About Jack
Category: Character Info

Jack is the protagonist of Bioshock. He is a young man who, prior to his unwilling arrival in Rapture, was a passenger on an airplane  that crashed near the lighthouse that provided entry to the underwater city. During his journey through Rapture, Jack comes across a number of gene-altering substances, known as Plasmids, that he uses to empower and protect himself. According to the passport he used to board the plane, his full name is Jack Wynand and he is twenty-four years old.
 

Jack is the illegitimate son of Andrew Ryan and Jasmine Jolene, Ryan's lover. While pregnant, Jolene suffered some financial difficulties and decided to sell Jack, as an embryo, to Dr Brigid Tenebaum on behalf of Frank Fontaine, without consulting Ryan. Jack was to be Fontaine's back-up plan if he was ever forced into an unfavorable situation by Ryan, which happened during Rapture's Civil War.

Jack was "born" and "grown" by the scientists of Fontaine Futuristics, including Dr,Yi Suchong and Brigid Tenenbaum. According to Audio Diaries by Dr. Yi Suchong, who was responsible for Jack's development, Jack, by the age of one, weighed fifty-eight pounds and had the "gross musculature of a fit nineteen-year-old", thanks toLot 111  Dr. Suchong also reveals in another Audio Diary that he was responsible for the mind control imprinting that Frank Fontaine requested.

Jack's similar genetic structure to Andrew Ryan meant that he would be able to use the city's bathyspheres that were in lockdown, be resurrected at Vita-Chambers, and the Automated sercurity  of Rapture would not be as effective against him.

Sometime in 1958, before Fontaine faked his own death in a shoot out with Chief Security Sullivan's  forces, Jack was smuggled out of Rapture in a bathysphere and sent to the surface as a sleeper agent, living out his pre-programmed life as Jack Wynand where he had memories of being born in 1936 and living on a farm in Overlook, Kansas with his "parents". Jack boarded a plane in 1960 supposedly visiting his cousins in England. However Frank Fontaine "activated" him using the trigger phrase "Would You Kindly", when the plane passed near Rapture's location in the North Atlantic, Jack hijacked it using a gun that was smuggled onto the plane in the form of a present gifted from home, forcing it to crash land at the coordinates of the Lighthouse, the main entrance to Rapture.

Bioshock

During the events of BioShock Jack arrives in Rapture in a Bathysphere taken from the lighthouse on the surface. In the beginning, he explores the different areas of Rapture under the guidance of Atlas, who speaks to him through a short wave radio. Jack's main objective, at first, is to find a functional bathysphere that will return him to the surface. Atlas promises to help him if in return Jack will save his trapped family in Neptunes Bounty . This proves to be more difficult than it seemed at first, as Andrew Ryan notices the intrusion and cuts off access to Neptune, keeping close tabs on Jack and setting Security Devices and Splicers on him from then on. Jack is forced to detour through Medical Pavilion, encountering the deranged cosmetic surgeon J.S Steinman. After killing him, Jack meets Brigid Tenenbaum for the first time. She implores him not to hurt the Little Sisters, and gives Jack a way to rescue them, although Atlas advises against it, as he believes that they are monstrosities that have a higher reward when harvested (it becomes your choice to save or harvest them).

When Jack finally reaches Neptune's Bounty he makes his way to the Smuggler's Hideout  where Atlas's family are allegedly trapped in a submarine. Jack is supposed to meet Atlas there, but when he enters the control booth to open the submarine, Andrew Ryan makes his move, sending a wave of Splicers that force Atlas to flee and destroying the sub, apparently killing Atlas' wife and son. Jack escapes through a tunnel to Arcadia, and Atlas informs him that their new objective is to put an end to Andrew Ryan.

Jack makes his way through Arcadia, the Farmer's Market, and Fort Frolic, facing numerous obstacles. In Fort Frolic, Jack makes the discovery that Jasmine Jolene was Ryan's murdered lover, although he does not realize the significance of this at first. While trapped at Fort Frolic, Jack is forced to work for Sander Cohen and assassinate his former disciples for one of Cohen's deranged works of "art."

Eventually, Jack reaches Hephaestus, where Atlas asks him, "Now, would you kindly head to Ryan's office and kill the son of a bitch? It's time to finish this." Ryan had set up strong defenses, but Jack eventually breaches them and enters  Rapture Central Control only to find that Ryan has set the entire complex into self destruct, which will also destroy the city. Jack enters Ryan's office and sees the "Would You Kindly" board upon which Ryan has connected all the evidence about Jack's true past. Jack finally encounters Ryan for the first and last time in a scene during which Ryan proves that Jack has been a slave under the control of Atlas the entire time, saying "A man chooses, a slave obeys." Ryan forces Jack to kill him, and he takes his Genetic Key  to shut down the self-destruct mechanism. Finally, Atlas reveals his true identity as Frank Fontaine and thanks Jack for handing the keys to Rapture to him, before betraying him, trying to kill Jack with the city's security devices, but Jack is led to an escape route by Tenenbaum's Little Sisters. Jack enters a vent only to have it collapse under him and is knocked unconscious.

Bioshock 2

In BioShock 2, Jack has seemingly become a man of legend among the Splicers left in Rapture. Even Sofia Lamb looks upon him positively, seeing his lack of free will as a boon and inspiration for her to begin her Utopian Experiments. Simon Wales believes Jack to be a god, mentioning how he killed Andrew Ryan. In Siren Alley, paintings of Jack's activities in Rapture can be seen, with subjects such as the plane crash, Dr. Steinman, and Jack's wrist about to be injected with a Plasmid. In one of Frank Fontaine's Audio Diaries, set directly before the beginning of BioShock, he mentions "I've got a hell of a surprise for Andrew Ryan. Long time comin'. And right about now, I expect the prodigal son is bookin' his flight…"

Several Splicers can be heard mentioning Jack. In the Atlantic Express  workshop, three Splicers have a conversation around a burning barrel as Subject Delta approaches. One of them speculates that Jack is "highballin with all the can-can girls" on the surface and in possession of the nuclear warhead seen on the submarine in the "Sad" and "Bad" endings, which he will use to destroy the city if anyone "gets lippy". Another states that he saved the Little Sisters and went up "happy ever after." This is a reference to the first game's two possible endings. Brute Splicers can also be heard referencing Jack; when idle, they mention their refusal to have children out of fear that they will suffer the same fate as Andrew Ryan. As in the first game, Jack's name is never mentioned in dialogue.