Rainbow Six

Ryan Reynolds may be busy manifesting further greatness over at Fox with Atomic Blonde helmer David Leitch’s upcoming Marvel sequel, Deadpool 2. However, if all goes as planned, he may soon find himself at the center of another franchise by way of Paramount with screenwriter Akiva Goldsman making some more moves this week with his Weed Road production banner.

The word is he now has a two-year first look deal at the studio with a raft of items to possibly work on, including an adaptation of Rainbow Six, late author Tom Clancy’s 1998 publication centered on John Clark, the ex-Navy SEAL character who has apprared in at least two live-action films inspired by Clancy’s Jack Ryan novels. Reportedly with Ryan’s pivot to Amazon by way of actor John Krasinski’s upcoming TV series in the Ryan character comes potential in a new action hero franchise for Paramount.

A partial description of the novel reads as follows from the official Tom Clancy website:

Newly named the head of an international task force dedicated to combating terrorism, Clark is looking forward to getting his teeth into a new mission, but the opportunities start coming thicker and faster than anyone could have expected: an incident at a Swiss bank, the kidnapping of an international trader in Germany, a terrible raid on an amusement park in Spain. 

Each episode seems separate, discrete, yet the timing disturbs Clark.  Is there a connection?  Is he being tested?  With the help of his close associates, executive officer Alistair Stanley and strike team leaders Domingo Chavez and Peter Covington, Clark tries to figure out where all this activity is heading, but there is no way to predict the real threat: a group of terrorists like none the world has ever encountered, a band of men and women so extreme that their success could literally mean the end of life on this earth as we know it.

Beverly Andre Nemec and Josh Applebaum are penning the script with Goldsman to produce should current loose discussions between all parties solidify, and with a possible follow-up in John Clark origin adaptation, Without Remorse at that. Goldsman is also in the mix to direct Deadpool creator Rob Liefeld’s comic creation, Avengelyne, in addition to hatching a writers’ room to advance the Ologies YA novel series for Paramount after the IP fell through from Universal prior to beating out Fox for the rights, and leading development on several genre films budgeted from five-to-ten million dollars.

Reynolds’s next return to the big screen will be with actor Samuel L. Jackson in The Hitman’s Bodyguard on August 25 from Lionsgate. (Deadline)

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