Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (2016) (SPOILERS) It was probably inevitable that Tom Cruise’s dedication to his declining “brand” meant Jack Reacher would renounce his stone-cold, death-machine mantle almost as soon as he had found his footing. But that doesn’t mean we have to like it. As other commentators have noted, with nineteen novels to choose from, what were the chances Cruise would pick the one that softens the character up, giving him a potential daughter and (only ever potential) love interest to pick away at his concealed human side? But then Cruise, amid his scientological myopia, probably thought he was playing safe, to his strengths, despite Jack Reacher getting a sequel based on the slenderest of threads (courtesy of post-theatrical income streams) and the vocal outcry about the half-pint not being of suitable altitude to fill Reacher’s heavyweight boots. He clearly felt he needed to steer the character further off piste from the self-sufficient introvert,