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Hollywood superstar Tom Cruise portrayed the iconic role of Reacher in the films Jack Reacher (2012) and (2016), while actor Alan Ritchson is the current face of the same name in the Prime Video series.
Lee Child's first book, Killing Floor, served as the basis for Reacher Season 1, while Bad Luck & Trouble, his eleventh, is what Season 2 is adapting.
So let's delve deep into how Alan Ritchson’s portrayal of the Lee Child character surpasses that of Tom Cruise’s, with comparisons, shortcomings and even Lee Child’s two cents on the portrayal of his characters in film and TV.
Who is the best Jack Reacher?
The first season of the hit Amazon Prime video series, Reacher is based on Child's 1997 debut novel in the series, Killing Floor, in which the titular character is described as, a six-foot-five, 250-pound, fair-haired ex military police officer whose intelligence and fierce fighting abilities make him an almost unstoppable force.
As Jack, Alan Ritchson somehow surpasses Tom Cruise in performance. Ritchson had the character's iconic scrutiny, while Cruise oozed swagger and bluster. Even though Ritchson, who is six-foot-three, does not exactly match Child's description of the character, he beats the portrayal of Tom Cruise, who's five-foot-seven
Author Lee Child, who is also an executive producer on the Amazon series, said in an interview with Hindustan Times about the portrayals of his characters:
“I wanted an actor who would step on the screen and just own it and command it and be Jack without doing anything or saying anything. Alan Ritchson was that person, straightaway he's very comfortable with not talking, which is perfect for Reacher but very rare for actors, and he was very cool with that.
"Tom Cruise is a great actor, and he had the internal part of Reacher, which was good. But physicality is important to Reacher since he is a huge-looking and scary man, so when he steps into the room, everybody's a little nervous. And I thought that Alan commanded that much better on the screen.”
Author Lee Child, who created the book series, attempted to explain Cruise's out-of-place look in the film series by saying that Cruise's tremendous attraction and natural persuasiveness metaphorically mirrored the character's enormous proportions.
The time constraint is another significant distinction between the two portrayals, as Lee Child notes in the interview:
“The key difference between the movie and the television is the running time. We have so much time to tell the story. It also means that the actor is on the screen for that much longer”
Because of how much time Alan Ritchson spent on screen and how he acted during that time, his portrayal of Jack in the Prime video series seems like a logical continuation of the character's story in the book series.
In contrast, Cruise's portrayal of the character reflects personality as the result of an imposed trial that was started mostly due to Cruise's box office pulling power rather than his on-screen persona or acting.
With very little speech or activity, Ritchson's acting captures the essence of a city or environment.
His version of the character is also a stoic who only speaks when something significant has to be spoken to get others to pay closer attention. Ritchson's core portrayal is defined by under-control but also untamed magnetism.
Tom Cruise's portrayal of the character isn't quite as sensitive to the characteristics as Ritchson is.
Jack is a figure well-known for his commanding presence, which is in line with his fundamental identity as an estranged, nomadic recluse and a former US military officer who was abruptly dumped into an ordinary society where he fails to fit in and keeps getting into problems. This is something Tom Cruise's version of the character lacked or felt forced to have.
Reacher season 3 is also in the works, so it looks likely that Alan Ritchson will continue to play Jack Reacher for a while. Even more so, the enduring success of the Amazon Prime series will probably also allow Ritchson to try his hand at an acting career beyond TV shows as well.
The show is available to stream worldwide via Prime Video. What's more is that Ritchson has already expressed a desire to take on the role of Batman in the upcoming James Gunn DC universe, so if fans can't get enough of him, it comes as good news.
