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Alan Ritchson has a science fiction thriller film on Netflix that is like Reacher meets a blockbuster epic. Ritchson has come a very long way since his years as the high-pitched, hyperactive, hi-larious Thad Castle on Blue Mountain State. Almost overnight, Ritchson has gone from a beloved but little-known comic actor to one of our major action stars.
There have been few casting decisions as spot on as making Ritchson the hulking lead of the Prime Video show adapted from Lee Child's series of novels. It's a role that has opened up the actor to a wider world, including parts in The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, Playdate, and Motor City.
His biggest non-Reacher success is undoubtedly War Machine, a 2026 sci-fi action movie on Netflix that spent weeks on the top ten list after it premiered on March 6. War Machine earned strong reviews upon release, with critics and audiences favoring its throwback sensibilities and strong acting.
It's a simple science fiction action film, as simple as they can be, anyway. Behind the CGI and heroic battle sequences is a tale of survival that's easy to follow, but never talks down to its audience. It seems that Ritchson has a knack for telling classic, even formulaic stories, with enough punch that you don't even notice you've heard it before.
Alan Ritchson's War Machine Is Like If '90s James Cameron Time-Traveled Into The 2020s To Make A Reacher Movie For Predator Fans
War Machine feels like the type of action pseudo-horror movie we don't get very often. We're not in the '80s anymore, where films like The Terminator, Predator, and RoboCop dominated the box office and impressed critics despite their veneers of cheesiness.
These types of films used big action set pieces, creative VFX, and bloody violence to Trojan Horse interesting ideas into their stories, and bring audiences along on compelling rides that remain engrossing even after the dazzle of explosions wears away. War Machine follows a similar train of filmmaking.
The movie follows a soldier known as "81" (Ritchson), an Army Ranger who suffered a terrible loss in Afghanistan. He's recruited into a special regiment where he and the other soldiers who sign up learn they are training to face a foe that no one on Earth has faced before, and that no one is sure about how to defeat.
There are some fantastic twists in the story starting from the beginning of the film, and while you'll probably start to guess where War Machine is going about a third of the way through, director Patrick Hughes makes sure that the characters are surprised enough for the audience.
War Machine's Huge Netflix Success Gives Alan Ritchson A Major Franchise Beyond Reacher
Now that War Machine is getting a sequel, Ritchson can officially claim a movie franchise to go along with his television franchise. It's been a long while since we've had a new face in the action space, and Ritchson fits the mold tremendously. Most of the rising stars get gobbled up by the superhero machine, their identities subsumed by their costumes.
Ritchson has wisely kept his face in center frame and has become nearly as recognizable as John Cena and Glen Powell. Between War Machine and Reacher, Ritchson has staked his claim in both Hollywood and TV Land, and it makes his future delightfully hard to predict.
