Memorial Hospital, where the President was under observation for the Ebola scare and well, if Suleiman was successful in his mission, all kinds of chaos and panic would ensue. But thankfully, Jack figured out the plan and we were treated one tense sequence of events in the hospital as everyone worked to capture their man.
 
Unfortunately, however, Mousa was able to escape, and in order to keep the good fight alive, he abandoned his son, and the fear and panic in the young man’s eyes helped lead Jack to Suleiman’s location and this led to the most heart pounding sequence of the episode. Because it was truly a race against time to stop Mousa before he was within range of a functional cellular tower, wherein he could detonate the Cesium and still wreak havoc. But Jack stayed hot on Suleiman’s trail and the instant he lost sight of the madman, a quick reminder of how important Samir is to Mousa, helped Jack zero in and put the man down for good, making the Jack the hero we’ve been waiting for him to become.
 
So yeah, woo. This one outright took my breath away and I give the writer’s room serious credit for giving us a fast-paced episode that nearly gave me a heart attack and wrapped everything up in a neat little bow and well, when all is said and done, what a phenomenal first season for this series. It was just, powerful and magnificent and I loved the shout out to The Sum of All Fears in this one with the nuclear subtext and it would seem the sky is the limit for Jack Ryan related adaptations down the line. After all, Greer going to Russia and offering Jack a ticket implies he may meet one Marko Ramius, leading us to a remake of The Hunt for Red October and I’ve already heard talk that next season takes place in South America meaning we may be seeing a new iteration of Clear and Present Danger. Either way, I am one hundred percent sold on this series, and I’m ready for more and I’ll be counting down the minutes to season two. Until next year.  

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