After an exciting ending to Season 2, viewers of Reacher are already anticipating Season 3, which will adapt Persuader, the seventh book in Lee Child’s Jack Reacher series. However, who is to say that Reacher must begin and stop with Jack Reacher?
The powers that be should consider creating more spin-offs in the Jack Reacher Universe now that the book series has been adapted into a live-action media phenomenon. The first of these spin-offs should feature the beloved character, Detective Oscar Finlay (Malcolm Goodwin).
Finlay, who was a member of the main cast in the first season of Reacher, makes a much-needed comeback as a guest star in Season 2. It’s the ideal time to investigate a Jack Reacher spin-off based around the severe, austere detective because Goodwin is as fantastic as Finlay.
Malcolm Goodwin Can Carry a ‘Reacher’ Spin-off
Throughout the first season of the show, co-star Malcolm Goodwin asserted himself surprisingly effectively, even though the show is named Reacher. The degree to which Goodwin was able to bear the emotional weight and heaviness of the series—particularly in the moments when star Alan Ritchson was off-screen—is astounding.
Finlay has an unlikable appeal that Goodwin captures, despite his sometimes too-serious and unforgiving demeanour. Finlay is seen in the first season as a complex, engaging character.
Later episodes reveal that he is a fan of old rock, which irritates Reacher when he begins to play “Carry On My Wayward Son” by Kansas as they are driving.
In action scenes that call for it, Goodwin’s Finlay more than holds his own. In the first season finale, for example, the character has an epic Die Hard-style moment when he takes off his tweed jacket and smokes one last time before going into battle. “Papier,” the sixth episode of the first season, has the greatest revelation regarding Finlay.
Finlay clarifies that he and his wife are not divorced, contrary to what Reacher implied in the season opener, while the two are on a stakeout at the Kliner Foundation’s factory. Rather, we learn that Sharon, Finlay’s wife, died of cancer.
In actuality, Finlay moved from his birthplace of Boston to the remote hamlet of Margrave, Georgia, where he was despised by the townspeople and even some of the Margrave Police Department officers, as a result of the emotional anguish he had suffered after losing his wife.
Finlay sees his relocation to Margrave as a self-imposed exile and retribution for his wife’s passing. He holds himself responsible for his wife’s illness and his failure to save her.
When Reacher questions Finlay about why he didn’t clarify the error, Finlay responds that he chose not to correct people because he doesn’t want their sympathy.
Finlay says that everyone believes a man like him is divorced. Finlay has even kept up with his wife’s phone bills so he could continue to speak with her and leave voicemails. In the end, the revelation in the episode makes Finlay a far more compelling, likeable, and accessible figure.
