When author Lee Child created Jack Reacher, he didn't make things too complicated for himself. The ex-military policeman is known for not talking much, traveling from town to town, and being really big. Oh, and he's really good at fighting. And it turns out that's all you really need to create a massively popular character. The Jack Reacher novels are big enough to have spawned two Tom Cruise-led movies and a record-setting Amazon Prime Video series.
When author Lee Child created Jack Reacher, he didn't make things too complicated for himself. The ex-military policeman is known for not talking much, traveling from town to town, and being really big. Oh, and he's really good at fighting. And it turns out that's all you really need to create a massively popular character. The Jack Reacher novels are big enough to have spawned two Tom Cruise-led movies and a record-setting Amazon Prime Video series.
In the streaming sphere, "Reacher" has thus far proven as popular as the books, with fans finally getting a version of their beloved bruiser that looks like the guy from the novels. That was important to Child, who made clear early on that the 5-foot 7-inch Tom Cruise would not be returning as Jack Reacher, mainly because he's too small. And after a protracted audition process, the 6-foot 2-inch Alan Ritchson was brought in to front Prime Video's "Reacher," packing an extra 30 pounds onto his 205-pound frame to get as close as possible to the character's bulky 250-pound physique.
But even the hulk of a human that is Jack Reacher was a kid once. And when the writers needed to flesh out their main character's story in "Reacher," showrunner Nick Santora brought in Maxwell Jenkins to play a younger version. The 17-year-old grew up performing in his parents' circus, before switching to acting and starring as Will Robinson in Netflix's "Lost in Space." He's also shown up in movies, playing Gerard Butler's son in 2016's "A Family Man" and starring alongside Mark Wahlberg in "Joe Bell." And for his role as young Jack Reacher, he'd get help from Ritchson himself.
Season 1 of "Reacher" was all about absurdly fun action, with Alan Ritchson's itinerant hero often taking on entire gangs of enemies in brutal fight scenes that took months of preparation. But that didn't mean the eight episodes were devoid of any character development or exploration. Reacher reveals small details about his life throughout, whether it's telling Willa Fitzgerald's Roscoe about his experiences as a soldier in Baghdad, or reliving memories of his younger self hanging out with his brother, Joe.
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