When Amazon Prime Video announced that it was making a show adapting Lee Child's long-running Jack Reacher books, way back in 2021, I was absolutely buzzed. At that point I'd read every book in the series (which is still true today) and been baffled by how we only had two okay Tom Cruise vehicles to show for it.
Now, I'm experiencing probably the first comedown of the whole series so far – we're years on from that initial announcement, and the third season of the show just wrapped up with a fairly spectacular finale. Still, something about it didn't grab me like the first two did, and I'm struggling to put my finger on why.
It's still got the same blend of ferocious action and slow-burn mystery that makes each book such a pleasure to read, but I can't help but feel like the formula is becoming a little familiar in a way that's more unique to the show.
One of the major challenges that faces any huge series of novels like the Reacher books is staying fresh, after all. Given that every book has a similar template (Reacher arrives in a nowhere town, finds crime, then beats crime up), Child had to work hard to switch things up.
This sometimes meant novels written in the first-person instead of the third, and it often meant inventive scenarios that put Reacher in new situations. The third season of the show adapts a great novel, Persuader, but it doesn't feel massively different to what came before.
One of the other minor complaints I have, which could explain my apathy, is that the show is performing one small betrayal of the source material in amongst its impressive loyalty. Rather than letting each season truly stand alone, it keeps bringing people back into the frame, however briefly.
The chief offender here is Neagley, an ex-colleague of Reacher's who pops up in all three seasons to help, and I understand why. In TV, people want more familiarity and continuity to track characters. Still, the books are excellent precisely because they're not tied to each other, and I'd much rather the show was brave enough to cut things off properly between each run of episodes.
Still, I'm not going to claim these are huge issues – the show is still really fun, and there have been some great fights to enjoy this time out. Amazon's status as one of the best streaming services isn't really in doubt, but I do hope that the next season of Reacher can be a little bolder.
