Paramount has yet to make any official statement on the casting, but according to Variety, Branagh is definitely in talks.  Assuming those talks go smoothly, Branagh will collect two paychecks for directing and playing the bad guy, a Russian whose nefarious and topical scheme involves devaluing the dollar to the point of worthlessness and destroying the American economy.

This original story finds Ryan, a former Marine discharged after a horrific helicopter accident, working as a financial analyst in Moscow.  When he discovers that his boss is plotting to bring down the U.S. economic via a terrorist attack and various machinations, he must race against time in his usual fashion to stop the scheme, saving the global economy and his wife.

Branagh, who was nominated for an Oscar this year for his performance as Laurence Olivier in My Week With Marilyn, has directed himself a number of times.  The noted Shakespearean did so with Hamlet, Henry V, Love's Labour's Lost, and that turgid Frankenstein movie in which he and Robert De Niro rolled around in amniotic fluid for an excruciatingly long time.  After delivering a blockbuster with Thor last year, Branagh found himself in demand as a director of big summer entertainments, and though he's producing the sequel, he opted not to return to helm Thor: The Dark World.

In March, we learned that he was in talks with Paramount to take over Jack Ryan, which the reboot will most certainly not be titled when it reaches theaters.  Frequent Lost director Jack Bender was attached to the project for a long time, going back to the time when Paramount planned to shoot the action-thriller before Pine went to work on the Star Trek sequel for J.J. Abrams.  As development continued on Jack Ryan, though, Bender eventually departed.

The new take on Clancy's famous protagonist has seen a number of screenwriters come and go, as well.  Hossein Amini of Drive and Snow White and the Huntsman was first, then the studio hired Adam Cozad to retrofit his original script Dubai into a Jack Ryan origin tale.  After Anthony Peckham then did some rewrites, Steve Zaillian was hired to overhaul the screenplay, but the busy Oscar-winner exited Jack Ryan before contributing significantly.

This will actually be the second time that Paramount will attempt to completely reboot the franchise with a younger, less experienced Ryan.  A decade ago, Ben Affleck played the character in The Sum of All Fears, which didn't lead to hoped-for sequels.  Ryan made his cinematic debut in 1990's The Hunt for Red October, where he was played by Alec Baldwin.  In 1992 and 1994's Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger, however, Ryan was portrayed by Harrison Ford.

Now it's Chris Pine's turn, and he'll be facing off against Kenneth Branagh, it seems.