Who plays Jack Reacher in the Amazon series? All about Alan Ritchson ahead of the Season 1 premiere

Amazon has dropped the first-look trailer for Reacher, a small-screen adaptation of the Jack Richer novel by Lee Child. Smallville star Alan Ritchson is the latest actor to join the cast of Amazon Prime Video's upcoming thriller drama series.

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Who is Alan Ritchson and whom did he replace?

Jack Reacher, the hero of bestselling author Lee Child's enormously popular book series, has been a long-coveted character in Hollywood, having been played by Tom Cruise in the 2012 film and its 2016 sequel. Dwayne Johnson, aka The Rock, was also reportedly up for the role.

Alan Ritchson, an American actor best known for his roles as Aquaman on the CW superhero series Smallville and Hawk from Titans, is playing the eponymous role in this Amazon adaptation.

He's closer to the character's formidable 6 foot 5 inches than Cruise, who is 6 foot 2 inches. When Ritchson earned the role, he made it his mission to look the part, which included getting jacked enough to play Reacher.

Sharing his journey in an Instagram post, he acknowledged the lengthy process he had to undergo, but that it was eventually worth it.

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'Reacher' Season 1: Release date, trailer, and cast

Reacher will be available on Prime Video on February 4. The first season is based on Child's first Jack novel, Killing Floor. It will consist of eight episodes, all of which will be released on the same day.

The series' trailer depicts the protagonist arriving in a tiny town in America, where he gets the attention of the local authorities, who are impressed by his credentials but worried by a death that appears to have occurred around the same time as his arrival.

Soon after, he's assigned the responsibility of cleaning up the bad guys, which, as expected, entails a lot of hand-to-hand combat. At the very least, he's courteous enough to leave his opponent's bones undamaged so they can drive themselves to the hospital.

Harvey Guillén from What We Do in the Shadows, Malcolm Goodwin from iZombie, Willa Fitzgerald from The Goldfinch, and Maxwell Jenkins from Lost in Space are among the cast members of the first season.