Diksha Sundriyal
Prime Video’s ‘Jack Ryan’ is a spy thriller series that takes its titular character on missions across the globe. As a CIA agent, he is stationed in other countries, ensuring that no nefarious powers succeed in their evil plans to take over or destroy the world. In the fourth season, Ryan comes back home and is now working as the deputy director of the CIA. This promotion comes with its fair share of challenges, as Ryan gets caught up in a mission that makes him reconsider everything he thought he knew about the agency he worked for. However, spending more time in Washington, DC, also allows him to reconnect with his old flame, Cathy Mueller. Will they end up together? Let’s find out. SPOILERS AHEAD
Jack and Cathy’s Journey Back Together
Jack Ryan and Cathy Mueller met in the first season, and their romance developed quickly. The show is based on the characters created by Tom Clancy, and in his Ryanverse, Jack and Cathy get married, have children, and live happily ever after. The events of the first season of ‘Jack Ryan’ made it look like we would see a similar progression in their story. However, as an utter surprise to everyone, there was no sign of Cathy in the second or third season.
Considering that Ryan spent most of his time outside of America in the missions in the second and third seasons, Cathy’s absence made sense. However, the weird thing is that the show never acknowledged it. Jack, or any other character, didn’t even mention Cathy, and the audience never received closure about what might have happened between them. It was clear that they had broken up because, in the second season, Jack has a brief romantic encounter. However, the story behind his and Cathy’s separation is never touched upon.
Cathy reappears in the fourth and final season of the show, just as suddenly as she had disappeared after the first season. With only six episodes to wrap up the story, there was no point in going back to the basics of a relationship and having Jack and Cathy rebuild everything from scratch. Instead, in the first episode of Season 4, we discover that whatever differences had led to their break up have been resolved, and Cathy are Jack are back together.
The breakup is mentioned in passing when James Greer visits Jack and finds Cathy at his place. He is surprised to see her and wonders when they got back together because he thought they’d broken up. Jack and Cathy laugh it off, and Cathy said that Jack practically begged her to come back. It may or may not have gone down like that, but we can imagine how their reunion might’ve come about. With Jack becoming the deputy director of the CIA, he will no longer be going on any missions that will keep him away from home.
We can assume that his stationing in foreign countries and the pressure of a long-distance relationship might have been the reason behind the breakup. Now that Jack will spend most of his time at home, things are much more straightforward. He and Cathy might have run into each other at some point and reignited the flame, which never really went out. From how things are between them in Season 4, it looks like they are way past the initial stages of getting back together.
Talking about her return for ‘Jack Ryan’ Season 4 and what it spells for Jack and Cathy, actress Abbie Cornish said: “They kind of leveled up; they’re like level four. Because in season one, they never really got past level one, in a way. And we come in, and they’re just like, ‘Yeah, we’re doing this, we’re together,’ and they’re there.” Cornish added that there is a lot left to work on in their relationship, but they are together for good now.
Jack and Cathy’s reunion aligns the TV show with Jack’s arc in the books, where he ends up marrying Cathy. This happens when he turns more towards the political side of his job, eventually climbing the ladder to become the President of the USA. We find him in a similar place in the fourth season, which explains why the writers chose this as the apt time to bring back Cathy and get her and Jack back together.
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