Franco as Jack Ryan?

Sam Raimi is working to get the Jack Ryan franchise off the ground and relaunched but replacing Harrison Ford, Alec Baldwin and Ben Affleck is proving difficult (OK, replacing Affleck shouldn’t be too hard). CHUD has some interesting scoop on who Raimi wants, who Sony doesn’t want and what it might mean for the franchise.

They report that Raimi wants to cast his SPIDER-MAN star James Franco as Jack Ryan but the Paramount execs aren’t ready yet to hand over a big franchise like this to Franco. This is reportedly causing a major rift between Raimi and Paramount and may wind up causing the director to walk off the project. Personally I think Franco’s a great choice for an action star if someone would give him the chance. He’d need to bulk up a bit I suppose but if Matt Damon (Matt Damon!) can become one of the biggest action stars courtesy the BOURNE franchise, why not Franco? All interesting things to keep an eye on…