Amazon's Reacher Subtly Honored The "Reacher Said Nothing" Rule (Despite Totally Breaking It)

 Amazon's Reacher may not have loyally adapted the "Reacher Said Nothing" rule from Lee Child's Jack Reacher books, but it does subtly honor it. As it is well-known by now, Amazon's Reacher is not the first adaptation of Lee Child's Jack Reacher novel series. 

In 2016, Edward Zwick's movie Jack Reacher: Never Go Back traversed the 19th book from Lee Child's novels to the big screen, with Tom Cruise starring as the titular character. Unfortunately, while the movie received mixed reviews, Lee Child's reader base was not satisfied with Tom Cruise's casting as he just did not fit Child's description of the central 6 feet 5-inch behemoth of a man.

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Taking cues from the Tom Cruise movies' failure, Amazon's Reacher did things differently by casting Alan Ritchson as Jack Reacher and keeping its storyline closer to the narratives in the original Lee Child books. However, in all of its differences, there are times when even Amazon's Reacher takes some creative liberties to make the series more suitable for the audiovisual storytelling medium. One of these differences is its unique take on the "Reacher Said Nothing" rule from the original Jack Reacher novels.

Amazon's Reacher Adapted The "Reacher Said Nothing" Rule... Sort Of

Alan Ritchson Reacher the hard way

Lee Child gives Jack Reacher minimal dialogue in the original novels to highlight how his actions speak much louder than his words. Instead of being a loudmouthed vigilante who throws one-liners at his enemies, Reacher is calm and collected, always observing and calculating his surroundings. His laconic nature in the books has given birth to the term "Reacher Said Nothing," which is often referred to as a rule that Lee Child uses to describe Jack Reacher. As seen in the Amazon series, Alan Ritchson's Jack Reacher does not necessarily conform to this rule, but in one scene he shows how he, too, can choose silence over unnecessary chatter.

Reacher's Opening Silence Made The Book Change Work

Alan Ritchson Reacher

In Reacher's opening scene, the titular character confronts a parking lot goon by giving him a piercing death stare without uttering a word. Terrified by the Reacher's intimidating glare, the goon simply surrenders. Moments later, cops arrive to arrest Reacher while he tries enjoying his first peach pie and coffee in Margrave. Instead of protesting, Reacher gives the cops the silent treatment and does not say a word until much later in the episode. However, once he starts talking in Amazon's Reacher, he does not hold himself back from outwitting others with his dry humor, which makes him slightly different from his source material counterpart.

While Amazon's version of Jack Reacher does not wholly embody the "Reacher Said Nothing" Rule, he honors it in some ways by letting his actions do all the talking in Reacher's opening moments. Considering how it would be challenging to portray Jack Reacher in the audiovisual medium without giving him enough dialogue to work with, it is understandable why Reacher's creators made him seem more chatty than in the books' version. Although this chips away the mysteriousness and enigma that makes Jack Reacher more appealing in the books, Amazon's Reacher deserves credit for balancing the character's clever wordplay and sarcastic banter with a pinch of the "Reacher Said Nothing" rule.