Jack Reacher has never been particularly interested in putting down roots, but that hasn’t stopped the people he’s encountered over the years from becoming increasingly important to his world. Prime Video’s Reacher has already expanded beyond Alan Ritchson‘s wandering former military policeman with the spin-off series Neagley, starring Maria Sten. Now the man who created the character believes another familiar face could be next in line for their own spin-off.
Speaking exclusively with Collider for the release of Chain Reaction, the latest Jack Reacher novel, Lee Childhas confirmed that he thinks Susan Turner could be an ideal candidate for another series. The character, previously played by Cobie Smulders in Jack Reacher: Never Go Back, returns in the new book with a considerably more powerful position within the military, and Child believes her expanded role could provide Prime Video with another opportunity to build on the success of its franchise. He told Collider:
“I was glad that Andrew brought back Susan Turner. Good character, but also a spin-off opportunity because we’ve already got Neagley, and Amazon tends to want as much as possible if it’s working. And so, do they want another spin-off? In which case, she’ll do.”
Now a general, Turner commands CSA G-99 Section, an elite military investigative organization that operates independently of the usual command structure and reports directly to the Army’s Chief of Staff. It’s the next iteration of the 110th, and essentially, she’s running the Army’s own FBI, and that’s a premise that could easily sustain a television series without requiring Reacher to show up every week. In fact, it sounds ideal.
Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz Which Action Hero Would Be Your Perfect Partner? Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt
Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive — with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably shouldn’t work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back.
🎖️Rambo
🍸James Bond
🏺Indiana Jones
🔧John McClane
🎭Ethan Hunt
01
You’re dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner? The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you.
02
You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission.
03
You’re pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what someone is really made of.
04
The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are.
05
How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability.
06
Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.
07
Things go badly wrong and you’re captured. What do you trust your partner to do? Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters.
08
What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn’t replace? A great partner fills the gap you didn’t know you had.
09
Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.
10
It’s the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one.
Your Partner Has Been Assigned Your Perfect Partner Is…
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Rambo
Your partner doesn’t talk much, doesn’t need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you’ve finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You’ll never need to ask if he has your back. You’ll just know.
James Bond
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it’ll take you a moment to remember what’s actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You’ll never be bored. You’ll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Indiana Jones
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar’s eye and a brawler’s instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn’t matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you’ll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
John McClane
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren’t so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Ethan Hunt
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you’ve finished reading the briefing, and the plan he’s settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn’t exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
Why Did Susan Turner Return in ‘Chain Reaction’?
Speaking separately with Collider, Andrew Child, who has taken the lead on writing the Reacher novels, explained that bringing back somebody from Reacher’s past also solves one of the most persistent challenges of writing the character. Reacher doesn’t have a job, a home, or any particular destination, which means every novel needs a convincing reason for him to become involved in somebody else’s problems.
“One of the main issues that, from a practical point of view, we have is, and this gets harder with every installment, you always need a mechanism, like a hook, to bring him into the story. Some sort of coincidence. He happens to be in the place where these bad guys are doing this thing again. So we have to be really careful not to make that part too incredible.”
Turner’s existing relationship with Reacher provides a natural solution. In Chain Reaction, she seeks his help after one of her investigators is murdered, drawing him into a conspiracy involving artificial intelligence and corporate espionage. Rather than relying on another coincidence to put Reacher in the wrong place at the wrong time, Andrew explained that the character’s history gives the story a more convincing starting point. “By having somebody from his past reach out to him and ask for his help and bring him into the story, then that is a very good way of getting him on board without there being any, ‘Well, isn’t that a bit of a stretch? Is it too much of a coincidence?’ It’s a very watertight method for bringing him into the story at the beginning,” he explained.
There’s also the matter of Turner being one of the few people capable of operating alongside Reacher as an equal. Both previously commanded the 110th Military Police Special Investigations Unit, but while Reacher abandoned military life, Turner continued climbing the ranks. Andrew explained that her promotion creates an interesting dynamic between two characters who understand each other extraordinarily well.
“That’s the dynamic that has to be right. In this particular book, there’s an extra element because at this stage, even though Reacher is a civilian now, he had the rank of major, but by now Turner is a general. So I thought there was an interesting dynamic where they’re debating what to do. Reacher, with his military background, will defer to the general because there’s also the hierarchy involved. So it’s fun to play with those things.”
Lee Child and Andrew Child were speaking exclusively to Collider in support of Chain Reaction, the latest Jack Reacher novel, which arrives October 20. Child will also co-write Zero Margin, the first Frances Neagley novel, with Yasmin Angoe, arriving in Spring 2027. Explore the Reacher novels and more with a free trial of Audible.
