Jack Reacher is safe, dull and disappointing.

Jai Courtney and Tom Cruise ready to thrown down in Reacher

Jack Reacher is boring but that doesn't mean it's terrible or bad; it is just achingly by the numbers. As Tom Cruise's comeback movie it is barely serviceable, essentially the film feels like you're watching the Cruise version of The Da Vinci Code, an airport mystery novel brought to life in the blandest way possible. As an action movie, Jack Reacher moves too slowly, plodding along as we wait for the lead character to catch up, so by the time the final shootout comes it feels too little too late. As a mystery it's terrible, just your average episode of CSI brought to movie length; if anything that makes it feel like Reacher is the most expensive TV movie ever. Jack Reacher is without a doubt the best version of Jesse Stone we're going to get for quite some time.

A much more accurate poster of Jack Reacher

The plot is straight-forward: a former sniper is accused of murdering citizens in broad daylight, when he's put in custody he tells the police to get Jack Reacher. As we're told Jack Reacher has got a history of military badassery, we expect he's going to come in, fuck shit up and set things right. Well, he does and he doesn't; he spends most of the movie telling people how stupid they are and how they are not as awesome as he is, while he stumbles from clue to clue not because he wants to but because people keep bothering him.

The movie doesn't need to be amazing or thrilling or reach for bigger themes to be entertaining, but as a straight-forward thriller it's barely functional. The fact that the movie aims so low as to just barely make it over the bar feels utterly annoying and frustrating. This is even more shocking when considering this franchise starter is directed by the smart and talented Christopher McQuarrie--seriously, just listen to his stories on the Kevin Pollack show, or his experience on writing Valkyrie (another collaboration between McQuarrie and Cruise from 2008, although McQuarrie just wrote that one.) This is McQuarrie's return to directing after a twelve year hiatus when he delivered his first film, the under-appreciated, Sam Peckinpah-homage The Way of the Gun. The film was violent and shocking and cynical in all the right ways while featuring an incredible third act shootout. Jack Reacher by comparison looks like it could've been made by anyone. The only piece of dialogue that sounds like McQuarrie is when Reacher threatens to drink Jai Courtney's character's blood from a boot (spoilers: he doesn't even follow up on that promise). There's nothing wrong with a movie that's unambitious, straight-forward or lean but the problem is the movie is just plain damn uninteresting.

Seriously the movie is worth rental for some Herzog greatness.

There are a few bright spots in the movie. One scene has Rosamund Pike's character recount the last hours of each of the victims, which is different and effective. The other highlight is the perfectly underused Werner Herzog as the big heavy, known only as "The Zec."  Herzog, who shows up one-eyed and two-fingered, does his best to suitably chew all the scenery he can in his few memorable moments. What's great is that when you view the movie you'll see that Herzog doesn't really do anything other than sit and stand around,  while looking totally scary or like plotting something really evil. However, despite his total lack of action, Herzog manages to command your attention and convince you of his evil backstory, a testament to his talent and awesome accent.

Jack Reacher just caps the year off in functional blandness, working it's biggest crime is being boring and unengaging. The film aims too low to not work for what it's doing. It's not great, it's not good, it's not bad, it's just okay but sometimes that's not enough and coming from the man who made something as exciting as The Way of the Gun , Reacher just doesn't reach hard enough.