TV Shows #30 - Part 1

Reacher Season One (2022)
Developed By: Nick Santora
Starring: Alan Ritchson, Malcolm Goodwin, Willa Fitzgerald, Chris Webster, Bruce McGill, Maria Sten, Currie Graham, Kristin Kreuk, Harvey Guillén

Certificate: 15 Running Time: 42-54 Minutes per Episode, 8 Episodes

Usually I find it somewhat irritating when people complain about a book adaptation straying from the source material. After all, if the screen version is different enough, it just means you potentially have two things to enjoy rather than two different forms of the same thing! One recent(ish) example I remember was Jack Reacher, released just over ten years ago starring Tom Cruise as the titular character. I personally didn't even know there were Jack Reacher books at the time but it turned out there were many, they were very successful, and their many fans were incensed at the casting choice to play their beloved hero. Moviegoers seem to have a bit of a love/hate view of Cruise at the best of times but here he was playing a character who, in the books at least, is 6ft5 and 250lbs. I've always been a fan of Cruise, at least as far as his movies are concerned, but for all his talents and abilities, being 6ft5 and 250lbs is not among them! The film did okay but most Reacher fans stayed away.

In fact, it did well enough to get a sequel, but that was it for Lee Child's popular anti-hero. But then, a couple of years later, whispers grew of new attempt to do justice to the character and his many stories. A series this time, announced by Amazon, and due to premiere a couple of years later on their Prime Video service. Would the fans be happy this time? Would Amazon even care about making them happy?

Welcome to Margrave, lummox!

The answer to the second of those questions was apparently yes. The first season of the show was based on Killing Floor, the first Reacher novel, and it was supposedly going to be very faithful to it. What about that elephant in Amazon's writers room though - who on earth could they find to play Reacher himself? Their choice was Alan Ritchson who I had only seen as Hank Hall/Hawk in the Titans show beforehand. He is a big guy but would he be big enough to make the fans happy? And could he meet the other requirements of playing the character? We'll come back to that point later. First, the story which, for the benefit of those who have not read the book, takes place in a small (and fictional) town in Georgia called Margrave, formerly one of the US's many dying towns until it was revitalised by Kliner Industries.

Reacher arrives there one day by bus in search of information about depression-era blues musician Blind Blake, who supposedly spent some time and died in Margrave many moons previously. Within about half a picosecond of arriving, however, he finds himself arrested for murder! Being a former U.S. Army military policeman, and a very skilled one at that, he is soon able to extricate himself from this situation, and then finds himself assisting Margrave PD, particularly Officer Roscoe Conklin (Fitzgerald) and Chief Detective Oscar Finlay (Goodwin) in their murder investigation.

Officer Conklin is immediately horny for Reacher...

Sadly for Reacher, the victim, shot from behind in the countryside just outside Margrave, turns out to be his younger brother Joe who was working for the Secret Service and was in the midst of an investigation when he was killed. Unsurprisingly, Reacher resolves to finish what his brother started as well as find out who was responsible for his death. Working with Finlay and Roscoe, he soon uncovers evidence of a wider conspiracy, perhaps involving the town's revered hero and saviour, Mr. Kliner himself (Graham). Before too much longer there are more murders, particularly brutal ones in fact, South American heavies start showing up, and there's animal feed. Lots of animal feed. For the most part though, it's a fairly standard mystery/investigation-type crime show. What makes it stand out is Reacher himself.

You might think an investigator - a detective, basically - would need to blend in to a crowd somewhat, so being a hulking great brute would probably be a hindrance, but it seems to work well enough for this particular investigator. Granted, being a self-proclaimed hobo means he's not usually looking to solve any mystery or conspiracy until he finds himself in the middle of one by just happening to be there, and huge or not, he invariably proves far more skilled and effective at conducting investigations than the actual authorities! Being huge can have certain advantages as well though.

Finlay contemplates stuff...

I pretty much had a smile on my face for the whole first episode, in fact. Imagine being so imposing that you can turn an aggressive, sweary guy into a meek, snivelling weasel, just by staring at him! That's exactly what happens in one of the show's first scenes, and soon afterwards Reacher finds himself in prison (for the aforementioned murder) and quickly takes out all the heavies single-handedly in two fantastic (and brutal) fight scenes! He's not all brute force though. Again, as we see in the opening minutes of the first episode, in little more than one conversation with Finlay he's able to rule himself out of the murder, give a profile of the perps, and make some personal observations regarding Finlay himself, which of course turn out to be (mostly) true. Not bad for a jobless lunkhead passing through town!

Despite being centre frame from the start of the first episode, we don't even hear him speak until a good few minutes in. Indeed, he's a man of few words, generally. In the books he rarely speaks. Here, we don't have the advantage of being able to read his thoughts/inner monologue so he does speak more, but still only if he actually has something to say. The show is well named then; Reacher is the main man from the first minute to the last, and he's a character well worthy of such prominence, but no show can thrive on the strengths of one person.

Reacher, Finlay and Conklin do some investigating...

For yes, in case you had started to wonder if any other actors are even in the show, the answer is: yes, and they are mostly excellent too! As you might have noticed to the right here, Reacher is joined in his investigation/obsession by the no-nonsense Roscoe and perpetually uptight Finlay, and the three of them make an effective as well as appealing team. I'm not sure I've seen Goodwin in anything else (or at least not whilst knowing it was him), and I've only seen Fitzgerald in one film (in which her character was ghastly), but they are both excellent here. They, along with Reacher, occupy the bulk of the screentime but they have some good support too, most notably from the always-welcome Bruce McGill as Grover Teale, Margrave's mayor, and Maria Sten as Neagley, a member of Reacher's old military police unit and basically a female version of him who now works private security.

They are close (in a platonic way) though, and she is always ready to help him when needed, as she was here. She is actually about the only change I know of from the book on which the season is based too. She is in some of the books, just not that one. Her premature presence here is welcome nonetheless and she may be the only character besides Reacher himself we see in future seasons too, due to his hobo-ish ways and all that. I certainly wouldn't be opposed to some of the others returning though, for it's the excellent cast that make the show so enjoyable.

That's Neagley behind the sight of the rifle...

The main plot is engaging and well-paced but there are tons of shows with corrupt oafs conspiring on some nefarious scheme, often while redirecting suspicion toward some innocent party - we've seen it a million times - but what sets this example apart are the nuanced characters and the sheer presence and attitude of the titular man-mountain himself. His early scenes showcase his imposing nature and brutal physicality superbly and are a lot of fun, and as the plot unfolds his intelligence and intuition comes to the fore as well. He really is a captivating character, especially for those who haven't seen/read him before, and yes, to answer the question asked earlier, Ritchson was a perfect choice to play him and makes him an immensely watchable character too. I'm pretty sure even the existing fans of the books who so scoffed at the Cruise films must be happy with this casting choice, so the rest of us who either didn't care or didn't know about him will certainly be happy too.

It's actually quite impressive just how watchable and enjoyable this show has ended up. You know Reacher won't die as there are many more books set later than this that feature him; you know he'll save the day and take down the ghastly bad guys with the help of the new friends he has picked up along the way; and yet virtually every minute is fantastic. Time spent in 'small town USA' is usually nice anyway, and the fictional one depicted here (and built from the ground up in Canada for the show!) is another pleasant one and proves a welcome host. It's a shame we won't see it or its residents again but at least Reacher (and possibly Neagley) will be back on our screens stomping arse again soon(ish). Whether you're a fan of the books or not, this fantastic show and fantastic character come highly recommended, especially if you like seeing unpleasant people get what's coming to them.

RKS Score: 9/10