Jason Bourne
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Jason Bourne is a fictional character in a series of novels by Robert Ludlum and later Eric Van Lustbader, who picks up where Ludlum left off. He first appeared in The Bourne Identity (1980). This novel was adapted for both television in 1988 and a film by the same name in 2002 – see The Bourne Identity (film). The character, currently, has since been in three more novels and one other film.
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[edit] Novels
- Real Name: David Webb
- Aliases: Delta One, Jason Bourne, Cain, John Michael Kane, Charles Briggs, George P. Washburn, Mr. Cruett (Supremacy)
Jason Bourne has a long and mysterious past which continues to torture him throughout his lifetime. His real name is David Webb, a career foreign service officer and a specialist in Far Eastern affairs. Before the events in Identity, Webb had a wife named Dao and two children named Joshua and Alyssa in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. During the Vietnam War, an aircraft strayed into Cambodia dropping two bombs and strafed a spot near the Mekong River, unintentionally killing Webb's wife and two children. Due to Cambodia's neutrality in the war, every nation disclaimed the plane, since no one wanted to be responsible for the incident. Having nothing left, Webb went to Saigon and trained for a special, top secret unit called Medusa (many years later the unit and its actions would still remain top secret.) At this point, Webb was known as Delta, his codename within the unit.
[edit] Medusa
The top secret and government-funded project codenamed Medusa is a vital part of David Webb's life. Taking place during the Vietnam War, Webb was recruited into Medusa by friend and CIA agent, Alexander Conklin, after the death of Webb's wife and children. At the time, Webb was furious and wanted revenge in any possible capacity. By joining Medusa, he felt he was seeking revenge against the people that presumably killed his wife and children, the North Vietnamese. Since no nation took responsibility for the bombings in Cambodia (and the Americans were not supposed to be there), whoever was responsible remains a mystery. The reason why Medusa remains top-secret is because many of the members of Medusa were criminals hired by the American government during the war to do its dirty work: to infiltrate parts of Northern Vietnam and kill suspected members of the Viet Cong. In addition, they also murdered village chiefs that were suspected to be in collaboration with the Viet Cong and aided in rescuing POWs wherever they could. They were considered an assassination team or a death squad. For doing this, each member would be taken care of by the United States.
Most of the members were murderers, fugitives, smugglers, arms dealers, or drug lords being led by Delta. Delta became well known as a ruthless person, with little regard for orders, but succeeding in all his missions. To get to Delta, his brother, Gordon Webb, was kidnapped.
One member of Medusa was a man by the name of Jason Charles Bourne. During the mission to save Gordon Webb, it was found out that Jason Bourne was a double agent born in Australia. Bourne was into all sorts of illegal activity including slavery, narcotics, smuggling, and assassinations. With this knowledge, Delta executed Bourne in Tam Quan while he (Bourne) was busy exposing the rescue operation. Due to the American government not wanting to acknowledge the existence of Medusa or its members, they never reported the death of Bourne, but rather listed his status as MIA.
[edit] Treadstone 71
Years later, a black ops arm of the CIA was formed called TreadstoneA 71 -- named after a building on New York's Seventy-first Street -- and Webb was called up by the creator of Treadstone and the creator of Medusa - David Abott (nicknamed The Monk, short for The Silent Monk of Covert Operations). At this point, Webb (Delta) takes the identity of Jason Bourne due to his status as MIA in the war and the fact that Bourne was in reality a ruthless killer that had a long criminal record. The point of all this was to turn Jason Bourne into something more than he really was, into a contract assassin who would be known all over the world for terminating the lives of just about anyone. The assassin's nickname was Cain. The reasoning for creating such a fallacy was to create a competition for a well-known assassin named Carlos or Carlos the Jackal, who up until then was the world's best and most famous assassin. The name Cain was chosen because it had some significance for what he was doing. During Vietnam, Cain was used instead of Charlie in the aviation alphabet (Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot...) because Charlie became synonymous with Vietcong. So Delta dropped back one letter to Cain which stood for Charlie, which in Spanish (Carlos was Venezuelan) is Carlos. The myth of Cain was created by having him take credit for any well-publicized killings that took place in Asia (and later Europe) regardless of the circumstances. By creating Cain, it would drive Carlos out in the open where Cain could kill Carlos and take his place. To add insult to Carlos' name, Cain stole the credit for Carlos' kills, even if Cain had no part. One was the killing of an American diplomat, Howard Leland. Unfortunately, Cain was unsuccessful and ended up shot a few times (once in the head) and left for dead in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. Luckily, he would later be recovered by a fishing boat only to awake as an amnesiac.
[edit] Identity
For the plot of the novel see The Bourne Identity.
Throughout the novel Bourne fights to learn about his past and his true identity while being chased by both the CIA and Carlos' henchmen. During the novel, at a hotel, Bourne takes a young woman hostage to escape. This woman, named Marie St. Jacques, as it turns out is an employee of the Canadian government. Bourne and Marie start discovering the identity of Jason Bourne, the contract assassin. The true identity of David Webb is known only to those at Treadstone. She is convinced that the man she knows as Jason Bourne cannot be the ruthless killer that all discoveries they make seem to imply. It is due to Marie that Jason continues to search for his true identity and in the end finds the truth. Through this time, Bourne continually has the phrase "Cain is for Charlie, and Delta is for Cain" flash through his mind, propelling him in the direction of his mission. Charlie refers to Carlos in Spanish and Bourne (Cain) is to replace him.
Between the books Identity and Supremacy, Bourne marries Marie and they both settle down (although under guard) in a small town in Maine. David Webb would go on to become an associate professor in Asian studies at a local university.
[edit] Supremacy
For the plot of the novel, see The Bourne Supremacy.
When Supremacy starts, Marie is taken captive by the United States government in an attempt to turn David Webb back into his former self, the mythical Jason Bourne. While in reality it was the U.S. government who took Marie captive, they pinned the blame on a fictitious powerful Chinese businessman. This scheme was done to make Bourne go after a faux Jason Bourne that had been credited with a Far East political assassination that could, in a worst case scenario, cause a civil war in China over the ownership of Hong Kong.
[edit] Ultimatum
For the plot of the novel see The Bourne Ultimatum.
As Carlos the Jackal enters old age and his infamy fades, he decides that he will do two things before he dies: the first is to kill Jason Bourne. Webb's family is forced to hide in the Caribbean while Webb himself works with old friend and CIA agent Alex Conklin to hunt down and kill the Jackal first. Webb poses as an important member of Medusa, now a nearly omnipotent economic force that controls the commander of NATO, leading figures in the Defense Department, and large NYSE firms. The plan is to use Medusa's resources to contact the Jackal. Webb just misses the Jackal several times, including when the Jackal locates Webb's family in the Caribbean, before Webb stages his own death and convinces the Jackal that he has succeeded. Following this, the Jackal turns to his second goal -- to destroy the KGB facility of Novgorod, where the Jackal was trained and later turned away (His files with his real Identity were still stored there). Webb tracks the Jackal down with the help of Conklin and a KGB agent as the Jackal begins destroying the KGB compound. In a final confrontation, Webb at last kills the Jackal and returns to his family.
[edit] Television movie
In 1988 a two-part made-for-television movie of The Bourne Identity aired on ABC. It starred Richard Chamberlain in the role of Jason Bourne and Jaclyn Smith as Marie St. Jacques. The TV movie was largely faithful to Robert Ludlum's novel.
[edit] Films
In the films, the character of Jason Bourne (played by Matt Damon) is a much more simplified character as opposed to the one portrayed in the novels. He was a CIA assassin working on a job when he had a sudden attack of conscience, failed his mission, and was shot multiple times in the back attempting to escape. Similar to the novel, he was left for dead in the Mediterranean Sea and woke up with no memory. Near the end of The Bourne Supremacy, Bourne learns that his real name is actually David Webb and that he was born 1971-04-15 in Nixa, Missouri. In the films, he speaks fluent French, Russian, Dutch, German, Italian, and English rather than French and "Eastern dialects", as in the novels. However, the movies make no mention of Carlos the Jackal, most Bourne fans regret this fact - the real Carlos was in prison by the time the films were made.
| Jason Bourne | |
|---|---|
| Robert Ludlum novels: | The Bourne Identity (1980) | The Bourne Supremacy (1986) | The Bourne Ultimatum (1990) |
| Eric Van Lustbader novels: | The Bourne Legacy (2004) | The Bourne Betrayal (2007) |
| 20th century films: | The Bourne Identity (1988) |
| 21st century films: | The Bourne Identity (2002) | The Bourne Supremacy (2004) | The Bourne Ultimatum (2007) |
