Just like John Krasinski, Chris Pratt is now getting his own political thriller on Amazon
Aux Features TV
If you ever want to star in an action-packed political thriller show on Amazon, just play a funny guy on an NBC sitcom for nine years ago. It worked for John Krasinski, who went from being Jim from The Office to being Jack Ryan from Jack Ryan, and now it’s working for Chris Pratt. He was Andy on Parks And Recreation, and now he’s going to be James Reece on The Terminal List, an adaptation of Jack Carr’s book of the same name that was just picked up by Amazon (via Deadline). The series will be directed by Antoine Fuqua, who previously worked with Pratt on his remake of The Magnificent Seven, and it will be written by Strange Angel’s David DiGilio.
The Terminal List is about a Navy SEAL (Pratt’s James Reece) whose entire platoon is killed in an ambush during a “high-stakes covert mission.” He makes it home, though, with “conflicting memories of the event and questions about his culpability.” Naturally, he eventually finds some kind of big conspiracy, with “dark forces working against him.” Deadline says half of the show’s writers will either be veterans or family members of veterans to help with the authenticity of its story about a man returning from combat, with all of this making it pretty clear that this is going to be a straight dramatic role just like Krasinski’s Jack Ryan.
Now, who will be the next NBC sitcom star to get an Amazon political thriller? Tracy Morgan? Gillian Jacobs? David Schwimmer? We’d watch the hell out of a show where Ross from Friends is a government agent who gets wrapped up in some big plot to destroy the country. (Not really, but it’s fun to pretend sometimes.)
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“dark forces working against him.” Spoiler alert: it’s the gay agenda.
While I would despise a show that tried to dramatize what hordes of right wingers seem to fantasize about finding and confronting (Clearly, confronting their own sexuality will never be on the agenda), at least it would more sincerely reflect what the show’s creators and Pratt likely believe than what will inevitably be filmed. What we’re likely to actually see is going to be something both ludicrous and vague in its political sensibilities. At best, there will be attempts to take away “freedom” and “liberty” somehow.
Judging from reviews of the first novel by Amazon users, the series is chock full of right-wing political propaganda and liberal bashing. (The author even thanks Wayne LaPierre in his acknowledgments.) I’m curious to know if the makers of the show water this down considerably for mainstream audiences, but I probably won’t be watching to find out.BTW, why is it so difficult to find political action thrillers that aren’t written by RWNJs?
Chris Pratt just keeps getting sexier. When he reaches critical mass we’re in trouble. – Tifa Lockheart, Midgar, United Kingdom, 2 hours ago
I might as well be the first one to say it: Burt Macklin, Navy SEAL!
In a perfect world, I’d watch that twice right now.
If this was that I’d consider watching it. If Aubrey “Janet Snakehole” was his nemisis I would definitely watch this.
We could only hope for something this awesome. That Chris Pratt was a riot. This new one is going to run for office. We don’t need that.
Make Andy Fat Again!
Girthy might work better.
Zachary Levi.
It can’t be worse than the Jack Ryan series which is embarrassingly awful , despite some great actors.
I like Pratt a lot but I can’t take him seriously in a role like this.
The first time I saw David Schwimmer was before Friends. He did a heavy dramatic arc on NYPD Blue, and he was really good.
“Pivot! Pivot!” ~ Josh ‘4B’ Goldstein (David Schwimmer), NYPD Blue (1993)
Sigh. No. Can we just get the real Michael Schur male superstar we want in an action role? Jim O’Heir? Jerry Fucking Gergich as a TV Jack Reacher?
We all know William Jackson Harper is ripped enough to be an action star.
Very fair. TBH, William Jackson Harper has me questioning my sexuality in an Eleanor-Tahani way. (William Jackson Harper’s body with Tahani’s head? Or vice versa?)
I would also watch Terry Crews before Pratt or Krasinski, in an action role.
“Terry loves action roles!” ~ Terry (Terry), Terryn Nine-Nine
Brooklyn Terry-Terry.
But for how long? The man loves his chili and Peeps.
CSI: Mose
Or NCIS:Muncie
Looking for a good laugh? Pop over to Amazon and look at the book’s, ahem, ”Editorial Reviews.”
I might just do that. The title “The Terminal List” was my first clue that we might not be dealing with a classic here.
Title sounds like something James Patterson would use if he ever decided to start ripping off Michael Crichton.
You mean James Patterson’s army of ghost writers.
Speaking of literal ghost writers, Crichton’s estate is apparently collaborating with authors to finish half written/just plotted out novels that were on his computer when he died. Richard Preston finished up one such novel “Micro” (about miniaturizing people). It was kind of crap (think “Timeline” rather than “Jurassic Park”), but I don’t know if Preston or Crichton was more to blame.
Seeing as how no part of ‘Micro’ was good, I’d say they’re both to blame.
You mean James Patterson’s army of ghost typists.
It sounds like one of those fake movies on Seinfeld.
To be fair, the Jack Ryan show had only a nodding acquaintance with Clancy’s books, so that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
“THE TERMINAL LIST is a thrill from start to finish! Let’s all hope this is the first of many from Jack Carr.” — Chris Cox, NRA-ILA Executive Director
Oh god, more right-wing propaganda. Chris Pratt has again proved himself to be the worst of the Chrises
You needed that review to know it was more right-wing propoganda?
“David Schwimmer? We’d watch the hell out of a show where Ross from Friends is a government agent who gets wrapped up in some big plot to destroy the country.”“No sooner is the treaty between our two countries suspended than the US opens secret negotiations with our neighbours!”“WE WERE ON A BREAK!”
can’t wait for the lovable CIA officer to beg chris pratt to come out of retirement to please assassinate a depraved and bestial south american warlord who has the vile temerity to nationalize his country’s lithium mines and not allow american enterprise to pillage the entire global south with impunity. you know, if jack ryan is anything to go by
“You son of a bitch…! I’m in.”
I liked him as a SEAL in Zero Dark Thirty, he was the only person in the entire film to make Maya smile.
If the sequel is called “the Man With 5000 Candles in the Wind,” I’m in
Please God no. Why do you keep punishing us. Who wants to see this prat in anything?
“We’d watch the hell out of a show where Ross from Friends is a government agent who gets wrapped up in some big plot to destroy the country.”Homecoming! The original podcast had him in the Bobby Cannavale (from the TV adaptation) role, and he killed it.
Chris Pratt in a political thriller to me means he plays a character who has trouble figuring out how a voting booth works.
No, that was Bobby Newport, remember? He somehow got ink on his hands in a punch card voting booth while trying to vote for Leslie.Really wish YouTube had the clip. Damn you, proprietary rights!
Krasinski and Pratt are both closet Republicans. Krasinski is subtle with it, but Pratt married Clint Eastwood’s dauthter and found Jesus.
Krasinski has hosted fundraisers for Elizabeth Warren so I’m not sure.Pratt on the other hand has gone full-on douche canoe.
Krasinski also made A Quiet Place. Easily the most pro-abortion movie I’ve ever seen.
I read the script and Pratt ends each scene getting on his knees to pray.
Considering that Krasinski’s Jack Ryan had us believe that the major threat to America was Venezuela, what will Pratt’s show suggest? That we are under threat by Angola?
It’s even funnier that a bunch of Americans just launched a failed coup in Venezuela a few weeks ago.
I just can’t get over the line in that Jack Ryan trailer where Jim Halpert says in a gravelly voice: “A nuclear-armed Venezuela….it follows a pattern.” Literal spit-take every time.
Gillian Jacobs? She’d get into a dangerous situation, but she’d just Britta it. Yvette Nicole Brown, though…she’d kick some ASSHowever, maybe Joel McHale in a Rockford reboot?
Was it a mission to recover the president’s rubies?
Were this going to be a series that honestly follows the adjustment process of a veteran and those in his orbit. If we must involve conspiracies(!), considering the mindset of someone who may feel conflicted about his place in a country in which certain forces may have betrayed him could still be interesting (The Punisher sometimes succeeded in this vein).However, I’m guessing this will be more of the bad-ass but honorable SEAL warrior kills lots of interchangeable enemies who are part of a nefarious, yet generically non-partisan plot to … hmmm, does it matter anymore? Honestly, I liked the first season of Jack Ryan, and looked forward to the second. Unfortunately, the second season substitutes most of the virtues of the first for implausible politics, shaky acting, absurd character motivations, morally unsupportable actions by the protagonists and bloated action sequences with little tension.
“We’d watch the hell out of a show where Ross from Friends is a government agent who gets wrapped up in some big plot to destroy the country.”I would watch that, but only if it’s Ross from Friends, not just David Schwimmer playing someone else.
We need an action-vehicle name bracket. Tyler Rake vs James Reece – who ya got?