History Series / Reacher

* TruerToTheText: Alan Ritchson is both taller and more muscular than Creator/TomCruise, making for a Reacher much closer in build to the books than [[Film/JackReacher his depiction in the 2016 film]][[note]]Studio executives were very aware of fan backlash to Tom Cruise's casting and put a lot of emphasis on candidates' measurements, especially how tall they were in their bare feet[[/note]].

** Reacher being really bothered by the Kliner farm having too much feed for the number of cows in the pastures, to the point where several other characters express frustration with his focusing on it. [[spoiler:He's of course completely correct -- they're using the feed as part of the counterfeit ring when bleaching the printed bills, to clean up any chemical spills and thus keeping the DEA from coming to town. The farm has 116 cows, just shy of the 120 that would subject it to state inspections, so the operation keeps it below that number and successfully covers up where the bills are processed.]]

* LastNameBasis: Reacher is always addressed as "Reacher". Flashbacks show even his own mother and brother called him that. He even corrects people who refer to him as "Mr Reacher", preferring to just be addressed as "Reacher". Flashbacks to his military career show that he didn't even like being addressed as "Major Reacher" or "sir" and insisted on just being called by his last name.

'''David O'Donnell:''' It's sleazy adjacent. Hey, I got private school tuition to pay for, okay?\\\

*** As tough as he is, Reacher is not invulnerable. During one fight, his opponent recovers the gun he had and holds it on Reacher which forces Reacher to surrender and he is only saved by Roscoe shooting the other man dead. He is similarly shown to be taken aback and wary after attacking KJ when KJ pulls a knife on him.

* TokenEvilTeammate: [[spoiler:Swan]] is suspected of being this to the 110th, as he is employed at the villain's company, is the only member they can't account for, the circumstances of his disappearance don't match the deaths of the others, and there's at least one past incident where he seemed willing to skim a brick of drugs for quick cash. Reacher refuses to believe it, but Neagley surmises that he is only reluctant to consider the possibility because he would then consider himself partly responsible for the deaths of his friends, even though he shouldn't.

* BigBadWannabe: [[spoiler:KJ Kliner]] talks a big game and murdered quite a few people, but he's nowhere near the physical threat he likes to think he is. [[spoiler:Dawson]] gives Reacher the toughest fight of any character in the first season. [[spoiler:KJ Kliner]], by comparison, fights Reacher twice and is clearly outmatched both times, ultimately putting up very little in the way of a challenge.

* BlackBraAndPanties: Roscoe is shown wearing at least black panties when she and Reacher stay the night in a motel, though she has on a t-shirt so it's unclear what color her bra is (or if she's even wearing one).

* SheCleansUpNicely: Not that Neagley has ever looked homely, but the team has to dress up for a black tie event and Neagley has to look the part, so she wears makeup and a lovely dress...and is ''ungodly annoyed'' by having to wear it and to look utterly gorgeous even though she totally is. Two of her teammates are rendered speechless when they see her and she just reiterates that she doesn't want to hear one word about it from them.

** When Shane Langston (played by Creator/RobertPatrick) is told that Neagley checked into a hotel under the name [[Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay Sarah Connor]] his hireling asks who "Sarah Connor" is in reference to. Langston quickly states that he, "...(doesn't) give a shit."

* AdaptationalNiceGuy: In the book, Hubble's employer at the bank callously fired him before he got forcibly recruited into the counterfeiting ring. In the show, she seems pleasant enough and reveals that Hubble quit his job (due to being threatened, it turns out).
* AdaptationalVillainy: In the novel, KJ was just as much of a scumbag as he is here, being part of the cleaner crew, but this adaptation has him depicted far more worse than he already was, with him [[spoiler: torturing and murdering Stevenson and his pregnant wife, killing Mary Beth in the subway, slitting his own father’s throat using an agonizing technique, and being the one who shot Joe]].

* ArtisticLicenseLinguistics: The use of "carpetbagger" by a white Southerner who at most might be thirty years old. This term hasn't been spoken aloud by anyone from the South in a ''very'' long time, as the term was referring to the Reconstruction Era and at most, maybe someone elderly would say it, but certainly not the snot-nosed psycho KJ.

* PantsPositiveSafety: Reacher usually carries his Desert Eagle tucked in his waistband at the small of his back. Although no sensible person with firearms training would ever do that under normal circumstances, it's justified in his case because he simply doesn't ''have'' a holster he could put it in, and it's still better than shoving it in his pocket.

'''Reacher:''' [[BluntYes YES!]] ''[Puts his foot over Russo's in the pedal and grabs the steering wheel]''

** Reacher correctly figures that Margrave is a key location for an international counterfeiting conspiracy but his reasoning is backwards. [[spoiler: The money isn't printed in Venezuela, smuggled to Margrave and then distributed across the US. The money is printed in Margrave, smuggled to Venezuela and then distributed internationally]].

** Reacher being really bothered by the Kliner farm having too much feed for its cows. [[spoiler:He's of course completely correct -- they're using the feed as part of the counterfeit ring to bleach the printed bills. The farm has 116 cows, just shy of the 120 that would subject it to state inspections, so the operation keeps it below that number and successfully covers up where the bills are processed.]]

** Downplayed, but Stevenson and his wife decide to move closer to her parents in a different town as bodies keep piling up and it becomes clear that the investigation will likely lead to the end of Margrave as they know it. [[spoiler:Sadly, before they get a chance, the hit squad comes after them for information they don't even have.]]

* SelfMadeOrphan: [[spoiler:KJ]] is revealed to be [[spoiler:Kliner Sr.]]'s assassin. [[spoiler:He felt he was too weak to run their operation.]]

** Reacher can deduce minute details just through observation, such as when he is able to figure out that Finlay is a Harvard graduate, an ex-smoker, and estranged from his wife after spending just a few minute together in a conference room. [[spoiler:And just like Sherlock, Reacher can get things wrong since he usually goes by an assumption of details that are close to being right, but not exactly, and can let his own biases cloud his judgement. Case in point, he based his deduction of Finlay's marriage based on his age (as a younger man, divorce was the more probable scenario), and Finlay's reaction seemingly confirms his logic. Finlay later reveals she had passed away. He also ''completely'' overlooked KJ as a threat, seeing him as just a SpoiledBrat and being blinded to [[NotSoHarmlessVillain how dangerous he actually was]], considering him a mere lackey for the new leader of the operation like Teale, rather than [[TheManInFrontOfTheMan the actual leader]].]]

** Season 1: The Margrave counterfeiting ring tries to pin Joe's murder on a seemingly random outsider who just showed up in town. Unfortunately for them, not only is said outsider (Reacher) a highly trained and effective criminal investigator, his being arrested [[PullingTheThread leads to him learning that his brother was murdered and the circumstances of the murder don't add up]], which leads to a RoaringRampageOfRevenge. Reacher even flat-out says at one point that if the cops hadn't arrested him, he likely wouldn't have found out Joe was dead for years, as they had grown apart.

* WardrobeFlawOfCharacterization: Finlay wears expensive suits that are a bit too gaudy for a police detective, especially one in a small town in the deep south. Reacher surmises that it's because Finlay's wife isn't around to correct his fashion mistakes.

* WhiteBreadAndBlackBrotha: {{Inverted|Trope}} with the white Reacher and the black Finlay who more or less fulfil the opposite stereotypes: the former is TheDrifter, prone to being somewhat impulsive and reckless, while being [[HeroicBuild built like an armoured vehicle]] and [[OneManArmy completely unstoppable in combat]], while the latter is a Harvard-educated, [[SharpDressedMan bespectacled and besuited]], vegetarian ByTheBookCop.

* AllegedLookalikes: The Reacher brothers are described as being near-identical, to the point Joe's assistant and lover mistakes Jack for Joe on the phone and [[spoiler:as she dies]], which Jack even claiming she'd recognise him without having met him purely off of his resemblance to his brother. Later, another associate of Joe's even remarks that there must have been "something in the water at the Reachers' place", ostensibly because Jack's build is recognisably similar to Joe's. When we finally see Joe (via flashbacks), he's a much slimmer built man lacking Jack's sheer bulk, square jaw, and military crew-cut or even hair color, instead having shaggy black hair and a far less hunky appearance. The only thing they have in common is their height. (Their younger versions look rather similar though, despite the actors not being related.)

* ImmediateSelfContradiction: Reacher takes out a carjacker and rescues a small child. When the grateful mother asks who he is, Reacher replies "Someone who prefers not to get involved." After he just involved himself.

* SpannerInTheWorks: The hitchhikers who went off the trail at the Catskills and stumbled upon Franz's body. If it weren’t for them, his body would have gone unnoticed for months or even years, certainly too late for Reacher or the Special Investigators to have ever been able to do anything to foil his murderer's plans coming to fruition in the next few weeks.

* ArtisticLicenseLaw: Even in a tiny town with a population of only 1,700 people, there is no way two police officers who thought they spotted a murderer would burst into a diner, guns drawn, without evacuating the diner first. It's also a count of ArtisticLicenseGunSafety when one of the officers is pointing a shotgun at Reacher, but all of the patrons behind Reacher could be hit with stray bullets if he ended up needing to shoot him. Both officers would've been written up and possibly fired by any sane police precinct in the country for that behavior. Given how corrupt Margrave turns out to be, this is possibly explained by the chain of command enabling this sort of behaviour.

* AdaptationalSexuality: Frances Neagley is asexual and aromantic. Maria Sten is a lesbian.

* ActuallyPrettyFunny: Although Finley and Reacher have some friction early in their relationship, when Finley (very atypically) curses out Kliner Sr., Reacher can be seen hiding a smirk behind his hand.

* AdaptationalBadass: Roscoe and Finlay take out several bad guys at the end of the season, even killing [[spoiler: [[CoDragons Picard and Teale]] (whom they had beef with)]], while they were originally killed by Reacher in the book. [[spoiler:Hubble]] also has a brief badass moment at the end when he headshots a mook while rescuing [[spoiler:his kids]].
* AdaptationalEarlyAppearance: Frances Neagley appears to help Reacher in the last few episodes, while in the novels, she was originally introduced in "Without Fail".

* PlatonicLifePartners: Neagley and Reacher; they're clearly as close as family, closer even as they appear to have zero compunction about stripping naked in front of one-another and don't even react to the other's state, but there's zero attraction and Neagley herself appears to be a minor ShipperOnDeck for Reacher and Roscoe.

** Despite knowing everything there is to know about Reacher's military history, KJ still goes out of his way to antagonize him. [[spoiler:Once his true nature is revealed, it becomes clear that he was [[BloodKnight actively looking forward to the challenge]] of killing such a formidable opponent, but obviously lacked the skill to do so]].

* CantKillYouStillNeedYou: The bad guys capture Reacher near the end of episode 7, but they can't kill him because [[spoiler:Hubble]] has gone to ground and Reacher is the only person skilled enough to find him without a paper trail.
* CavalryBetrayal: Reacher enlists the help of [[spoiler:Senator Lavoy's ex-military private security]] in dealing with Langston, only for them to turn on his team after [[spoiler:Langston and his cohorts are all dead because Lavoy doesn't want any loose ends]]. Unlike most examples of a CavalryBetrayal, they do actually help win the fight that they came to fight (in a highly effective manner), but afterward, they are prepared to end their EnemyMine alliance with extreme prejudice. Reacher anticipates their betrayal and reveals he called in Homeland Security, who arrive just in the nick of time.

* DavidVsGoliath: This usually ends up being the case with most people Reacher faces off against, as he's naturally towering a foot over most people and is built like a brick shithouse, but it's most apparent in [[spoiler:Reacher's face-off with Dawson Kliner in the penultimate episode. Dawson is shorter than most people and the height and muscle disparity would clearly indicate a fist-fight between them would end decisively in Reacher's favour, but surprisingly, Jack actually ''loses'' in hand-to-hand combat with him. He makes up for his shorter stature with [[KillerRabbit relentless ferocity and single-minded determination]], attacking Jack with a crowbar and ignoring any guns in favour of beating him to death, shrugging off most of Reacher's blows and bouncing back whenever he's tossed around the room. Jack actually seems taken aback by his sheer energy in a fight and ultimately has to resort to blasting him point-blank with three [[HandCannon Desert Eagle]] rounds to put him down]].

* DiabolusExMachina: Reacher and the remaining 110th have been kicking the ass of everyone Langston throws at them with little effort and barely a few scratches, and just need to find out where they're having the Little Wing buy to stop them....[[spoiler:but then out of the blue, O'Donnell and Dixon have been kidnapped offscreen and now Reacher has to surrender to stop them being tortured to death like Franz and the others were. Its ''particularly'' egregious because with how much fight the two have previously shown putting up, its hard to buy Langston's men being able to take them down alive, never mind the fact up until this point, he's been trying to have them killed on-sight rather than captured. While capturing them to force Reacher to surrender ''is'' a smarter plan, up until this point, Langston had been somewhat defined as being completely out of his depth as a BigBad and not really the kind to think that far ahead, not to mention the only way he was able to capture them is because Reacher (offscreen) apparently used Russo's easily trackable police-issue car to drive to the motel they were staying at, which is a remarkably big oversight of Reacher's. It's not helped by the fact in the previous episode, Reacher had Langston dead to rights and he only got away thanks to an out-of-nowhere helicopter showing up to rescue him, which also feels like this.]]
* DidntThinkThisThrough: A minor example. KJ spray paints the word "WHORE" on Roscoe's car with the intent of getting Reacher in trouble and it works. He ends up not pressing charges because, as Reacher points out afterwards, having Reacher arrested would allow Reacher legal access to the Kliners' financial information and records, potentially exposing their shady business dealings. The net result is that KJ gets bitch slapped out of his seat for nothing.

* ElitesAreMoreGlamorous: [[spoiler:Senator Lavoy's private security detail]] is made up of several flavors of former Special Forces and they prove to be absolutely devastating when they assist Reacher and Neagley in [[spoiler:the final battle of season 2, carving through Langston's men like a hot knife through butter]]. It is very telling of the opinion Reacher has of their skills that his plant to deal with [[spoiler:their inevitable CavalryBetrayal is to call in Homeland Security to arrest them rather than even attempt to fight them.]]

* NotSoHarmlessVillain: Two examples [[spoiler: in KJ and his cousin Dawson. KJ is presented as a spoiled rich who runs errands for his criminal father, and Dawson seems to just follow him around, shooting mean looks. As it turns out, Dawson is sufficiently AxeCrazy to be a serious threat. He kills a substantial number of people and comes dangerously close to taking Reacher out in single combat. And far from being his father's lackey, KJ was the one conducting a campaign of torture and murder to protect their counterfeiting operation. He ends up killing his own father to take control and become the true BigBad of the season.]]

* RevengeBeforeReason: Subverted. When Finlay warns Reacher not to go off and kill Kliner Sr before they get all the information about his operation, Reacher tells him he has no intention of doing that just yet, as simply killing Kliner wouldn't put a halt to whatever he's doing and thus wouldn't properly avenge Joe's death. Reacher intends to first dismantle whatever is going on, ''then'' he'll kill Kliner.

* ElitesAreMoreGlamorous: Senator Lavoy's private security detail is made up of several flavors of former Special Forces and they prove to be absolutely devastating [[spoiler:when they assist Reacher and Neagley in the final battle of season 2, carving through Langston's men like a hot knife through butter]]. It is very telling of the opinion Reacher has of their skills that his plant to deal with [[spoiler:their inevitable CavalryBetrayal is to call in Homeland Security to arrest them rather than even attempt to fight them.]]