Tom Selleck’s Jesse Stone and Jack Reacher have been compared to one another, but there’s one line that the former would never cross. Before the arrival of Blue Bloods, the Jesse Stone TV movies were keeping Selleck busy. He made nine entries between 2005 and 2015, though with Blue Bloods ending there is renewed chatter about Jesse Stone 10. On the surface, Stone and Jack Reacher don’t appear to share much in common – but appearances can be deceiving.
Reacher is a hulking, often monosyllabic brute who roams America and often gets into trouble, while Stone is a 60-year-old, alcoholic police chief in a small Massachusetts town that attracts an awful lot of crime. One major similarity is that both men want to see justice done – and they’ll bend the rules to see that happen. Reacher is typically more direct in this regard (including the book where he bearhugs a man to death) but Stone typically engineers situations where the bad guys are forced into confrontations with him.
Stone Cold’s Ending Shows The Line That Jesse Stone Won’t Cross
The first Jesse Stone movie highlights that he doesn’t think himself about the law
In the Jesse Stone books, the character is a good 20 years younger than Selleck, but the star liked the character so much that he signed on for Stone Cold. This first film set the template for what followed, while author Robert B. Parker gave Selleck two rules for Jesse Stone (via TV Insider); he will forever be hung up on his ex-wife, and he will always have a drinking problem. Stone Cold’s ending saw Jesse lure two serial killers into a confrontation, but after shooting one of them, he resisted the urge to execute the other in cold blood.
By this point in the story, this thrill kill couple made things personal with Stone by murdering his love interest, Abby (Polly Shannon). Stone’s quest for revenge made him set a trap to kill them both, though after he shoots and kills Brianna (Jane Adams) when she fires on him, Andrew (Reg Rogers) claims he never killed anybody. He also refuses to pick up Brianna’s gun when Stone orders him, and while the chief visibly wrestles with the choice, Jesse won’t cross the line of executing an unarmed man.
Jack Reacher Would Have No Problem Crossing Jesse Stone’s Line
Reacher would have taken care of the killers way faster
Stone might walk right up to the line, but he ultimately doesn’t consider himself above the law. This is one area where Stone and Reacher differ, as the latter would have shot both killers without a moment’s hesitation or regret. Typically, Reacher tries to avoid getting himself involved with other people’s problems, but once he is, there are few rules he will obey. He has no trouble killing to defend himself or if he feels the other person “deserves” it.
In the case of Stone Cold, the Lincolns murder people just for the visceral thrill, and also feel themselves smarter than everyone else – Stone included. Had Reacher encountered the duo, the notion of a line or black or white simply wouldn’t apply; he would have killed them, and then probably caught a bus out of town or gone to a diner for coffee and pancakes.
Jesse Stone & Jack Reacher Still Have A Lot In Common
It’s easy to see a crossover between Reacher & Stone
Jesse Stone is a character fighting against his many demons and struggles with the notion of right and wrong. Unlike Stone, Reacher has no inner demons to speak of, and his thoughts on justice are intensely simple. Despite this, Stone and Reacher share a lot in common. They both love dogs and coffee, have surprisingly active love lives despite their issues, and are crack shots with guns. While Jesse has boundaries about how far he’s willing to go, like Reacher, he will still stretch the limits to see that the guilty parties get punished.
Both Reacher and Stone also share being great detectives in common and can read patterns or behaviors that others wouldn’t notice.
In everything from Stone Cold to Innocents Lost, Jesse will bait the villain of the week into a showdown that will justify his use of lethal force. He even gets taken to task for this recurring habit in the fifth entry, Thin Ice – which leads to him choosing decidedly less lethal means in the finale. Reacher, naturally, is blunter in his approach. Both characters also share being great detectives in common and can read patterns or behaviors that others wouldn’t notice.
It’s obvious who would win in a fistfight, but it’s easy to imagine the two would become allies if they crossed paths. With the popularity of Amazon’s Reacher and other detective shows like Bosch, it’s the perfect time for Selleck to mount a new installment of Jesse Stone. There is clearly a big audience for these detective shows that deal in murky shades of gray, with very flawed protagonists who try to do the right thing under trying circumstances.