First Dance is the second episode of the first season of the Reacher Prime Video television series. It aired on the Amazon Prime Video streaming service on February 3, 2022.
Synopsis[]
Reacher realizes that it was Paul Hubble that was the target of the attempted assassination in the prison. When Police Chief Morrison and his wife are found brutally tortured and murdered, he realizes that the criminal conspiracy is taking its revenge on the members that failed them. After Paul goes missing, his family is put in protective custody. With Chief Morrison dead, Mayor Teale appoints himself Police Chief. Reacher arranges to meet Spivey at the Blue Cat Bar & Grill, but finds that two South American assassins are waiting for him.
Plot[]
Once back at the precinct, Reacher storms off, so Finlay tasks Roscoe with ensuring Reacher doesn't jeopardize their case. After all, Reacher listened to her at the morgue. If he doesn't now, Finlay tells her to shoot him.
Roscoe tails Reacher in a squad car but he quickly lets her know he's aware of her tail. He doesn't want her screwing up his investigation, but babysitting him isn't high on her list either. She wants to do her job as she's good at it. He calls out her poor tailing skills but she already knows that he's going to Hubble's to interrogate the man. She can follow him the rest of the way, or he can get in. He decides to save the shoe leather.
At the Hubble residence, Charlie greets Reacher and Roscoe. She thanks him for protecting her husband in prison. She doesn't know where Paul is, and Reacher reveals that his brother's body was the one found by the highway. Joe had Paul's number on him. Charlie doesn't understand why that would be. Tally and Lucy arrive and greet the two adults. Charlie sends them up to get ready for bed. She describes Tally as the one with the glasses but being younger than Lucy. Reacher asks to use the bathroom but does some snooping on his way. He finds Paul's shoes and a familiar seed on the shoe. He returns and tells Roscoe he's leaving.
Once outside, he puts together that the distinguishing difference between the girls was glasses, as everything else varied. He thinks the cons that attacked him meant were supposed to take out the one in glasses. Reacher had on sunglasses because he took them from a fellow inmate. Hubble's on the run or they've already got him. He shows Roscoe the seed he found on Hubble's shoe, and she identifies it as a "hitchhiker" seed. They might grow where Joe's body was found.
They investigate the site but there are no burrs. Reacher still thinks it's important. He also thinks Joe's shooter was a skilled marksman. He breaks down the details of the kill and the crime scene. He knows the shooter enjoyed the kill. Roscoe asks about Joe and if they were close or had a family. She wonders what he did for a living. They were close when they were young, had no family, and worked with Homeland Security the last they spoke. He doesn't know the department as they hadn't spoken in a while. He suddenly walks off to find a motel, declining her offer for a ride.
Roscoe tails him to the motel anyway. He comes out of the office where a group of young men begins to harass him. Reacher knows they were waiting for him and that Kliner paid them to "take care" of him. Reacher isn't in the mood for this and one of the boys, Graham, throws a can at Reacher's back, threatening to beat him up. The fight commences with Reacher breaking their hands, leaving one kid to drive. From the lookout, Roscoe wonder what rolled into Margrave.
An unmarked van pulls up to a large house, and four people in white latex bodysuits emerge.
In the morning, Reacher goes for a walk and discovers a dog with an empty water bowl. He hops the fence and fills the bowl with water from the hose. The owner comes out claiming to have given the dog water that morning, but Reacher calls him a liar for it. He tells Reacher to leave and he pets the dog then obliges. He heads to the station to check in but Roscoe can't talk as Chief Morrison was killed. Reacher claims his innocence but she knows he didn't do it. He gets in the car with her.
Finlay is at the scene when Roscoe and Reacher arrive. The crime scene is worse than anything he saw in Boston. Reacher knows Morrison was nailed to a wall. Once inside, the crime scene matches exactly what Hubble described to Reacher in prison. Jasper is giving his coroner report when the trio arrives. Reacher knows it took four men to do the kill and that Morrison's testicles are in his stomach. Finlay pulled him outside and Reacher explains Hubble's warning. Reacher lied as he didn't know if he could trust Margrave cops. Finlay proposes that Joe could have been dirty, but Reacher shuts it down. He does, however, think the Margrave PD is dirty. Baker didn't go into the bathroom with him at the station because he wasn't worried about Reacher escaping. He knew Reacher was innocent. Reacher knows that Roscoe isn't dirty but wonders about Finlay, as he's next in line for Morrison's job. Roscoe intervenes as Mayor Teale appointed himself acting chief meaning Teale's dirty and Finlay's okay. Morrison's death was a message and Roscoe and Finlay can't handle that alone, so the three have to work together. Reacher thinks Hubble is already dead.
He and Roscoe head to the Hubble's, where Charlie reveals Paul never came home. Roscoe decides to stay there since she's armed but sends Reacher to talk with Finlay. He needs the Hubble's car. He steals a knife from the lockbox in the garage and tells Roscoe to shoot anyone under six-five if they come near the house. She also won't give him a gun.
Reacher goes to the town meeting where Teale is giving a speech about appointing himself chief of police. The town jeers back about both Teale and Finlay. Teale declines that the murderers were related. Mr. Kliner intervenes as Reacher is innocent and that his brother was one of the victims. He discusses the run-down state of Margrave five years ago, and how he brought them back. He gives them his word that he'll fix this. KJ and his cousin glare at Reacher from across the room.
After the meeting, Finlay talks with Teale about establishing a pattern between the killings. Teale refuses to allow it as they aren't connected. He sends him to search the archives of Morrison's recent convictions as the killer is one of those. He also refuses to let the highway murders take precedent over Morrison.
Finlay tells Reacher about Teale sending him off to chase his tail. Reacher thinks Kliner is dirty and worth looking into. Finlay notes it's a bad idea as the town will hate him more than ever, and he'll be stuck looking into the archives. Reacher wants Finlay and Roscoe to pretend to look into those cases to give them cover to do the real investigative work. Like looking into Joe's rental car. Hubble's wife and kids also need protection. Finlay decides to call his FBI buddy Picard from the Atlanta field office to watch them. He's known Picard for years and can trust him. He also tells Reacher to get a phone. After Finlay leaves, Teale approaches Reacher to offer his condolences for Joe's death. He swears to find the killer and will keep him up to date when he leaves town. Reacher isn't leaving as he's going to stick around Margrave for a while. Teale isn't pleased with that.
Reacher buys a phone at a store next to Mosley's barbershop. Mosley is sorry for Joe's death. He thinks Reacher is looking for vengeance and warns he might not be the only one. A group of Spanish-speaking individuals who weren't friendly came to Mosley's asking about him. Reacher wonders if Mosley is worried about him, but Mosley insists it's just his bottom line - Reacher might need another shave soon.
Charlie talks to Roscoe about Reacher being a good person who can help them. Reacher returns and tells Charlie to pack up as she's going into custody with FBI agent Picard. Charlie is hesitant but Reacher is sure this is what Hubble would have wanted. He reluctantly admits that Paul is probably dead, but she can't grieve now as she has to look out for her kids. Roscoe looks at him in disbelief. He leaves to wait for Picard. Once outside, he sees a children's bike.
He's back in Okinawa where a group of older boys is harassing a special needs kid, Billy, into dancing and mocking him. Reacher intervenes and wants to find out if he can take all of them. Billy's dad arrives and the bullies runoff.
In the present, Reacher sees a black car arrive on the street and watch him before driving off. He bursts in and commands everyone to leave despite them not being ready. The door opens and Reacher grabs Roscoe's gun. The man reveals he's Picard and Reacher verifies his identity. He then helps Charlie get the bags into the car. Picard tells Roscoe this operation is off the books so Picard is taking personal days to watch the family. He doesn't want to get burned and Roscoe promises he won't. Once Picard is gone, Reacher sends Roscoe back to Finlay while he goes to find Spivey at Warburton. Whoever paid Spivey is who's running everything.
Reacher calls Spivey and pretends to be Finlay. He wants to meet up to get their stories straight over the prison incident. They meet in a bar parking lot late at night. Spivey isn't surprised that Reacher set him up - which is why he did the same. A car turns over and pulls up, and a man with a gun stands in front of Reacher. The trunk to the car opens and he commands Reacher to get in, but he refuses as it's too small. Reacher knows the man will hesitate and uses that to his advantage to disarm the men. Reacher and one of the men get into a knife fight and the brawl escalates with Reacher getting cut in the back. The police arrive and Reacher runs off and the officer chases him.
Roscoe is in the Margrave PD office to look for rental cars but it's a dead-end. Reacher arrives covered in blood as things didn't go as planned. Roscoe patches him up even though he refuses stitches. Finlay is annoyed the brawl members weren't caught as they can't question them now. Reacher snips that he tried his best to shove a pole up his ass but still couldn't sound like Finlay. Finlay recaps Reacher's few days, with Reacher knowing they were South American military. Roscoe found out that Joe was working for the secret service division, but that covers a lot of topics. Reacher thinks it's counterfeiting as Hubble worked in bank management. Roscoe is waiting for a call from the Office of Investigations. Reacher's plans to search Spivey's house are thwarted with the lack of public information about a guard's home address, and Finlay sends him home. Reacher wants to go to a bar but Finlay shoots it down as the townees were mad enough before. Reacher leaves but Finlay puts Roscoe on Reacher duty again.
She stops him in the parking lot as she gets his need for a drink. She offers to take him out of town to a roadhouse. It might play the Blues stuff he likes. She needs to change first and he needs a shirt with less blood on it.
They drive to the roadhouse when Blind Blake comes on the radio. They arrive at the roadhouse and drink beer together. A Patsy Kline song comes on and it's the law to dance, but he doesn't dance. His mom taught him how to dance but when he asks, it usually proceeds a lot of punching. She asks him though, calling him Frankenstein's monster. They slow dance together to the music. By the time they're ready to leave it's raining, and he begins to remove his jacket for her but she doesn't need it. She runs out into the rain and into the car.
As they drive, they arrive at a scene of police cars. He takes a gun out of the glove box but she assures him they're far from Margrave. He admits it's not far enough and tells her to duck when he says to. They stop and she shows her badge, learning that the bridge is flooded. She asks if there's a motel nearby.
Reacher wrings out his shirt and she apologizes for not having anything his size in her truck. He got food from the vending machine and goes to the Clark Bar. He reminisces that every base he was at as a kid had Clark Bars. He and Joe could always count on that being consistent. He offers her half but she prefers Zagnut. He teases that no one likes Zagnut and dares her to read the flavor of the chips she's eating - Spicy Cajun Crawtators.
That night, he sleeps on the floor while she takes the bed. He's been a lot of worse places, and she's never left, Margrave. Her family had been there since the town was founded. The Conklins built the town but the Teale's got in with the railroads and stole the town, laid tracks, and swindled farmers out of their land. He asks about her family. Her parents died when she was a kid but she had Gray - the former chief detective and a family friend. He was her second dad and taught her how to be a cop. Despite his life, he was depressed and hung himself a year ago. He always gave her daisies on her birthday as they were her favorite. She asks about him, and his favorite flowers are snapdragons - cool names and hard to kill. She meant his family, though. He only had Joe left. If he hadn't heard the Blind Blake song it would have been years before he found out Joe was dead. Roscoe admits it's been nice getting to know him despite the circumstances. He returns the sentiment.
In the morning, they go to Roscoe's house and discover the front door is ajar. They investigate with their weapons drawn, finding muddied footprints but nothing missing. It's rubber overshoes and could have been there for either Roscoe or him. She closes the door and finds a message carved into the wood - "See you soon". Reacher proclaims he's gonna need a gun.
Cast[]
Starring[]
- Alan Ritchson as Jack Reacher
- Malcolm Goodwin as Oscar Finlay
- Willa Fitzgerald as Roscoe Conklin
- Chris Webster as KJ
- Bruce McGill as Mayor Teale
Guest Starring[]
- Kristin Kreuk as Charlene Hubble
- Willie C. Carpenter as Mosley
- Harvey Guillén as Jasper
- Currie Graham as Kliner Sr.
- Maxwell Jenkins as Young Jack Reacher
- Gavin White as Young Joe Reacher
- Hugh Thompson as Officer Baker
- Jonathan Koensgen as Stevenson
- Martin Roach as Picard
- A.J. Simmons as Dawson Kliner
- Peter Skagen as Chief Edward Morrison
- Patrick Garrow as Spivey
- Paul Braunstein as Dog Owner
Co-Starring[]
- Gator De St. Jeor as Curtis
- Ava Louise Murchison as Tally Hubble
- Rohan Mead as Graham
- Kaz Morgan as Townie #4
- Zachary Gallegos as Billy
- Sebastien Buitrago as Salazar
- Samie Siamak as Ramirez
- Scott Barker as Alabama Cop
- Mark McGrinder as Abe
- James Millington as Lloyd
- Brendan Beiser as Tom
- Raquel Duffy as Alice
- Dorian Giordano as Skater Kid
- Dan Fox as Statie
- Ava Cheung as Lucy Hubble
- Ryan Clarke as Townie #2
- Dylan Rampulla as Townie #3
- Blaze as Dog
Trivia[]
- First Dance is the only episode of the season to have an 18+ age advisory. The other seven episodes have a 16+ age advisory.
Images[]
Cast Images[]
Episode Images[]
Music[]
- Main article: Music in the Prime Video Series
- Midnight Train by Naked Blue
- Crazy by Patsy Cline
- Call in The Cavalry by The Shys