Diksha Sundriyal
Prime Video’s ‘Jack Ryan’ returns with its fourth and final season to send the titular character on his most dangerous mission yet. In previous cases, Ryan and the CIA were up against foreign powers aiming to destroy the country and disbalance the delicate nature of peace in the world. This time, however, the threat is much closer to home as Ryan discovers that some people have used the agency to do shady things. As he and Elizabeth Wright work to rehabilitate the CIA’s image, they have to clean up the mess left behind by their predecessor. By the end of the second episode, it becomes clear that the corruption in the agency is more strongly rooted than they’d imagined. Here’s what the ending means. SPOILERS AHEAD
Jack Ryan Season 4 Episode 1 and 2 Recap
President Udoh of Nigeria is assassinated, and the evidence links it to the CIA. When asked about the agency’s involvement in the assassination, Wright and Ryan confess they cannot be sure whether it was them. Looking into the missions that were greenlit in former director Thomas Miller’s time, Ryan discovers that at least nine operations exist on paper, but there is nothing official about them. Their records are highly encrypted and coded under the system that only Miller understands.
With no idea what these missions are supposed to do, Ryan decides to shut them all down. Meanwhile, Domingo Chavez assassinates the head of a rival cartel, giving the Marquez cartel a monopoly in Mexico. This is a huge step for the cartel that is set to enter into business with the Silver Lotus Triad. The plan is for the Triad to supply raw goods and other stuff to the cartel, which will use to manufacture drugs. This collaboration gives the triad access to the cartel’s transport routes in America, leaving the country open for terrorist attacks.
Unbeknownst to Ryan, the assassination of the Nigerian president was a part of the plan to consolidate the trade routes between the Triad and the cartel. With the CIA receiving flak for the assassination it can neither confirm nor deny its involvement in, Ryan and Wright try to convince the Senate that under their watchful eye, the agency will go through a series of reforms that will bring more answerability to the agency and less secrecy regarding the shady operations. While his professional life gets more turbulent by the minute, Ryan seems to be doing much better on personal accounts, especially now that he and Cathy are back together.
Jack Ryan Season 4 Episode 2 Ending: Who Killed Thomas Miller?
Taking charge of the CIA as director and deputy director, the most pressing concern for Wright and Ryan is cleaning up the mess Miller left behind. They discover that Miller had greenlit several operations he handled himself, but there was no clear record. Ryan and Greer tried deciphering the code Miller used but couldn’t make heads or tails of it. So, Ryan decides to shut down all such operations. This is when he meets Chavez.
A black ops operative, Chavez had been working undercover with the Mexican cartel. He had been on other missions before, almost all of whom included him assassinating someone. He thought he was helping the country by taking out the people who posed a threat to it, but then, he discovers that he and his team have been used as pawns in a much bigger game, and Thomas Miller, the former director of the CIA, is a link to that.
When Ryan cuts off the funding to Pluto, Chavez asks him to restart the project because too much is at stake here. By now, Chavez already knows he has been duped into believing he was doing the right thing for his country. However, he is in too deep with the cartel now, and he cannot leave just when he has discovered that the collaboration between the Triad and the cartel means much more than just drug trafficking. To get to the bottom of the truth, he needs Project Pluto to continue as it was.
Ryan knew that Miller had been involved in something illegal. Still, he never could have guessed that the former director was working with criminal organizations to foster the very threats they were supposed to protect. The meeting with Chavez confirms that Pluto needs to be resurrected, but a key part is getting Miller to turn. Ryan plans to get through to Miller and have him work for the CIA as an informant for his employers. He is the only one who knows enough about the mission to clear the picture and bring all perpetrators to the fore. This is why he is killed.
Threatened by Chavez, Miller meets Ryan but realizes he has made a mistake. When Ryan points out that they might be being watched, it dawns upon Miller that his employers will know about this meeting. He had already alerted Bill Tuttle, who oversees the project on behalf of the people orchestrating the whole thing. He thinks Tuttle will go after Ryan but later realizes that he is the disposable factor. Had Ryan been just another CIA operative, Tuttle would probably have killed him. However, he is now the agency’s deputy director, too high up the ladder and high profile to assassinate.
Tuttle and his employers will find another way to restart Pluto, but to ensure that things go as they were supposed to, they have eliminated anything that might threaten them. Knowing that Miller has already been made, they cannot risk the CIA arresting him and making him spill everything about Pluto and eight other projects he secretly worked on as the director of the CIA. So, Tuttle targets Miller and kills him before he can even think about telling anyone who is the real orchestrator, Pluto.
Now that Miller is dead, Chavez knows he will be targeted next. Miller’s death means whoever is in charge has decided to clean the entire thing, which means getting rid of anyone attached to the project. With Miller gone, Chavez is the only one from the CIA who knows about Pluto. The rest of his team is dead, and Tuttle knows how deadly an operative Chavez is. Not only does he have the skills to come after the people who put him on this shady path, but he also has enough information about Pluto and the deal between the Triad and the cartel to unravel the whole thing.
Read More: Do Jack and Cathy End Up Together?
