Andrew Ryan



"Now you've met Andrew Ryan... the bloody king of Rapture."

- Atlas

Andrew Ryan is the founder of Rapture and the owner of Ryan Industries. He is the main antagonist throughout most of BioShock. He only appears in person in the Rapture Central Control level.

Early Life in Russia/USSR
Andrew Ryan was born Andrei Rianofski in Russia during the time when the Czar still held autocratic rule over the country. In 1917 he witnessed the Russian Revolution which established the Soviet Union and put the Communist Bolsheviks in power. Ryan's experiences under Soviet rule led him to his personal philosophy: the modern world was created by great men who strove to make their own way. Anytime "parasites" gained control of such a world, they destroyed it. In 1919 Ryan fled the economic hardships in Russia and came to America, believing it to be a place where a great man could prosper.

Life in America
For a time, he was devoted to his adopted country, grateful for the wealth and fame it awarded his intellect and determination. However, the social programs adopted in the 30s increasingly tested that devotion. His experiences in the "worker's paradise" made Ryan despise the ideals of Socialism, believing that those who benefited from others were parasites. In his mind, one could only own what one earned. For instance, he once owned a large forest as a personal retreat, one that many groups envied (saying that it "belonged to God"). When the government attempted to nationalize it as parkland, Ryan's response was to burn it to the ground so no one could have it.

The final straw for Ryan was the destruction of Hiroshima with the Atomic Bomb. In his eyes, the Bomb was the ultimate corruption of his ideals — science and determination harnessed for destruction, creating a weapon that gave the parasites the ability to destroy anything that they could not seize.

Creation of Rapture
Ryan's response was to use his entire fortune to build Rapture; a community where "the artist would not fear the censor, where the scientist would not be bound by petty morality, where the great would not be constrained by the small," in the only place he felt the parasites could not touch — the depths of the Atlantic ocean. He created a shield company on the surface named Warden Yarn (an anagram of his name), and through it he conducted business with suppliers, such as Orrin Lutwidge's Scarlet Sovereign Import and Export, to receive materials necessary to build his city. When Rapture was completed, Ryan filled it with several thousand of the world's best and brightest, and for a time, it was everything he dreamed it would be, a paradise of freedom and wealth. From 1946 to 1958, Rapture experienced tremendous economic prosperity, and solid political stability.

As Ryan predicted, citizens in Rapture created a culture of entrepreneurship that was unrivaled, with numerous businesses established and unprecedented scientific advancement, culminating in the discovery of ADAM by Brigid Tenenbaum. The full implications of which was not immediately appreciated by Ryan who dismissed the concerns of men like Rosenberg and Bill McDonagh. Ryan's failure to understand the ramifications of the burgeoning ADAM-based culture resulted in the rise of a little-known Fishery owner named Frank Fontaine.

With Rapture in it's apogee, Ryan hired a man named Carlson Fiddle to build Ryan Amusements a theme park that doubled as a propaganda tool for the children of Rapture. Ryan himself provided narration to many of the rides and animatronic set pieces which attempted to warn children of the evils of the surface. This theme park embraced the city's new ADAM-culture, exalting plasmid technologies like Incinerate! in the House of Tommorrow section of the park.

Rapture's Decline
However, by filling a city with ambitious experts, trained geniuses, and breakthrough artists, Ryan set up a top-heavy class system with most Rapture citizens feeling that essential jobs such as food processing, cleaning, simple maintenance, etc. were beneath them, and thus were often ignored. This led to widespread dissatisfaction when these jobs were neglected and an eventual economic collapse throughout Rapture. The social conditions resulting from the economic collapse allowed Frank Fontaine to establish the influential but undermining Fontaine's Home for the Poor and also allowed Atlas to rise to political power and openly challenge Andrew Ryan's leadership.

Furthermore, in order to keep Rapture safely hidden from the parasites, Ryan strictly forbade contact with the surface, inadvertently creating a market for smuggled goods, which in turn led to the rise of Frank Fontaine. At Rapture's outset, Ryan intended this law to be Rapture's only one, but in the end, it proved to lay the groundwork for Rapture's decline and then divisive civil war.

Ryan received challenges from other sectors as well. A seemingly benign psychologist named Dr. Sofia Lamb, whom Ryan had invited to Rapture to help the citizens deal with psychological issues stemming from the isolated environment, began to speak out openly against the Ryanist philosophy. Lamb espoused a collectivist, altruist philosophy that could not be more different than Ryan's. Lamb's followers represented a legitimate challenge of their own, but remained a minority until after Ryan's death.

Sensing that the "Great chain was pulling away" from him, as he was to relate in one of his audio diaries, Ryan finally realized the threat that Fontaine posed and began to take steps to curb his influence. Trying to get to the heart of Fontaine's smuggling operation, he had some of his security forces, such as Sullivan, try to investigate Fontaine and his men. Although these efforts largely successful in breaking the back of the smuggling operation as a whole, Fontaine himself remained elusive, always managing to be "where the evidence isn't". The frustration of this situation affected Ryan deeply, causing him to begin to turn away from his own beliefs. Despite considerable uproar, Ryan implemented a highly unpopular law, sentencing convicted smugglers to death.

Sometime in 1956, an Eve's Garden exotic dancer by the name of Jasmine Jolene became pregnant by Ryan. Once again showing his gift for foresight, Frank Fontaine made arrangements to purchase the embryo from Jolene, who claimed to "need the money". By that time, Ryan had much of Rapture's security and infrastructure coded to his own genetic frequency to combat the growing threat of the destabilized society. Fontaine realized that Jack, as the child became named, could be a powerful ally. Jack would share genetic code with Ryan, giving Jack access to secure areas that only Ryan and his relatives had access to.

With the smuggling operation in it's death throes, Ryan sought a decisive conclusion to the Fontaine question. Ryan authorized putting an end to Fontaine and the remainder of his operation. An unrepentant Fontaine chose to, as Bill McDonagh put it, go down like "John Bloody Wayne" in one last stand. As the famous Rapture Standard headline proclaimed, "Ryan takes down smuggling operation ... Fontaine and thugs killed in fiery shootout!" on September 12th, 1958.

Unbeknownst to Ryan, his arch rival concocted a scheme to fake his death. As Fontaine was later to relate in one of his audio diaries, "Ryan wanted Frank Fontaine dead, I just gave him what he wanted. As Atlas, I got a new face, a clean record, and a fresh start." Although Frank Fontaine was dead, out of his ashes emerged Atlas, an adversary that would prove much more dangerous than Fontaine ever was. Though Fontaine was correctly looked on as a thug by much of the Rapture public, Atlas was beloved, and for many he represented a legitimate alternative to the increasingly tyrannical Ryan.

In the aftermath of Fontaine's perceived death, Ryan took a step that proved to be yet another betrayal of his philosophy, the nationalization of Fontaine Futuristics. Although building Rapture to escape the sort of "big government" that would take over private industry, he now engaged in precisely the same behavior. This move shook Rapture to it's core, and proved to be a turning point in the decline of Rapture. Even his long time friend, Bill McDonagh resigned from the City Council in protest of this move.

Civil War and Collapse
Rapture's high water mark can be traced to nearly an exact moment, New Year's Eve, 1958. In a televised broadcast that night, Ryan acknowledged "trials" in the previous year but offered a toast to the city that 1959 may be Rapture's finest year. Alas, it was not to be. Just moments after his broadcast, the citizens of Rapture were alerted to an "incident in the Kashmir Restaurant." This incident marked the most significant turning point in Rapture's decline as a civilized society. On this night, a masquerade ball was organized for Rapture's elite in the plush Kashmir Restaurant. During the festivities, a group of Atlas' revolutionaries launched an attack on the restaurant.

Ryan and Atlas engaged in a destructive civil war that brought ruin to the city and claimed the lives of an untold number of its citizens. It was hoped that a peaceful resolution to the conflict could be achieved and that Ryan would be forced to address many of the Atlas supporters' grievances. However, Ryan refused to compromise with the "parasites" and was intent on fighting to the end even if it brought down the entire city. Plasmid technologies played a central role in the conflict, with the "genetic arms race" as McDonagh coined it, leading to the development of many of the combat plasmids and gene tonics. Ryan's heavy-handed approach alienated many of his former supporters, even turning his closest friends, McDonagh and McClintock against him. The corpses of many of these former supporters were mounted on the wall leading to his office as "trophies".

As the civil war deepened,Yi Suchong proposed an unconventional means of breaking the stalemate that currently divided the city. He proposed altering the structure of the commercial plasmid line to make citizens susceptible to mental suggestion by pheromones. This represented the ultimate betrayal of Ryan's objectivist philosophy, to deny citizens even the ability of free will itself. Yet Ryan agreed to this with the justification that Atlas and his supporters would make them slaves and free will would vanish in any case. These pheromones proved decisive in turning the tide of the Civil War in Ryan's favor. With the situation now desperate, and with only a few unspliced followers who weren't susceptible to Ryan's pheromones, such as Johnny, Atlas was forced to use his "ace in the hole."

Events of BioShock
Ryan is an ever-present voice while Jack travels through Rapture. Frank Fontaine sends Jack on his journey to kill Ryan using the "would you kindly" trigger phrase, though Ryan is not aware of this at first. When Jack first arrives in Rapture, Ryan assumes he is someone from the Russian KGB or CIA, come to make an already disintegrating situation worse. After Jack makes it safely out of Arcadia, Ryan begins to piece together the puzzle, realizing that it is Atlas who is directing Jack's movements. .

As Jack heads to Rapture Central Control, Ryan begins to hint at this knowledge in his final radio messages before his face-to-face meeting with Jack. The "Would You Kindly" board outside his office shows how Ryan put together the clues connecting himself with Jasmine Jolene, and Jack as their illegitimate son. Infuriated with this knowledge, Ryan decides to activate Rapture's self-destruct mechanism in a final attempt to put a stop to Fontaine's plan.

Minutes later, Jack confronts Ryan, who is casually playing golf in his office. He educates Jack about his true self, telling him of his birth, his conditioning, his experiences in Rapture and the phrase "would you kindly", which controlled his every action. He tells his son that the fundamental difference between a man and a slave is that "a man chooses, while a slave obeys". Ryan then hands Jack the golf club and orders Jack to kill him. Jack obeys, and proceeds to batter his father to death. With Ryan dead, Jack claims the genetic key to Rapture's systems from Ryan's corpse. With the Vita-Chamber in Ryan's office deactivated, Ryan is officially dead and cannot be resurrected.

Appearances in BioShock 2
2K Marin has stated that, Andrew Ryan will feature again in BioShock 2. One of the most obvious ways would be through Audio Diaries, and perhaps messages left over the intercom system. It has also been seen through videos showcasing Ryan Amusements, that his ideals will be carried on through the large animatronic devices showing his versions of the "Parasite's world". The player will be able to listen to his voice booming over the scenery, as shown in the videos. The relationship between him and his political opponent, Sofia Lamb, will be detailed throughout the game.

BioShock 2 Multiplayer
During the apparent first play of BioShock 2's Multiplayer, the player will be greeted by a live video feed of Andrew Ryan addressing the city to ring in the New Year of 1959.

BioShock

 * Medical Pavilion
 * Parasite Expectations
 * Vandalism
 * Neptune's Bounty
 * Fontaine Must Go
 * Watch Fontaine
 * Death Penalty in Rapture
 * Working Late Again
 * Arcadia
 * The Market is Patient
 * Offer a Better Product
 * The Great Chain
 * Farmer's Market
 * Pulling Together
 * Desperate Times
 * First Encounter
 * Hephaestus
 * A Man or a Parasite
 * Impossible Anywhere Else
 * Great Chain Moves Slowly
 * Point Prometheus
 * Marketing Gold
 * Mistakes
 * Removed Audio Diaries
 * Congregations

BioShock 2

 * Removed Audio Diaries
 * Sinclair Solutions

Trivia

 * Andrew Ryan's actions are heavily based on those of the character John Galt from Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand, though their end results are drastically different . Ryan's actions (burning an entire forest down when the government nationalized it and then isolating himself from the rest of the world) closely mirrors that of another character in the novel under the same circumstances (the character in question was Ellis Wyatt. Instead of a forest he burnt down his oil fields and retreated to Galt's Gulch.) Also, Project X in the same novel is similar to the Atom bomb in one respect, both were applications of science for destructive purposes (although Project X was created as a defense and the Atom Bomb was created "to destroy what the parasites couldn't seize"). The term "Looters" was used often in that novel in the same way as "Parasites" was used by Andrew Ryan in Bioshock, both describing either those who take the unearned by force or receive the unearned as alms from big government.
 * Andrew Ryan's name is an anagram of Ayn Rand, with the letters REW added in. Additionally, his political philosophies and personal history are very similar to hers. For example, they were both born in Russia and emigrated to America after their home country adopted a Communist regime, and both believed in the philosophy of Objectivism..
 * In his office, as aforementioned, Ryan has turned off the Vita Chamber which could have otherwise resurrected him. However, there is a glitch which turns it on without so much as touching it; after the player has killed him and put the genetic key into the slot, wait until the locked door opens and the alarm begins to sound. When the Little Sisters appear, don't follow them, but instead allow the Security Bots to kill Jack. The player will then respawn in the previously deactivated Vita Chamber.
 * Despite Frank Fontaine and Atlas being his arch-nemeses, Ryan never figured out that they were the same person.
 * Ryan is also prone to favoritism, doting on those who side with him, so much so that he has subdivided Rapture and given two of his subordinates Sander Cohen and J.S. Steinman complete control over their respective sectors.