Jack Reacher, like Oblivion and Edge of Tomorrow, didn't quite do the business expected of its megastar headliner Tom Cruise. A sequel, despite the obvious franchise potential of the multiple Lee Child source novels, wasn't a foregone conclusion, although rumblings began in May that it was starting to look possible, with Ed Zwick in the director's chair.
Now, with the success of Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation reassuring everyone that Cruise's mojo is still intact, studio Paramount are pushing ahead, with shooting on Jack Reacher 2 earmarked for November this year, for a release in late 2016{
Paramount are also keen to keep on striking while the Mission: Impossible iron is hot, with THR reporting that the studio want the sixth instalment shooting next summer, for a June or July release in 2017.
Back when Jack Reacher 2 was first mooted, the plan looked to be an adaptation of 2013's Never Go Back, Child's eighteenth Reacher novel. That plot would see Reacher heading back to his old military base in Virginia, to be charged with a violent incident and faced with a paternity case, neither of which transgression he remembers. Richard Wenk had been working on the screenplay, but it's now being re-written by Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz. So the final thrust remains to be seen.
With Cruise and Doug Liman's drug-smuggling DEA drama **Mena almost wrapped but not due to come out until the beginning of 2017, we're looking at a triple-whammy of Cruiser vehicles released in a single year. Is Paramount making a mistake, putting its faith in '90s-style star power when, these days, it's IPs rather than people that dictate box office? Tell us your thoughts on that in the comments section, why don'tcha.