Reacher Season 3’s Biggest Action Scene Pays Homage To A Sylvester Stallone Classic

This post contains spoilers for “Reacher” season 3 episode 6.

Jack Reacher doesn’t need to prove himself as a hero at this point. Across 29 books and what is now almost three seasons of Prime Video’s “Reacher” series, the character has proven he is every bit the archetypal American action hero, dispatching armies of enemies with ease and weathering the kind of beatings that would snuff out lesser heroes. He’s an itinerant former military policeman with an unwavering commitment to justice and chivalry who is always one step ahead of those that dare to cross him. Fans know the formula and Reacher delivers, time and time again.

But there’s no doubt this particular American hero is indebted to those that came before him. While he clearly shares a lot in common with other contemporary characters, such as the similarly unstoppable John Wick, he is also quite clearly the modern equivalent of the muscle-bound action heroes that proliferated in the 1980s. Lead actor Alan Ritchson — who is arguably on his way to becoming one of the best action actors of all time — is as close to the hulking 6-foot 5-inch, 250-pound bruiser of Lee Child’s popular book series as we’re likely to get, and the show makes no attempt to play down his imposing physique — as demonstrated in the latest episode of season 3.

In episode 6, Reacher is seen shirtless once again, accusing Sonya Cassidy’s DEA agent Susan Duffy — one of the best things to happen to “Reacher” yet — of sneaking looks at his impressive figure as he changes out of his wetsuit. But the episode also pays homage to one of the most beloved action stars of the ’80s with an action sequence that might be its most direct reference to a spiritual Jack Reacher predecessor yet.

Aside from Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone is the epitome of the ’80s action hero — mostly thanks to his “Rambo” franchise, in which he played the titular Vietnam War veteran. In 1982’s “First Blood,” based on David Morrell’s 1972 novel of the same name, we were introduced to Stallone’s returning soldier in a story that didn’t actually depict John Rambo killing anybody, mainly because Stallone was worried that all the killing in First Blood” would ruin his career and requested it be removed from the script. Rather, it showcased his elite guerilla warfare abilities, as the titular veteran took on the Sheriff’s department of the small town of Hope, Washington, the national guard, and the state patrol in a remote woodland. Though Rambo didn’t kill anyone in the inaugural “Rambo,” flick, he’s quickly established as the kind of preternaturally-gifted combatant that would become the archetypal ’80s action hero. As Rambo’s former commanding officer, Colonel Samuel R. Trautman (Richard Crenna) tells Sheriff William Teasle (Brian Dennehy) in the film, “I didn’t come here to rescue Rambo from you, I came here to rescue you from him.”

Alas, Trautman doesn’t save anybody from John Rambo’s skills. As a former Green Beret, Stallone’s hero makes short work of everybody sent after him, at one point painting his skin to blend in with the foliage and taking out an entire team of national guard troops without killing a single one. When 1985’s “Rambo First Blood: Part II” arrived, however, the character would abandon his aversion to killing, as evidenced by a sequence that saw a mud-covered Rambo emerging from various forest environs to dispatch a team of Soviet troops. In his review for the Los Angeles Times, Michael Wilmington described the scene thusly:

“The air reeks with sweat and tangled foliage. A squad of Soviets is searching for one man, one walking hunk of slaughter and vengeance […] One of the soldiers pauses by an embankment of pure mud. Suddenly, the mud stirs. The mud breathes. The mud glares angrily at the marauding Soviet. The mud reaches out with one tawny mud-arm, throttles the invader and sends a hunting knife deep into his chest.”

Alongside the image of Rambo wielding a giant machine gun, Rambo “the mud-man, battalion of one” became emblematic of the character — a soldier so adept at jungle warfare that he basically becomes one with the landscape. It’s this to which “Reacher” pays homage with its latest episode, and it’s one heck of a tribute.

In “First Blood,” Colonel Samuel R. Trautman describes his former soldier as “the best, with guns, with knives, with his bare hands. A man who’s been trained to ignore pain, ignore weather, to live off the land, to eat things that would make a billy goat puke.” That wouldn’t be a bad description of Jack Reacher, who as a former military policeman is trained to do everything the most elite soldiers can do — but better.

In episode 6 of season 3, we see how Reacher quickly adapts to exactly the kind of situation in which John Rambo so frequently found himself. After his cover is blown at Zachary Beck’s (Anthony Michael Hall) mansion, Alan Ritchson’s hero has to make a quick escape, which he does in typically bombastic style by driving a plough through the mansion grounds, almost running over Olivier Richters’ Paulie, the hulking henchman that somehow makes Reacher himself look small.

Once free, however, the plough breaks down and Reacher is forced to retreat into the woods, where he’s quickly followed by henchmen working for the season’s villain, Xavier Quinn (Brian Tee). It’s then that we get what scans as a full-on tribute to Rambo and his jungle warfare skills, with Reacher painting his body with mud and taking out every member of the hit-squad. Making the allusion all the more obvious is the fact that he uses a dagger for many of his kills, much like John J. Rambo himself. At one point, he even emerges from the forest behind the squad leader and, in the words of the LA Times’ Michael Wilmington “sends a hunting knife deep into his chest.”

There’s nothing in this sequence that necessarily makes the Rambo link overt. Reacher doesn’t utter any famous lines from Stallone’s franchise, and there’s no bandana in sight. But the whole thing is almost certainly inspired, at least in part, by the franchise to which Jack Reacher and his creator Lee Child are surely indebted.

The forest sequence in episode 6 of “Reacher” season 3 is one of the best action set-pieces in the series yet. We’ve seen Reacher dole out pure barbarity against entire prison gangs — in what remains one of the best fights from “Reacher” — but his tactical guerilla killing spree in this episode reveals more about the man’s diverse range of skills and his ability to adapt to any situation at a moment’s notice. It’s also a fully adoring tribute to the “Rambo” movies, and once Reacher is done taking out Xavier Quinn’s goons, the “Rambo” allusions look as though they’re set to continue.

For a second after Reacher’s forest sequence, it seems as though the episode is going to wrap up with a face-off between Reacher and Paulie, à la Rambo’s final standoff against the sheriff in “First Blood.” The climax of the very first “Rambo” film saw Sylvester Stallone’s hero do battle with sheriff Will Teasle (Brian Dennehy) in the small town of Hope, Washington at night. In “Reacher” episode 6, after dispatching Quinn’s goons, Reacher escapes to the local town where he hides out at a local laundromat. Meanwhile, Paulie tracks him to the town and for a second, as Quinn’s henchman surveys the small, deserted town illuminated only by glowing storefronts, it seemed as if Reacher and Paulie are set to re-enact Rambo’s final showdown under cover of darkness from “First Blood.”

Of course, in that original movie, John Rambo breaks down as a result of his PTSD from the Vietnam war, but Reacher wouldn’t be caught dead buckling under pressure. Paulie returns to Beck’s mansion and we’re left waiting for the final fight between him and Reacher. But when that battle does arrive, it’s sure to be one of the highlights of this season — much like this episode’s Rambo homage.