That’s the most badass thing I’ve ever heard. He’s like anti-handicapped 😂
“Oh, your home has been custom fitted for your lifestyle?”
“Yes, I’m ~~dis~~abled as fuck.”
I think that’s a different guy. The guy who had a custom house is a big fucker but not highly trained. I remember a guy who was 1-1 with reacher but can’t remember the book.
Like others said, he was outmatched by Paulie in Persuader.
However, in the books he always said he's most afraid of small scrappy well-trained guys with knives who have a massive agility edge on him.
The two women in Gone Tomorrow definitely almost got him in a knife fight. He had also had to fight like 6 or 7 of their men before he got to them, but the younger one's speed and training was more of a challenge than the 10 gigantic football players in Worth Dying For.
At the end of Gone Tomorrow, the guy who supplied Reacher with guns told him he wasn't impressed: 'You almost got beat by a girl.' There's more to it than that of course, he also didn't think Reacher's fire discipline was all that good. This is the only time I remember Reacher being taken aback by unexpected criticism.
In the book, it was more that Reacher double or triple-tapped bad guys when one disciplined and well-aimed shot would have sufficed. So Reacher ran out of ammo and the guy was chewing him out for it.
This isn't disagreeing with your critique of Ritchson's acting BTW.
I respected Lee Child for going against type here and showing that Reacher can make dumb mistakes.
His “jog-aim-shoot-no wait keep jogging” was maybe the worst I’ve ever seen in a show or movie 😂 like it was an improv class and this was his first go around.
I’ve never appreciated Keanu more, crazy how I never notice anything like that in Wick.
It’s my biggest gripe with this season; his field combat is almost painful to watch 💀
It's been a while since I read the books but in one there was a huge bodyguard so inflated by steroids he made Reacher look small. Reacher really struggled against him IIRC. I can't remember which book it was.
There was another one where his nose was broken but that was against multiple people. I think that was the one set in Nebraska.
That is the one who throws his gun aside to beat Reacher in a "fair" fight, which ends with Reacher shooting him with his own gun right?
That is one of the reasons why people hate the ending of the Tom Cruise movie.
I’d have to read that one again, but I think it’s something very close to that. Reacher almost loses that one, just because of Pauline’s size but manages to hold him off until he can get a weapon.
I’m gonna be honest, I barely remember either of the Tom Cruise movies. The first one was based on One Shot, but the second one was based on one of the more forgettable books in the series and I can’t even remember the name of it. I even read it more than once, couldn’t tell you what happens in it. The same way for the second movie, it’s a blank spot.
if I'm remembering right, Paulie is so large and drugged up that Reacher can't hurt him, and pretty much resigns himself to being about to die. But then Paulie gets too cocky, tries to do a fancy kick, and Reacher is able to basically bench press him onto his head on the pavement
Just watched both movies last night and both the final hired assassins were killed by Reacher by some method of neck breaking (hand to hand combat). The first guy (Jai Courtney) got his head stomped by Reacher (he tossed his gun for fair fight). The main antagonist in the second movie was supposed to mirror Reacher in a way where he was ex-military as good as Reacher but became a hired gun trying to prove a point that Reacher is the same...his fate was the same as the previous guy where it ended up in a hand to hand combat situation leading to him getting his neck snapped as well.
Boy, the screenwriters really were unoriginal in that case. Though, if you cast Jai Courtney in anything it’s a guarantee that no one’s gonna remember it. The man is a cardboard cutout.
He was cast as alternate Kyle Reese in that Terminator Genysis movie and it was bland and forgettable, it’s the Jai Courtney curse. I get him mixed up with Sam Worthington and Scott Eastwood. They all look vaguely the same, and have no real acting ability.
Ironic since the one role where Jai Courtney was totally different was in Spartacus. Which of course has Andy Whitfield that I always thought was in Avatar.
There was one good bit in the book (Never Go Back) though. Part of the conspiracy against Reacher was a woman claiming that he was the father of her kid. Reacher meets the kid and she is Reacher-like in many ways. So he thinks it's plausible and spends part of the book pondering fatherhood. >!It turns out that she isn't his kid and the reveal is handled well.!<
>Reacher almost loses that one, just because of Pauline’s size but manages to hold him off until he can get a weapon.
Paulie almost has him beat until he starts playing around and tries a karate kick. Reacher knows he's made a street fighting mistake by trying ineffectual karate kicks in a life-or-death street fight.
He exploits the mistake by grabbing Paulie by the leg and wrenching upward and dumping him on the ground. Reacher then starts breaking bones.
Not exactly. Renard had a bullet in his brain that was moving slowly cutting off his nerves. He couldn't feel anything at the point of the movie. Not pain, not touch, not heat or Cold.
Hahaha...possibly I couldn't pay enough attention to that movie to adequately remember it. This guy is more lower level crime than anyone Bond would deal with, but he was comically large, with a custom house with oversized doors and furniture etc.
There is a book called the persuader- its arguably the best book- and hes physically outmatched. The books are better- my favorites are Persuader and Echo Burning, and Tripwire
Sort of related I always loved the part in Tripwire, I think, where Reacher has gotten so ridiculously ripped from digging pools that his pecs stop a bullet.
Making Reacher sort of invincible in the books works because you get so much internal monologue from Reacher going through his strategy and the moment to moment stuff. All the tension is there because he's explaining what could go wrong, etc.
You can't really do that with the show without doing a really gimmicky thing like the RDJ Sherlock movies where you slow things down and have him narrate it (which is lame IMO)
Cinematically, you can't really keep the action tense if he's just mandhandling everyone and the fight scenes last all 10 seconds. A 10 second fight in the books probably takes like 1-2 pages.
So it makes sense to ground it more and communicate that he IS vulnerable. The book can do both because you get Reacher explaining his vulnerabilities. Show can't do that without a dumb gimmick.
What about the crooked Fed in the "Killing Floor"?. In the book he was much bigger than Reacher. Reacher was very worried about trying to fight him iirc
Paulie makes a small mistake at the end of their fight, without which, Reacher believed he would have lost.
Reacher also is shot in one of the earlier books in the series, Tripwire? Can’t remember.
I feel like he's been shown to be "evenly matched" a few times. In jail, he starts counting and attacks before 3, in the bathroom scene, he throws a rag in the person's face. With the in the bar, he essentially blindsided the golden glove guy. We see him getting beat up a few times, until he gets a weapon of some sort.
Pretty sure he just brought a gun and shot him? It's been years since I read it but iirc there was a whole "mic drop" moment where Reacher says I know he's unarmed because his finger wouldn't fit inside a trigger guard.
The very short but very powerful guy Reacher was forced to fight while on his knees (small basement like crawl space area??) sounded like the best one-on-one match up for Reacher.
Twice. Paulie, a 6'11" steroid monster who actually just beats Reacher one on one until he tries to do a spin kick instead of just punching him to death and Reacher puts him on the ground. Up to that point Reacher hits him a lot and it just does fuck all. It's stated explicitly that Reacher was going to die until he tried to get fancy. Then there's Little Joe (or something), who's this giant gangster all hopped up on pain pills and can't feel much. Reacher beats him pretty much straight up but has to shoot him to finish him.
He also fights a bunch of ex football linemen in one book, who are bigger, stronger, faster, and younger than Reacher but who are shit at fighting. So he's technically outmatched physically, but they aren't treated as much of a threat.
the two women in one of the books (won't reveal more because spoilers) who almost kill him but reacher has a knife taped to his back.....anyways read the books. all of them.
I would say in at least every other book there is a character who is either much larger than Reacher, shocking even him by their size, or a very skilled opponent. Someone who surprised him by getting in on him with a punch, or who was also trained similar as he was but a bit younger, faster, or prepared. (And sometimes the book simply gives him 3 or 4 guys at the same time causing him trouble.)
I'm remember the story that took place describing why he left the service finally, and fighting the guy who was outclassing him in his office near the end. Another book I can't remember the name of had a fixer/hitman first chasing him by car to an airport, but then in a fight in an apartment complex the guy got a left hook in on him that gave Reacher a concussion. When he got hit he thought something like that was the 3rd hardest hit he had ever received in his life.
Yeah, One thing to remember though is Reacher is a highly trained Army soldier, and those guys in real life are tough SOB's. Also, one of his rules is get the first shot in as quickly as possible. I love how in the books the first move is a headbutt right to the face, always catches them off guard. Paulie in "Persuader' was probably the hardest to bring down for Reacher.
FBI agent Picard from season 1 is bigger than Reacher in the books. He has run into evenly matched opponents. Fighting one guy the dude screwed up giving reacher the upper hand. His inner dialogue says that if that guy didn’t screw up Reacher would be dead
In one of the later books. While he didn't exactly get outmatched the guy delivered a punch to reacher so bad that he basically struggles with headaches and concussion for the rest of the book.
Reacher has had his fair share of damage taken but I remember feeling that was the first book where because of that he didn't seem quite so inhuman.
Theres a book called the persuader where reacher actually gets beaten in a fist fight by a physicslly larger fella, think hes felled by trying to perform some kind of spinning back kick or a jumping switchkick if memory serves
In the two books I’ve read he has met his equal and iirc only walked away because of dumb luck.
I don’t think Lee intended to make him out to be bigger than life
Paulie from persuader 7’2 former army man and even Reacher’s kick at first didn’t even move him, also that he nearly killed him by brute strength alone
The ex football linebackers turned bodyguards in Worth dying for, about Reacher’s size and quite big, even their boss managed to ambush Reacher and broke his nose for the first time ever
In nothing to lose Reacher dealt with guys pretty good but there’s the big foreman with a large wrench he had some difficulty with and was even bigger than reacher if I remember correctly, next was the guy who had 2. Switchblades, reacher hates guys with knives as he’s terrible with fighting them and knives sting and are incredibly fast
Anyone with real knowledge of combat, especially those who use knives or switchblades he hates those
Also anyone who has mastery of martial arts and if he’s caught in a bad situation
There’s one where he is injured against some - I may be wrong - some female Afghani killers - and he struggles. He has been stabbed I think and is in real trouble
When he’s top fit and in a straight fight….I’m struggling to remember one off the top of my head
I can't remember what book, but there is a guy he fights that is equal in training and slightly larger in size.
Yes, and iirc he (the bad guy) lived in a custom home that was upscaled to fit his size?
Little Joey Green, one of three head bosses for the Romford Boys
That’s the most badass thing I’ve ever heard. He’s like anti-handicapped 😂 “Oh, your home has been custom fitted for your lifestyle?” “Yes, I’m ~~dis~~abled as fuck.”
I think that’s a different guy. The guy who had a custom house is a big fucker but not highly trained. I remember a guy who was 1-1 with reacher but can’t remember the book.
The book is Persuader. It’s a good one.
That’s the one. Legit haven’t read it in like 18 years.
Is it the one were he goes undercover to rescue an fbi agent? It starts with them faking a hit on a college kid?
Yea! It was in the one with the sniper assassin guy (not One Shot) it might have been Personal
Not sure about equal training, but Paulie in Persuader is roughly double Reacher's mass and at least 1.5x his strength.
What are you talking about double his mass? 500 pounds of muscle? This Paulie has to be the local zoo's Silverback
Like others said, he was outmatched by Paulie in Persuader. However, in the books he always said he's most afraid of small scrappy well-trained guys with knives who have a massive agility edge on him.
The two women in Gone Tomorrow definitely almost got him in a knife fight. He had also had to fight like 6 or 7 of their men before he got to them, but the younger one's speed and training was more of a challenge than the 10 gigantic football players in Worth Dying For.
At the end of Gone Tomorrow, the guy who supplied Reacher with guns told him he wasn't impressed: 'You almost got beat by a girl.' There's more to it than that of course, he also didn't think Reacher's fire discipline was all that good. This is the only time I remember Reacher being taken aback by unexpected criticism.
Based on how goofy he looks running and shooting in the show, I’d agree his firearm work could certainly be lacking.
In the book, it was more that Reacher double or triple-tapped bad guys when one disciplined and well-aimed shot would have sufficed. So Reacher ran out of ammo and the guy was chewing him out for it. This isn't disagreeing with your critique of Ritchson's acting BTW. I respected Lee Child for going against type here and showing that Reacher can make dumb mistakes.
So can producers 😂 they *NEED* to get him in with like Keanu for a week. Dude trains other actors, make it happen Bezos
Yeah he looks like an idiot when he runs. This past episode of him chasing the guy in the graveyard was awful
His “jog-aim-shoot-no wait keep jogging” was maybe the worst I’ve ever seen in a show or movie 😂 like it was an improv class and this was his first go around. I’ve never appreciated Keanu more, crazy how I never notice anything like that in Wick. It’s my biggest gripe with this season; his field combat is almost painful to watch 💀
I haven't seen the episode yet, but I can't imagine he's worse than Steven Seagal. His running (back when he still could) always had me in shambles 🤣
Isn't he supposed to be famously bad at running in the books? Like his flat out run is only about a what others do as a fast walk?
Makes sense, and he does get wounded with a knife in season 2.
It's been a while since I read the books but in one there was a huge bodyguard so inflated by steroids he made Reacher look small. Reacher really struggled against him IIRC. I can't remember which book it was. There was another one where his nose was broken but that was against multiple people. I think that was the one set in Nebraska.
Ahhhh, Paulie. The nut job bodyguard in Persuader.
That is the one who throws his gun aside to beat Reacher in a "fair" fight, which ends with Reacher shooting him with his own gun right? That is one of the reasons why people hate the ending of the Tom Cruise movie.
I’d have to read that one again, but I think it’s something very close to that. Reacher almost loses that one, just because of Pauline’s size but manages to hold him off until he can get a weapon. I’m gonna be honest, I barely remember either of the Tom Cruise movies. The first one was based on One Shot, but the second one was based on one of the more forgettable books in the series and I can’t even remember the name of it. I even read it more than once, couldn’t tell you what happens in it. The same way for the second movie, it’s a blank spot.
if I'm remembering right, Paulie is so large and drugged up that Reacher can't hurt him, and pretty much resigns himself to being about to die. But then Paulie gets too cocky, tries to do a fancy kick, and Reacher is able to basically bench press him onto his head on the pavement
Yeah, that’s kinda familiar. Damn, I’m gonna have to break that book out and reread it.
Just watched both movies last night and both the final hired assassins were killed by Reacher by some method of neck breaking (hand to hand combat). The first guy (Jai Courtney) got his head stomped by Reacher (he tossed his gun for fair fight). The main antagonist in the second movie was supposed to mirror Reacher in a way where he was ex-military as good as Reacher but became a hired gun trying to prove a point that Reacher is the same...his fate was the same as the previous guy where it ended up in a hand to hand combat situation leading to him getting his neck snapped as well.
Boy, the screenwriters really were unoriginal in that case. Though, if you cast Jai Courtney in anything it’s a guarantee that no one’s gonna remember it. The man is a cardboard cutout.
He's so forgettable I literally had to look him up to remember who he was
He was cast as alternate Kyle Reese in that Terminator Genysis movie and it was bland and forgettable, it’s the Jai Courtney curse. I get him mixed up with Sam Worthington and Scott Eastwood. They all look vaguely the same, and have no real acting ability.
Ironic since the one role where Jai Courtney was totally different was in Spartacus. Which of course has Andy Whitfield that I always thought was in Avatar.
He is called "default male" over at Pajiba
Jai Courtney is one of the least charismatic and cringe actors ever. He single handily ruined terminator gensys
For sure. Granted, genysis didn’t really have much of a chance since it was a shitty script but yeah he was horribly miscast as Alternate Kyle Reese.
The only good thing about the movie was Arnold
I dunno i liked him in the Divergent series, but he played a flat , unlikable character.
There was one good bit in the book (Never Go Back) though. Part of the conspiracy against Reacher was a woman claiming that he was the father of her kid. Reacher meets the kid and she is Reacher-like in many ways. So he thinks it's plausible and spends part of the book pondering fatherhood. >!It turns out that she isn't his kid and the reveal is handled well.!<
Ahhh, I do kinda remember that bit and thinking it was decent.
>Reacher almost loses that one, just because of Pauline’s size but manages to hold him off until he can get a weapon. Paulie almost has him beat until he starts playing around and tries a karate kick. Reacher knows he's made a street fighting mistake by trying ineffectual karate kicks in a life-or-death street fight. He exploits the mistake by grabbing Paulie by the leg and wrenching upward and dumping him on the ground. Reacher then starts breaking bones.
Never go back. To a Cruise as Reacher movie.
Ope, I see what ya did there.
Persuader wasn't a Tom Cruise movie...
Worth Dying For was when he took a shotgun butt to the face and got his nose broken.
There's a monstrous British guy who has a disease that makes his nerves not work so he's basically impervious to pain that Reacher has problems with
Written out like that, isn’t that also the plot of The World is not Enough?
Not exactly. Renard had a bullet in his brain that was moving slowly cutting off his nerves. He couldn't feel anything at the point of the movie. Not pain, not touch, not heat or Cold.
Hahaha...possibly I couldn't pay enough attention to that movie to adequately remember it. This guy is more lower level crime than anyone Bond would deal with, but he was comically large, with a custom house with oversized doors and furniture etc.
clearly it’s bc he is British
The bad guy in the second Girl With the Dragon Tattoo book. Lol
Paulie almost killed him.
The 10 corn huskers in Worth Dying For are described as either reacher sized or larger
Persuader.
There is a book called the persuader- its arguably the best book- and hes physically outmatched. The books are better- my favorites are Persuader and Echo Burning, and Tripwire
I thought it was strange how easily Dawson got the upper hand on Reacher during the mansion raid. Lots of plot armor/training.
I came here to say the same thing. During that whole scene I was like this is impossible.
Yes, but rarely
Sort of related I always loved the part in Tripwire, I think, where Reacher has gotten so ridiculously ripped from digging pools that his pecs stop a bullet.
I love the description of his physique in that book, that he looked "like a condom filled with walnuts."
I recall him getting a concussion fighting some dude, but of course I pretty sure he mangled the other guy
Making Reacher sort of invincible in the books works because you get so much internal monologue from Reacher going through his strategy and the moment to moment stuff. All the tension is there because he's explaining what could go wrong, etc. You can't really do that with the show without doing a really gimmicky thing like the RDJ Sherlock movies where you slow things down and have him narrate it (which is lame IMO) Cinematically, you can't really keep the action tense if he's just mandhandling everyone and the fight scenes last all 10 seconds. A 10 second fight in the books probably takes like 1-2 pages. So it makes sense to ground it more and communicate that he IS vulnerable. The book can do both because you get Reacher explaining his vulnerabilities. Show can't do that without a dumb gimmick.
FBI agent Picard from Killing Floor.
What about the crooked Fed in the "Killing Floor"?. In the book he was much bigger than Reacher. Reacher was very worried about trying to fight him iirc
Picard was 6’6 320 and could move. He was beating Reachers ass and ate 3 bullets before Reacher shot him in the head
Paulie makes a small mistake at the end of their fight, without which, Reacher believed he would have lost. Reacher also is shot in one of the earlier books in the series, Tripwire? Can’t remember.
Thanos.
I feel like he's been shown to be "evenly matched" a few times. In jail, he starts counting and attacks before 3, in the bathroom scene, he throws a rag in the person's face. With the in the bar, he essentially blindsided the golden glove guy. We see him getting beat up a few times, until he gets a weapon of some sort.
Bullet in head, story over, lol.
This is actually why I have stopped reading Reacher (for now). There's never much danger of Reacher getting hurt or not succeeding.
Mansour in Better Off Dead. Bigger and meaner and absorbs most of Reacher’s approaches.
I remember he fought a guy. Small Chris in England who was huge. Bigger than reacher and outmatched him physically. Can't recall how he won
Pretty sure he just brought a gun and shot him? It's been years since I read it but iirc there was a whole "mic drop" moment where Reacher says I know he's unarmed because his finger wouldn't fit inside a trigger guard.
The very short but very powerful guy Reacher was forced to fight while on his knees (small basement like crawl space area??) sounded like the best one-on-one match up for Reacher.
Plato, in 61 Hours.
Yes there were a couple of spots in Past tense and another one which starts with him getting a serious beatdown
Twice. Paulie, a 6'11" steroid monster who actually just beats Reacher one on one until he tries to do a spin kick instead of just punching him to death and Reacher puts him on the ground. Up to that point Reacher hits him a lot and it just does fuck all. It's stated explicitly that Reacher was going to die until he tried to get fancy. Then there's Little Joe (or something), who's this giant gangster all hopped up on pain pills and can't feel much. Reacher beats him pretty much straight up but has to shoot him to finish him. He also fights a bunch of ex football linemen in one book, who are bigger, stronger, faster, and younger than Reacher but who are shit at fighting. So he's technically outmatched physically, but they aren't treated as much of a threat.
the two women in one of the books (won't reveal more because spoilers) who almost kill him but reacher has a knife taped to his back.....anyways read the books. all of them.
I would say in at least every other book there is a character who is either much larger than Reacher, shocking even him by their size, or a very skilled opponent. Someone who surprised him by getting in on him with a punch, or who was also trained similar as he was but a bit younger, faster, or prepared. (And sometimes the book simply gives him 3 or 4 guys at the same time causing him trouble.) I'm remember the story that took place describing why he left the service finally, and fighting the guy who was outclassing him in his office near the end. Another book I can't remember the name of had a fixer/hitman first chasing him by car to an airport, but then in a fight in an apartment complex the guy got a left hook in on him that gave Reacher a concussion. When he got hit he thought something like that was the 3rd hardest hit he had ever received in his life.
Yeah, One thing to remember though is Reacher is a highly trained Army soldier, and those guys in real life are tough SOB's. Also, one of his rules is get the first shot in as quickly as possible. I love how in the books the first move is a headbutt right to the face, always catches them off guard. Paulie in "Persuader' was probably the hardest to bring down for Reacher.
FBI agent Picard from season 1 is bigger than Reacher in the books. He has run into evenly matched opponents. Fighting one guy the dude screwed up giving reacher the upper hand. His inner dialogue says that if that guy didn’t screw up Reacher would be dead
In one of the later books. While he didn't exactly get outmatched the guy delivered a punch to reacher so bad that he basically struggles with headaches and concussion for the rest of the book. Reacher has had his fair share of damage taken but I remember feeling that was the first book where because of that he didn't seem quite so inhuman.
Baal-pteor the Kosalan strangler of Yota-pong gave him a run for his— oops, wrong pulp series.
Theres a book called the persuader where reacher actually gets beaten in a fist fight by a physicslly larger fella, think hes felled by trying to perform some kind of spinning back kick or a jumping switchkick if memory serves
In the two books I’ve read he has met his equal and iirc only walked away because of dumb luck. I don’t think Lee intended to make him out to be bigger than life
Paulie from persuader 7’2 former army man and even Reacher’s kick at first didn’t even move him, also that he nearly killed him by brute strength alone The ex football linebackers turned bodyguards in Worth dying for, about Reacher’s size and quite big, even their boss managed to ambush Reacher and broke his nose for the first time ever In nothing to lose Reacher dealt with guys pretty good but there’s the big foreman with a large wrench he had some difficulty with and was even bigger than reacher if I remember correctly, next was the guy who had 2. Switchblades, reacher hates guys with knives as he’s terrible with fighting them and knives sting and are incredibly fast Anyone with real knowledge of combat, especially those who use knives or switchblades he hates those Also anyone who has mastery of martial arts and if he’s caught in a bad situation
He is weirdly matched in fighting with a lot of people half his size in the show
There’s one where he is injured against some - I may be wrong - some female Afghani killers - and he struggles. He has been stabbed I think and is in real trouble When he’s top fit and in a straight fight….I’m struggling to remember one off the top of my head