Alan Ritchson Says a ‘Reacher’ Plot Was Dropped After Trump’s Win

• Alan Ritchson says a Reacher season based on Die Trying, the Lee Child novel in which Reacher takes on a white-supremacist militia, was approved “until someone got re-elected.”
• He wrote it on Threads on Sept. 18, in a reply calling it his favorite book. Prime Video has not commented.
• It came days after he and his wife, Catherine, announced they are ending their marriage of 20 years, and two days before he posted about feeling unworthy of love.

A plot twist he says never made it to the screen. Alan Ritchson, 43, the star of Prime Video’s Reacher, says the show was going to adapt the book in which Reacher takes on a militia, and that the 2024 election stopped it.

Replying to a fan on Threads on Sept. 18, he wrote:

My favorite book. Fun fact: I had it approved until someone got re-elected.

Alan Ritchson, via Threads

He did not name Donald Trump, and did not say who approved the plan or who stopped it. Trump won the 2024 election between the show’s second and third seasons, and Ritchson has criticized him publicly before.

What is ‘Die Trying’ about?

Die Trying is the second Jack Reacher novel, published in 1998. Reacher is kidnapped off a Chicago street along with Holly Johnson, an FBI agent who turns out to be the daughter of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Their captors are an armed white-supremacist militia holed up in the mountains of Montana, planning to declare its own nation. Most of the book is Reacher’s fight to get Holly out of the compound.

How does ‘Reacher’ choose its books?

Each season adapts one of Lee Child’s novels, out of order. Season 1 was Killing Floor, the first book; Season 2 was Bad Luck and Trouble, the 11th; Season 3 was Persuader, the seventh.

With more than two dozen books to pick from, the choice is a producer and studio decision each time.

That is the mechanism Ritchson is pointing to. A book can be “approved” as the next season’s source and still be swapped out before scripts go into production. Die Trying has not been adapted.

Here he is taking the internet’s most-searched questions about himself, including why he was cast:

Are Alan Ritchson and his wife getting divorced?

Yes. Ritchson and Catherine Ritchson, his wife since 2006 and the mother of their three sons, said in a joint Instagram post this month that they have “decided to end our marriage and continue alongside one another in a different way.”

Court records show the split has been coming for a while. He first filed for divorce on Dec. 1, 2025, citing irreconcilable differences. The couple reconciled on March 4, then announced the separation in September.

On Sunday, Sept. 20, he posted a video about self-worth. “Today I want to talk about learning to love yourself,” he said, “and how I think this could be the great antidote to our times.” He described carrying a feeling of not being “worthy of love” since childhood.

More actors caught in politics this week: Sylvester Stallone and his Hollywood ambassador role. On streaming: whether Lioness is coming back for Season 4 and the cast of Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story. More from Movies & TV.

— Bruno Monteiro

Sources: Alan Ritchson, Threads, Sept. 18, 2026, and Instagram video, Sept. 20, 2026; joint statement from Alan and Catherine Ritchson, Instagram; divorce filings (Dec. 1, 2025). Lee Child, Die Trying (1998). USA Today (Brendan Morrow); Entertainment Weekly; Deadline; The Playlist. Photos and video: WIRED’s Autocomplete Interview and GQ’s Tattoo Tour (YouTube).