When you think of Jack Reacher, you don't necessarily think of his sense of humor. Author Lee Child envisioned the lead character of his wildly popular books as a bulky, taciturn hero who travels the US after leaving the Army and runs into his fair share of trouble along the way. Not exactly the perfect setup for comedy. But according to Alan Ritchson, star of Prime Video's equally popular "Reacher" series, there's plenty of levity to be found in the world of Jack Reacher.
Tom Cruise's portrayal of the character in two movies didn't quite match the 250-pound, 6-foot-5-inches bruiser of the novels — which in and of itself is kind of funny, but certainly didn't amuse fans of the books. Luckily, Amazon fixed all that when they cast the 6-foot-3-inches, 235-pound Alan Ritchson to lead their show based on Child's books. And it wasn't just the actor's considerable frame that hewed closer to the novels.
Showrunner Nick Santora made sure to capitalize on Child's expertise and involvement as executive producer, creating a run of eight episodes that not only broke Nielson's streaming records but resulted in a show that was generally much more familiar to fans of the Jack Reacher novels. And for Ritchson, part of doing justice to the fans was retaining Jack Reacher's sense of humor, which is an often overlooked aspect of the books.
After Amazon initially decided against casting Alan Ritchson as Jack Reacher, then went back on that decision, the actor threw himself into research, reading all the novels, and hanging out with Lee Child, from whom he said he learned a lot. Specifically, the actor claimed to have seen a lot of Child in Reacher and vice versa, particularly in terms of his intellect. But there was also what Ritchson referred to as a "dry sardonic humor" to both Child and his books.
Child himself confirmed as much when he responded to a fan question about Reacher's sense of humor on GoodReads, saying, "Yes, I would say Reacher and I share a sense of humor. I remember laughing out loud when I wrote some lines in [the 19th Jack Reacher book] 'Personal' — usually when Reacher feels some kind of sardonic bewilderment about the craziness of whatever world he's up against." And that craziness certainly found its way into Amazon's series, as Reacher frequently finds himself up against absurd odds, often having to single-handedly battle entire gangs of enemies to get what he wants.
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