MovieChat Forums > Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (2016) Discussion > First one MUCH better: my theory on why ...

First one MUCH better: my theory on why (spoilers on both)

posted 7 years ago by DietSoda78
15 replies | jump to latest

(1) Plot. The idea of covering up a murder through a mass shooting is simple and brilliant, much more engaging than any part of the plot in JRNLB. Oh, wow, a conctractor is selling to Afghan opium cartels and making tons of money, and the big mystery is that they're also importing drugs? The big reveal of finding the opium inside the missile canisters was a total fizzle. Plots this straightfoward can work fine if there's great characters, but...

(2) ...Character chemistry. The chemistry between Cruise/Pike in JR, and between Cruise/Smulders characters in JRNLB is about the same. They might hook up someday, but they can't right now because they're all just so stoic and asexual and PG-13 about everything. No wonder social conservatives love Lee Child so much. The heyday in the blood is tame...but JR had the wisdom not to spend much time on the chemistry; it was downplayed, in the background. But in JRNLB, I haven't seen so many scenes of two characters staring at each other but not touching each other outside of Twilight.

The "daughter" was a bright spot. The teenage sidekick, sarcastic but still a kid with a good heart, is one of the biggest cliches in action films, but for good reason.

(3) Most important, in terms of my tastes: action scenes. The action scenes in JR are among my favorite in recent years. They're quirky, elemental, unpredictable. Picture JR getting clocked by the baseball bat and then dodging the yokel's blows by simply staying in the tub, his attackers too hopped up to actually hit him, or JR then breaking the guys finger with the trigger guard, or the simplicity of the car chase, that is all about the FEEL of driving a stick shift muscle car.

And it's almost two different characters. JR (in the first film) is not Jason Bourne or Jason Statham; he's a realistic fighter. He's only able to take on 5 guys in a bar parking lot because they're local hoods, drunk and casual, with no real training. I LOVE Cruise's shrug when one of them says, "You done this before?" It's like he's communicating, "Um, actually yes. I'd much rather go in and eat...Are you SURE you want to do this?" When Reacher goes up against top-shelf Mercs in the final scene, with only Gunny to back him up, he comes across as terrified at times (ie, pinned down in the Mercedes), because he's no invincible super-soldier. Just a very good one.

But in JRNLB he continually takes down top-shelf Mercs, supposedly all ex-military, with a few blows. And the kiss of death: like a cardboard Jason Statham character, he acts completely calm and casual, making dumb wisecracks, before going up against 4 well trained guys who want to kill him, barely breaking a sweat. Apart from the senior bad guy, Reacher comes across as more-or-less invincible, which is boring.

Swagger + vulnerability = classic alpha-male stoic masculine character. With it's classic Western plot (well-meaning drifter coming into a classic American town, solves a crime, then takes down the whole syndicate), and it's hard-boiled dialogue ("I can't afford you." "I'm not a hooker!" "Then I REALLY can't afford you."), JR is a classic. JRNLB was fine, but a pale shadow of the first one.

Thoughts? Other than that I have too much time on my hands (guilty)?

[–] transmentalist 7 years ago

Pretty much agree on all points - thanks for ID'ing them

Zwick's action scenes were largely unclear, too many quick-cuts & close-ups

And I was getting at this before but couldn't put my finger on it: there were too many well-trained thugs in this movie for Reacher to credibly handle

The bar fight was fun because (A) we got to see everything and (B) we could believe a trained veteran could take on five low-rent yokels single-handedly

In this film, he takes out four trained mercs, at least two armed with GUNS, at close-quarters (everything I've ever heard about close-quarter fighting says that numbers beat training, every time)

Seems like they amped up Reacher's bas-assery beyond credibility in this one

Though I did like the Josey Wales aspect, forcing Reacher & Turner to become surrogate parents against all their instincts, training and experience

[–] DietSoda78 7 years ago

The surrogate parent scenes were, at times, downright adorable. The expression on Reacher and Turner's face as they both try to figure out how to exert authority on someone that they have no authority over. Without this aspect, all we would have had was exposition heavy conversations between the two of them in a series of hotel rooms. Now that would have been a true snooze...

[–] alisaifmemon 7 years ago

I don't really understand why Susan was arrested.Granted, she may have been suspicious about Afghanistan,but wouldn't it have been easier just to kill her?Also, why did she refuse to meet him in jail?Was it because she found out he was a dad?

[–] DietSoda78 7 years ago

In the film, I think that the answers to these questions are clear enough, but the answers are neither that interesting or that convincing. Apparently, she refuses to see him officially because he was accused of being a deadbeat dad, and unofficially because she didn't want someone as volatile as him to get involved in what she was hoping to be a fair trial.

And given that the assassins approach her in jail, it seems clear enough that they had her arrested in order to both discredit her (now she's a murdered corrupt accused officer, as opposed to a victim people will care about) and to temporarily isolate her.

But given how urgent it was to have her dead, and how ruthless the baddies are in this film, it seems odd that they would risk her opening her own unofficial investigation. By having her arrested, at least one person knows that there is something very fishy going on with the Afghanistan investigation, that her investigators must have uncovered something there: her. Even without the Reacher factor, she would have had precious days before her death to get that truth out, to get her many friends in MP community to look into things, risks that it doesn't seem like the baddies would want to take.

If they can break in and plant a hard drive, they could have simply broken in and shot her. Much less risky. But if baddies didn't toy with their victims or try to plant elaborate frames, we wouldn't have the plots of half our action movies...

[–] Movie_Riggs 7 years ago

You're right all around, my friend. Pretty much everything I said in my review you discussed even moreso. Good analysis of this movie.

[–] standard_guy 7 years ago

I don't know about "social conservatives" liking the books so much being indicated by these characters not screwing. He bangs the female lead in at least 80% of the books. DId you actually read any of them?

[–] radarking 7 years ago

What standard_guy said. JR gets a lot of p-$$y in the books. A LOT. So I'm not sure where this ridiculous "social conservatives" comment is coming from, but it's definitely not from someone who's familiar with the character.

"It seems we are not all in agreement."
"I disagree!"

[–] DietSoda78 7 years ago

Fair enough. I could get snarky and assert that I am VERY familiar with the character as presented in the films, and that this is a thread about the films, but I understand that Jack Reacher is quite the icon in the paperback world, and that my comment seemed to say something about him.

My comment was entirely based on two things: a comment from one of my super-Christian friends (like, 7 kids, no birth control level conservative), who said that he liked Reacher because he didn't play around.

The character as presented in the films seems way too cool to ever have sex, or even to particularly want to. Does Reacher ever read a book? Have a casual conversation? Watch sports? Um...this deserves it's own thread, actually. I'm not much of a book reader in this genre...

[–] cataclysmmm 7 years ago

You've hit the nail on the head. I did feel, however, that the cliched daughter was not a bright spot. Just an extra layer of baggage for our hero to lug around.

[–] AgentBlue 7 years ago

Yeah I agree with everything you typed.

Lose the Game!!!!!!!

[–] mobocracy 7 years ago

There's a Reacher book which centers on some kind of conspiracy involving Reacher as an MP investigating something at a base with special forces soldiers and he's not intimated by them at all.

They get described in the books as wiry little guys who can handle the long-distance running and physical challenges of special forces.

[–] zcarface86 7 years ago

Yep this feels like a family roadtrip compare to the first one. Regardless it's still tolerable fun mindless action flick. What really annoy me is the fake reaction from the henchmen during the scuffle in the warehouse. Like a father's reaction faking a grimace when role-playing with a child. Terrible acting.

[–] jdfan247 7 years ago

A lot of the criticisms of this movie compared to the first one are criticisms of the book itself, moreso than the movie adaptation. As a fan of the book series, I can tell you that One Shot (the book the first was based on) is much better source material than Never Go Back. Unsurprisingly, the screenplay for "Jack Reacher: Never Go Back" strayed further from the source material than the original "Jack Reacher" did in an attempt to make it more entertaining on screen. You can blame some of this on the acting and directing, but simply put it was easier to make a good movie out of the first one.

My only hope is that this movie makes enough profit to justify another sequel, and the powers that be select a better book from the series to adapt the next film.

[–] cabbageboy316 7 years ago

I think a problem this had is that Reacher works better without the various female accompaniment dragging him down, which is the entire plot of this film. He even notes as much at one point, almost like the character wants to break free of the plot and do his own thing, but the film won't let him.

I also think the whole plot of corruption in the U.S. military and its contractors is something a lot of people simply don't want to see. It seems a bit absurd that any of this stuff could happen in real life, or that this bunch of corporate mercs would frame army majors, kill colonels, etc. In the first one we had a cheesy Werner Herzog and his incompetent goons, which made for a fun time.

[–] Sythorn83 7 years ago

In the first one we had a cheesy Werner Herzog and his incompetent goons, which made for a fun time.

I believe you've hit the nail on the head with that sentence. The first Jack Reacher was straight up pulp neo-noir. It was cheesy in a cool, subdued way. This sequel went for more of a slick thriller vibe with a family element, which is missing the point ... especially since the plot--and many scenes therein--turned out to be so unbelievable.