‘Reacher’ Season 2 Episode 1 Recap: “ATM”

In the series of Lee Child-penned books on which Reacher is based, the biggest constant that isn’t the sequoia with arms physical size of the former military investigator himself is his unwavering desire to wander. After a period where the trouble in some town finds him and he takes the time to settle it – whether by fist, firearm, or flame – Reacher will invariably be found either hitching his way out of there or buying a ticket on the next bus departing the local depot. Thousands of years ago, there were people who cowered close to the campfire and those who walked free of that warmth and safety. And Reacher, this large-sized itinerant ass kicker randomly accessing the two-lane highways of America, has always believed in his descent from the latter.

So, like David Carradine’s Caine in Kung Fu, Michael Landon’s probationary angel in Highway to Heaven, or even Natasha Lyonne’s Charlie Cale in Poker Face, Alan Ritchson’s TV version of Jack Reacher seems destined for successive sets of co-stars. After he helped Officer Roscoe Conklin (Willa Fitzgerald) and Chief of Detectives Oscar Finlay (Malcolm Goodwin) free Margarve, Georgia of its problem with corrupt politicians and psychopathic counterfeiters – and in the process solved the murder of his only brother – Reacher packed his toothbrush and passport and stuck out his big thumb. And neither Fitzgerald nor Goodwin are on the scene as Reacher Season 2 picks up the thread.

It’s been a little over two years since Margrave. Reacher’s in a thrift store in small town Arkansas, trading his existing clothes for a refreshed set, when a quick stop at an ATM yields two pieces of information. First, Reacher senses the woman in front of him has been carjacked for quick cash. Without further discussion, he strides over to her minivan, shatters the driver’s side window with one punch, hauls the hoodlum halfway out, punches him with his own gun, reunites the woman with her son, and leaves the mess for the local cops to sort out. He prefers anonymous intervention, or at least as anonymous as a giant guy with deadly weapons for fists can get. But Reacher won’t be staying in town, anyway, because the ATM gave him a second key piece of information. A deposit in the specific amount of $1,030.00, which Reacher immediately translates to “10-30.” It’s money in the form of a radio distress call, which means Frances Neagley (Maria Sten) is trying to reach her off-the-grid former commanding officer.

Bringing Neagley into the events of Reacher Season 1 was a big change from Killing Floor, the book it was adapted from, but a welcome one. Sten is fantastic as the former army staff sergeant and right hand to Reacher when he built his 110th Special Investigations MP unit from the ground up, and Season 2 takes on Bad Luck and Trouble, which finds forces unknown killing the former members of that very elite team. (Reacher author Lee Child is an executive producer on the TV version, which was developed by Scorpion and FUBAR creator Nick Santora.) Reunited with Neagley in New York City, Reacher learns that whatever former 110th member Calvin Franz (Luke Bilyk) was working on as a private investigator, it got him tossed bodily from a helicopter. He was tortured for either revenge or information, and then they dumped him from the sky to avoid ballistics. Even worse, Neagley can’t reach anyone else from their old team. What the hell is going on? 

Reacher season two also spends some time in the flashback zone. In the past, we see how Major Reacher hand picked his group of army special investigators, which also includes blades and brass knuckles guy David O’Donnell (Shaun Sipos), forensic accountant Karla Dixon (Serinda Swan), guitar-playing chill bro Swan (Shannon Kook), and close pals Orozco (Edsson Morales) and Sanchez (Andres Collantes). But when Reacher’s idea of a team-building exercise leads to the obvious setup for a knock-down, drag-out bar fight, Reacher cuts away with only one body getting thrown through a plate glass window. This decision counts as a flagrant miss. If there’s one thing Reacher needs to always be doing, it’s engaging with every opportunity for its signature huge dude to stomp on people. 

In the present, Reacher and Neagley do manage to raise O’Donnell on the blower, and he joins them in NYC with one simple question. “Who are we killing?” They’re not interested in leaving Franz’s murder for the NYPD to solve. Especially when a search of Swan’s house finds his beloved dog dead from dehydration, which means another of their team was taken and killed. (The only way Swan doesn’t come home is if he couldn’t come home.) “There’s someone taking out the special investigators,” Reacher says, “and they’re coming after us.” And then he does that thing where he looks over his shoulder with the promise to start throwing ‘bows.

So who is it that Reacher and his group are up against? Who are the helicopter body tossers? Well, one guy who’s been tailing Reacher and Neagley in New York is in regular phone contact with a grim-faced Robert Patrick, who manages to sell a line where he says he doesn’t recognize Neagley’s “Sarah Connor” hotel alias. But there’s also another dude taking stock of the team’s movements, played by the always awesome Domenick Lombardozzi. And we also get a few shots of someone traveling under various aliases with the initials “A.M” (Ferdinand Kingsley). He has the composed look of an international businessman. But he also slits the throats of two forgers who provide him with fake IDs, so this guy’s clearly on his way to cause Reacher some kind of trouble.

Neagley, O’Donnell, and Reacher have recovered the flash drive full of encoded data that Franz secretly mailed to himself for safekeeping. Their next move is to try and track down Orozco and Sanchez in Atlantic City. And in the meantime, as he considers the busy lives of his friends and former colleagues – Neagley working in lucrative private security, O’Donnell with his wife and young family – Reacher is left to consider the cost of his wanderer’s existence. With no phone and no address, he couldn’t be present for Franz when his old friend truly needed him. And now Franz is dead along with an unknown number of their old team. Reacher only knows one way to put things right. And that’s to find whoever started this and throw them from a chopper.

Johnny Loftus (@glennganges) is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift.