After Amazon Prime Video’s ‘Reacher’ began adapting Lee Child’s very first novel – ‘Megalomania’ – the eleventh book ‘Trouble’ served as the template for the second season. The third season will now be based on the seventh novel: “Persuader” aka “The Janus Man”. That promises variety. The novel also has a brutal and initially surprising opening.
The original opens with Jack Reacher (played again in the series by Alan Ritchson) observing as heavily armed masked men attempt to kidnap a student who is being guarded by bodyguards. As is his habit, he must intervene. In the end, the kidnappers and the bodyguards are dead – but also an old police officer who apparently happened to be on the scene and wanted to intervene. Reacher shot him with a pistol. Is the ex-soldier now a cop killer?
Reacher undercover
No, this much can be revealed here because it has already been revealed in all the announcements for the third season. The event has just been staged, because Reacher has to conduct undercover investigations on behalf of the DEA. Richard Beck’s kidnapping, which he foiled, gives Reacher access to his father Zachary Beck, who also hires him as planned. Beck Senior is said to be a major player in the drug world and Reacher uses his position as Beck’s new man to gather evidence.
But when Reacher discovers that Beck’s business involves much more than drug trafficking, the authorities want to call off the undercover operation. But Reacher has no way back, especially since Beck was never his target. Because he has known for a long time that he is only an accomplice – and that an old acquaintance looms over him. Francis Xavier Quinn is a man Reacher once thought was murdered – and now he wants to make sure he doesn’t return from the dead. This time, Reacher will ultimately kill the “Janus Man,” but to do so he must survive and hide his true identity. And that is becoming increasingly difficult.
The return of Frances Neagley and an action highlight
With ‘Persuader’, also known as ‘The Janus Man’, the people behind ‘Reacher’ have chosen a truly gripping novel in the series. It will also be interesting to see how they will step it up. The book is not told chronologically, so things only reveal themselves gradually. It will be exciting to see if the series makers keep this up. There was a lot of flashback work in the first two seasons, but they kept going further back into the past. This is also useful here to shed light on Reacher and villain Quinn’s shared military past and explain the protagonist’s hatred of the sadistic villain.
In any case, there will be changes to the book template, because, as has become known, things are turning back Maria Sten as the tough investigator Frances Neagley. She doesn’t appear in the novel at all. Already in the first season, those responsible integrated it well into the setting, even though it was not part of the template there either. Sten should remain a kind of second well-known character in a cast that continues to change from season to season. We think it’s conceivable that in the third season, just like in the opening season, she will only make sporadic appearances and won’t be there all the time.
Those responsible also offer “The Janusman”. Potential for an unforgettable action scene. Because there is also a man in Beck’s employ named Paulie, who is described in the book as a true monster: more than two meters high and therefore even towers over Reacher. Also equipped with much more mass, seemingly indestructible and also agile despite its enormous body.
From the character’s first appearance, we know that there will be a fight between Paulie and Reacher at some point – and that it will be tough. Author Lee Child describes the story over several pages one of the most intense and best fights in the long line of novels. It remains exciting to see how the series makers adapt this (and who they find to cast Paulie).
It is not yet known when the third season of ‘Reacher’ will come to Amazon Prime Video. Given the current schedule, a start at the end of 2024, about a year after the second season, seems quite realistic.