When conspiracies attack

Well, I've only read a couple reviews of Jack Reacher 1, but they helped me through those nagging feelings I had.  Sure, it's entertaining, with fine action scenes and all that, and Chris McQuarrie gets to do another fast car chase with a slow part to vindicate the strange car chase from his previous and ominously-titled The Way of the Gun.  And Tom Cruise has got the tightest inguinal ligaments I've ever seen in a 50 year old.
But like with the nagging problem of paying for parking when you're about to shoot some random people, I had a few nitpicks.  But I'll set those aside and continue anew my rant for a rating between PG-13 and R.  Like a guy said in Videodrome, the world's getting tougher!  And America may still be soft, but our harmless entertainments have edges.  The World Socialist Web Site didn't review Reacher, but did anyone else notice how sleazy and efficient the bad guys were?  Let's leave aside Werner Herzog for now.  After all, Roman Polanski got punk'd by Brett Ratner, and hey!  They could've gone with Christopher Lambert as the uber bad guy and gotten a similar voice, but it just wouldn't be the same somehow.  Herzog's body of work trumps the Highlander where I come from.  And sure, they could've gone with Kelly Rutherford or Deborah Kara Unger as the DA's daughter, but Rosamund Pike's a sweetie pie and she's not afraid to show off a little skin.
Anyway, I don't know how big the evil corporation is here, but they seem like awful small potatoes to have such committed hit men.  They've got one mine in Pittsburgh!  That's it?  Maybe it's all a setup for the sequel.  After all, there's, like, 300 books in this Reacher series.  They are working on a sequel as we speak and I blog, which is one more than the Cirque du Freak guy can boast.  So if you're a veteran who's returned state-side and have been framed, Jack Reacher just might be the guy you call... unless you didn't serve with him, of course.  Call the closest Reacher-type you can find.  Hopefully one who's a better shot on the range, tee hee hee.  And kudos to Emerson for the one car chase where he misses a turn or something, and makes a disappointed face.  You don't usually see that in a car chase!  At least, not that I recall.  A different flavor from Freebie and the Bean, for one.

***1/2
-so sayeth The Movie Hooligan