Reacher showrunner Nick Santora explains how Jack Reacher author Lee Child had a hand in bringing back Oscar Finlay for Season 2.

The following contains spoilers for Reacher Season 2, now streaming on Prime Video.

Reacher showrunner Nick Santora has opened up about Malcolm Goodwin’s surprise return as Oscar Finlay in the Season 2 episode, “A Night at the Symphony,” revealing that Jack Reacher author Lee Child had a hand in making the cameo a reality.

Speaking with TVLine, Santora discussed the initial challenges in bringing Goodwin back as Finlay, explaining, “Look, the rules are that Reacher doesn’t run with a crew. The 110 is his crew.

That’s his family. Those are his colleagues from the military, but he wanders the world alone. So, we know we can’t have Reacher with a rag tag team of people that go with him from city to city. That’s not the book.”

Lee Child Approved Season 2’s Reacher/Finlay Reunion

With plans for Reacher to visit Boston in Season 2, Santora reached out to Child to see if it would make sense for the title hero to contact Finlay — who was going back to Boston at the end of Season 1 — for help: “I said, ‘If Reacher was in the same town as someone he had had an adventure with, someone like Finlay, and he needed help to stop bad people from doing bad things, would he reach out?’ Lee Child said, ‘Yeah, he would.’ [Reacher] wasn’t going to say, ‘Come join me in my band of merry men,’ he’d reach out for a brief moment.”

Santora also revealed that he laid the groundwork for Goodwin’s Season 2 return during the final stages of production on Season 1. “At the end of Season 1, thinking about what book Season 2 was going to be, I remember calling Malcolm from my back yard.

I said, ‘Would you come in for just one episode, maybe just a couple of scenes? Would it even be worth your time?'” he recalled. “Malcolm was like, ‘Oh, I’m Reacher family. I’m in if you want me. Whatever you need.’ Malcolm has been in like four or five things that I’ve written and produced, and he’s also one of the best actors in the world.”

Reacher Season 3 Is Already Filming

Production has already begun on Reacher Season 3, which was secretly greenlit ahead of the show’s Season 2 premiere last year. While plot details remain under wraps, including which Jack Reacher novel will be adapted, Ritchson teased that it will be another self-contained story.

“[W]e get to enjoy Reacher in a new world. It may not have anything to do with family, with his past, he’s just living that adventure out and that’s kind of the direction that we’ve gone and it seems to really be working,” he said. The actor recently shared a behind-the-scenes image of himself covered in mud, hinting that Reacher will be getting his hands dirty in the forthcoming season.

The first two seasons of Reacher are available to stream on Prime Video. Season 3 does not yet have a premiere date.