Here’s some big news surrounding one of the biggest characters in print today, who also happens to be a big guy himself.
Jack Reacher will again be brought to life by actor Alan Ritchson, who has played the titular role in both seasons of Prime Video’s Reacher (Season 2 debuted in second place on Nielson’s Top 10 Streaming Charts). Earlier today, Amazon confirmed that a third season is, indeed, coming and that Lee Child’s 2003 novel Persuader will serve as the source material for the upcoming season, which is said to already be filming in Toronto. In addition to Ritchson, Variety is reporting that Maria Sten will also return, reprising her role as Frances Neagley after appearing in the first two seasons. No other casting news has been announced.
The official logline for the third season of Reacher reads, “Reacher must go undercover to rescue an informant held by a haunting foe from his past.”
For those unfamiliar with Persuader, it’s the seventh book in Lee Child’s #1 New York Times bestselling series and was originally published in May of ’03. Written in the first-person narrative (Child has often swapped from first to third-person narration between books), the story follows Reacher, an ex-Army cop, who looks to right a wrong from a decade prior. Working with the DEA in a non-official capacity, Reacher agrees to go undercover to help take down a man named Zachary Beck, who they suspect of smuggling drugs, using his own trading practices and business to mask the transactions. To gain Beck’s trust, the DEA stages a fake kidnapping of the criminal’s son, with Reacher then being the one to “rescue.” The ploy works, and eventually, Reacher gains Beck’s trust, but as the story unfolds, through a series of twists and surprises, readers learn that Beck isn’t exactly who the DEA thought he was . . . and he isn’t Jack’s real target, either. Instead, Reacher, the beloved justice-seeking nomad, hopes his angle with Beck leads to someone else. Someone he’s waited ten years to get a shot at, who previously killed one of Reacher’s colleagues.
Also, while we know Frances Neagley will be back in season three, her character does not appear in Child’s book, so it’ll be interesting to see how the show’s writers and producers make room for her in the overall plot.
You can see the original cover and story details for Child’s book below.
“Gripping and suspenseful . . . Child ratchets up the suspense to new heights.”—The Denver Post
Jack Reacher lives for the moment. Without a home. Without commitment. And with a burning desire to right wrongs—and rewrite his own agonizing past. DEA Susan Duffy is living for the future, knowing that she has made a terrible mistake by putting one of her own female agents into a death trap within a heavily guarded Maine mansion.
Staging a brilliant ruse, Reacher hurtles into the dark heart of a vast criminal enterprise. Trying to rescue an agent whose time is running out, Reacher enters a crime lord’s waterfront fortress. There he will find a world of secrecy and violence—and confront some unfinished business from his own past.
