At this juncture, three years down the line, with a fourth season already greenlit, the Nick Santora-created adaptation of the Lee Child-penned Jack Reacher series strikes a very specific chord of masculine cartoonish pulp, which also hearkens back to the old-school westerns of the lone gunslinger or the very capable vagrant getting into all sorts of trouble as he walks from one town to the next.
This is precisely why the first episode of this new season, “Reacher” (season 3) should be praised for taking me by surprise because the initial impression of the story of this season—Reacher managing to save young Richard Beck from a kidnapping—and how that leads him to being undercover on behalf of the DEA takes me by surprise. It’s not surprising because of the revelation, but in how the creators, and especially Alan Ritchson as Reacher, manage to deviate just slightly from the no-nonsense capable aspect of Reacher’s physicality complimenting his skill set, into something prone to mistakes and genuinely allowing Ritchson to exhibit shades of vulnerability.
And perhaps that expressiveness should have been the clue about the heightened nature of the story of this season. Creator Nick Santora in seasons 2 and 3 took stories that connect directly to Reacher’s past, which works in giving an emotional anchor, but Reacher as a character, especially in the first season, worked because of both the unpredictability of his appearance and the case itself standing on its own merits.
Unlike season 2, however, the conceit of “Reacher, but 10 of them” that almost threatened to break the uniqueness of the “lone wolf” aspect of the show, season 3, deliberately goes back to basics. It still manages to incorporate Maria Sten’s Neagly in the fray, but only in spurts, with the majority towards the end. Considering her character has been the breakout amongst the recurring supporting cast such that a spinoff of her own is already under production, her appearance makes sense, and she is fun enough to not overstay her welcome.
It can’t be said for the rest of the cast of this season. The uniqueness, which in reality is essentially traditional television reskinned for an entire procedural television, rather than a single 42-minute episode, entails a new story for Reacher, and thus newer characters for Reacher to interact with and newer complexities to navigate. The show is still unable to reach the heights of the first season, precisely because the primary supporting cast of that season had been so strong. The second season with Reacher’s Special Investigator team had its own unique quirks within its supporting cast that added a texture to the show.
That’s not really the case here. Reacher’s interaction with the DEA agents led by Susan Duffy (Sonya Cassidy) and accompanied by Guillermo Villaneuvella (Roberto Monstesinos) and Daniel David Stewart (Stevven Elliott) feels very much par for the course. Cassidy’s strong Bostonian accent almost threatens to push the interactions to exaggeration, and while Ritchson and Cassidy share strong chemistry, none of the characters are truly memorable. There are key moments within the show where this supporting cast on Reacher’s side is rendered almost incapable and, at times, outright foolish. It could be a storytelling choice to heighten the stakes for Reacher and push his lone wolf persona out of depth, but where Reacher finds himself in the middle of Beck’s den of operations is already cartoonish and complicated.
It’s funny how the marketing of the show pitched the cornerstone of this season to be “Reacher vs an even bigger bad guy,” but Olivier Richters as Paulie is menacing because of his physicality as well as his agility in fighting. The problem is the character isn’t afforded any more shades. He is, however, afforded an entire 15-minute sequence of battle with Ritchson’s Reacher, and that is rather memorable. But as far as the overall story is concerned, the integration of Reacher’s past within an already barebones case doesn’t help elevate the material. Brian Tee as Quinn has presence, but for a character built up as the antagonist for Reacher, responsible for one of the central tragedies in Reacher’s profession as an Army Investigator, he strangely shares little to no scenes with Reacher, and that could also be attributed to the plot itself.
The show also strangely tries to push some of the soldiers working under Beck as comic reliefs, content to blabber on and essentially push Reacher to his breaking point, and thus catharsis resulting in Reacher dispatching them feels earned. But it adversely affects the viewing as well, because neither the comedic dialogues nor the performances land and thus essentially take up real estate in terms of runtime. Conversely, Reacher’s relationship with Richard Beck (Johnny Berchtold) is strangely moving despite the rocky start. Anthony Michael Hall as Zachary Beck surprisingly delivers on a very complicated role and executes it quite well.
“Reacher” in its third season still feels like the rebellious kid trying to break out of the pattern that had been established in its first season. While it is past its “rebellious phase” of the sophomore season, the aftereffects still linger. As a result, the show feels curiously in flux, but it is most comfortable when it showcases Reacher cracking heads, shooting down people, and generally acting beyond his bruiser persona.
The final episode almost pushed the “perceived reality of this season” to something resembling a Looney Tunes cartoon, especially when you consider the show lingering on the aftermath of these same violent acts, or in how it cavalierly lets Reacher and Duffy converse on how to break laws and arrest the perpetrators. However, the central presence of Ritchson truly grounds the show. He is the rock, the result of pitch-perfect casting, where the character literally leaps off the page, and there is charisma even in Reacher’s brevity and wit, which renders the show utterly watchable and fun, albeit remaining severely flawed.
