Fluff - Actors creating characters from books.

“A female fighter who dominates proper technique remains calm and in control of herself, can overpower a larger and stronger male.”

I changed a couple of words..

”A 5’7” man who dominates proper technique remains calm and in control of himself, can overpower a larger and stronger male.”

Both of these are true statements.  

I happen to have the first Jack Reacher book in my hand actually.  In the Introduction Child’s describes what went into creating Jack Reacher.  At the beginning of the introduction there are what he calls three specific conclusions.  The first “Character is king”.  

I looked up the definition of character and it doesn’t include physical descriptions.

Later on in the introduction he explains why he made Jack Reacher 6’5”.

”And I thought it would be interesting to reverse the paradigm in terms of physical vulnerability.  Usually, a book’s hero comes up against people he needs to be afraid of.  What if , I asked myself, the heroes toughest SOB in the valley and others need to be afraid of him?  In my fourth book, Running Scared, an FBI agent called Blake threatens to leak Reacher’s name to a violent psychopath called Petrosian.  Blake thinks it’s an effective motivation—and in real life and most books it would be.  But Reacher just says “Look at me Blake. Get real. There’s maybe ten people on the planet I need to be scared of.  Extremely unlikely this guy Petrosian happens to be one of them.”  I was trying to discover whether drama was possible without the usual David versus Goliath structure.  I wondered would Goliath vrs Goliath work?  I have a fan and friend who works in the gaudy world of pro-wrestling—worked, actually , because he’s retired now.  My friend’s major concerned is that the wrestling paradigm always has the designated good guy lose, and lose, and lose, before winning in the final round.  It was hard for him to come to terms with the absence of a battered underdog.  But I always wanted Reacher to be the overdog.   


In his introduction Child’s says “Character is king”.  IMO Tom Cruise took the characteristics Child’s created for Reacher and shoved him into his 5’7” body along with displaying the bolded part above and by doing so he made his version of Reacher the overdog Child’s was looking for.  The idea Cruise’s version of Jack Reacher would lose, and lose, and lose, before winning is not likely.  

I have not seen the Amazon Prime version of Jack Reacher and I’m not going to subscribe just to watch the series.  I do see the first season is out on dvd and maybe I will order it to see if I like this version of Reacher.

So I guess I disagree with the ones on this thread who don’t like TC’s version of Jack Reacher.  😀

Does anyone watch Will Trent on ABC?  He’s a police detective who is an interesting character.   He’s a character from books written by Karin Slaughter.

It seems Karin Slaughter and Lee Child wrote a book together about their two characters Will Trent and Jack Reacher.  It’s called “Cleaning the Gold”.

Considering the actors who play these characters it should make for good reading.  So I ordered the book.

I have the first couple of books to read.  But in the introduction of the first Jack Reacher book Lee Child’s talks tells why he made Reacher over 6 ft tall.  He wanted Reacher to be a hero but was tired of what he claims are the current crop of heros that are smaller and flawed.  

Lee Child   “What if , I asked myself, the hero is the toughest SOB in the valley and others need to be afraid of him?”  That is why he made him over 6 feet tall.

I watched all 8 episodes of tv series last night and I liked them.  

But, IMO the Jack Reacher persona Cruise created was more of what Child was looking for without being over 6ft tall than the Jack Reacher persona created by Alan Ritchson who is over 6 ft tall.  And to be honest while flashing back to what I watched last night it could be that Cruise is just a better actor than Ritchson.

Which means when I finally start reading the books in my mind my Reacher will look like Cruise.

In the introduction of the first Jack Reacher book Lee Child gives his thinking on why he made Reacher the way he did.  No matter what your persona is in order to be intimidating one has to be big.

But in nature some of the most deadliest animals are small.

The other day I was watching a reel of two German Shepherds standing at the top of a staircase wanting to go downstairs.  What was stopping them was a cat sitting on a stair two steps down  There was room on the stair for them to go by the cat.  In fact the cat looked like it was dozing.  The owner kept calling the dogs but they wouldn’t go past that cat.

Now we know two German Shepards could tear that cat apart.  But yet they were so intimidated or scared of that cat they wouldn't go by it to go the stairs even when the owners were calling them.   My point is, one does not have to be big to be intimidating.

I bought the Reacher TV series dvds because I was curious about this Reacher and wasn’t going to subscribe to another streaming company.  While I was watching him last night I whipped out my ipad and started streaming the movie Reacher that is on Paramount Plus.   I was watching both Reachers at the same time. How’s that for a comparison.  I still like Cruise’s version better.

Which I chalk up to his acting. He may be odd but when he wants to he can act.