Cobie Smulders on Life After 'How I Met Your Mother'

— -- It takes a very special person to stand out on screen next to Tom Cruise. And that’s where Cobie Smulders steps in. Smulders has teamed up with Cruise for the new big screen action flick “Jack Reacher: Never Come Back.”

Smulders recently sat down with Peter Travers to talk about taking on the role and keeping up with Tom Cruise, who does many of his own stunts.

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“Well, I am also a very competitive person so I fit into this world very well,” Smulders said. “There was a fair amount of training. The training started about six to eight weeks before we started shooting. I was training by myself here in new York leading up to that.”

But Smulders faced an even greater challenge in her role. Just before signing on for the film, she broke her leg.

“I broke my leg accidentally the summer before we started to shoot. It was so dumb,” Smulders said. “I tripped in my apartment and I fell. And I fractured my leg so I was on crutches for eight weeks. I didn’t save anybody from a building or stop a car."

But training for the film did help Smulders recover from her injury.

“The training was so intense. Tom has amazing stunt team, an amazing group of trainers,” Smulders, 34, explained. ”And so it was really the best physiotherapy I could have gotten. I became stronger than ever through the process.”

Smulders' role as Major Susan Turner, a gun-toting military leader, is a big departure from her longtime TV character Robin Scherbatsky in the hit series “How I Met Your Mother.” Smulders reminisced about her former castmates on the show.

“I feel like starring in a TV show is such a fun thing,” Smulders said. “You join together and you do this pilot and you don’t want to jinx anything because everyone gets along really well. It was such a lovely group, such a great script.”

And according to Smulders, they all remain great friends.

“I see Neil (Patrick Harris) all the time because he lives here in New York,” said Smulders. “I don’t see the others as much because they all live in Los Angeles.”

“Jack Reacher: Never Go Back” hits theaters everywhere on Friday.