While Reacher’s Neagley spinoff remains a risk for the Prime Video action thriller, the decision to take a leaf out of the Bosch franchise’s book is a wise one for the series. It’s fair to say that Prime Video’s Reacher franchise doesn’t need any advice when it comes to succeeding on streaming. Now that The Boys has finished its five-season run, Reacher is a serious contender for the title of the streaming service’s flagship series.
That’s a big claim when Prime Video’s Lord of the Rings prequel The Rings of Power is one of the most expensive TV shows ever made, but the critical response and viewership numbers don’t lie. Reacher is one of the most popular shows on Prime Video among critics and viewers alike, and Reacher season 4’s darker story seems set to keep this four-year hot streak alive. The R-rated adaptation of Lee Child’s novel series has captured the hearts of a huge audience with its crowd-pleasing action.
However, a big part of Reacher’s success comes from its leading man, the War Machine franchise’s Alan Ritchson. After spending the 2010s emerging in breakout roles from Blue Mountain State to Titans, Ritchson finally received the star vehicle he deserved when Prime Video’s show cast him as Child’s hulking soldier of fortune. Reacher’s title character is a major part of what keeps viewers tuning into the series, which is why it is wise for the franchise’s first spinoff, Neagley, to borrow a trick from Prime Video’s earlier detective drama Bosch.
Starring Titus Welliver as the titular homicide detective Harry Bosch, a troubled but brilliant cop, Bosch lasted seven seasons on Prime Video before spawning a three-season sequel series, Bosch: Legacy, a two-season spinoff, Ballard, and an upcoming prequel, Bosch: Start of Watch. The sheer size of Prime Video’s Bosch franchise proves that the series is almost as popular as Reacher.
Like the later action thriller, Bosch is also based on a series of bestselling novels of the same name. When the show launched its first spinoff, Ballard, its focus shifted from Welliver’s irascible detective to his longtime colleague, Maggie Q’s eponymous cold case specialist Renee Ballard. However, in an ingenious twist, Ballard season 1 featured Welliver in numerous season 1 outings, ensuring the show felt more like an expansion of the existing series than a cash-in.
Even though Welliver’s Bosch is only in three of season 1’s ten episodes, this was still enough to get viewers hooked and ensure that the show felt more like an extension of Bosch and less like a copy. Since the Bosch franchise is still going strong some 12 years after the original show debuted, Reacher’s spinoff Neagley could learn from this successful approach.
Even though Neagley will focus on Maria Sten’s Francis Neagley and her investigation into a friend’s suspicious death, the spinoff will reportedly feature Ritchson’s Reacher in a guest role capacity. Ritchson’s Neagley role repeats Ballard’s clever trick, ensuring fans of the original series feel like the new show isn’t an imitation but rather part of a contiguous, internally consistent fictional universe.
Of course, Neagley’s Reacher cameos still risk a major problem since Ritchson’s character is still, at the end of the day, Reacher. As such, the spinoff needs to ensure it doesn’t end up prioritizing him over her due to his existing popularity. Part of what made Bosch’s spinoff work was the fact that Welliver’s role was limited to only three season 1 episodes, so Neagley should keep the show's role for Ritchson’s beloved Reacher hero to a small handful of supporting appearances until the new series has established a solid fan base of its own.
