In the comments section below, tell me your favorite Die Hard sequel, and why. A winner will be selected at random from the commenters, so be sure to leave a Twitter name or email address I can use to contact you if you win.
I will be accepting comments for the giveaway until Monday, Feb. 25, 2013 at 11:59 EST. A winner will be selected shortly thereafter and notified. Good luck!
UPDATE: Congratulations to Tabathia, who was the randomly selected winner! She will be contacted shortly. Thanks everyone else for your comments.
I like Die Hard with a Vengeance because of Samuel L. Jackson. Jeremy Irons makes a great villain, too.
ReplyDeletemami2jcn at gmail dot com
Well, I've never seen any of the Die Hard movies (yeah, i'm not sure how that happened either...) but my husband has and his favorite is Die Hard with a Vengeance. Hope that counts! :)
ReplyDeletethanks for the chance!
rlahardison at gmail dot com
Definitely Die Hard: With a Vengeance. A bit of redemption, lots of plot twists, plus who doesn't love Samuel L. Jackson?
ReplyDeletesoluckyducky at gmail dot com
My fave is the original, but out of the sequels, I like Die Hard 2 the best..I have a strange weakness for even non-christmasy christmas movies ;)
ReplyDeleteI have to say my favourite is Die Hard 2: Die Harder. The tension throughout could be cut with a knife and is taken to new heights when we learn that Mclane's wife is on the plane. Like all Die Hard films it is laced with humour as we see Mclane having to manage inept policemen and security guards. The corrupt government officials add to his problems (off which he always has many, as we all know). Overall this film had my attention the whole way through and in terms of action, tension and humour did not disappoint.
ReplyDeleteI would have to say die hard 2 because that was the first one I seen that got me interested I the first and any to follow @tracyparral
ReplyDeleteA Good Day to Die Hard, because it is the first Die Hard movie conceived as an actual Die Hard, and it is hilarious that the generic superhero-like modeling of John McClane is by far the worst in the franchise. (I like making fun of dumb things.)
ReplyDelete"Die Hard 2: Die Harder". It's not only the best of the "Die Hard" sequels, it's also the only decent one. "Die Hard With a Vengeance" should have been called "Die Hard: With a Headache", considering the hero and the villain are battling headaches rather than each other (and the limp finale all comes from an idiotic stretch of McClane looking at the bottom of a bottle of aspirin, knowing French AND being familiar with hotels in Canada). "Live Free or Die Hard" pairs McClane with a sidekick, like in "With a Vengeance", a villain with muddled motivations, and recycling the original film's goal of winning over the woman to become a McClane once again (though instead of his wife it's his daughter, which is creepy, especially considering McClane's introduction in the film is him spying on her during a date). After enduring those two sequels I'll wait to see "A Good Day to Die Hard" when it comes to video.
ReplyDelete"Die Hard 2: Die Harder" looks great by comparison, but it's also a damn good action movie by any measure. With no family conflict for McClane in this film to work through the film instead tests him viscerally. McClane is put through the ringer in the film, particularly when his heroics fail to save a plane from crashing, killing all aboard. It's a moment that resets the film, showing that the villains, while not nearly as colorful or memorable as Gruber and company in the original film, are sadistic and a real threat.
The finale of the film is wonderful, as the film is cleverly plotted to make the finale a nail-biter. The villains are making their escape on a taxiing 747, while McClane's wife is on a plane doomed to crash on the dark runway within minutes. A fight on the wing of the 747 leads to McClane opening its fuel tank, allowing him to both kill the villains with the flick of his lighter and also save his wife's plane and all in the air by making the fire their guiding light to land. Even better is how the twenty or so seconds between McClane setting the fire and the villain's 747 exploding are handled. We see shots of the villains unaware of their pending doom, smiling and celebrating. It's the flip side of the plane crash at the halfway point in the movie, which showed the villains smiling because all aboard that plane were unaware they were all about to die--this time it's McClane and the audience smiling as the villains are unaware they are about to die. The finale is the payoff for having endured the horror at the halfway point. When I originally saw "Die Hard 2" in the theater the audience erupted in cheers and applause during those twenty seconds, and I haven't seen an audience applause so sustained during a film since.
While McClane might have saved the day, a wonderful shot near the end brings him down to size. As McClane runs across the runway to meet his wife's plane he's knocked on his ass by an approaching airplane. It's a simple, funny reminder that no matter how clever and resourceful he could be he's not the super hero but a real guy who once again rose to the occasion.
I wish the other "Die Hard" sequels could be this good, could have great payoffs and not try to awkwardly cram bits and pieces of the story and themes of the original. (Come on, Irons is playing Hans Gruber's brother? Wouldn't he have joined Hans in the Nakatomi heist, considering how resourceful he is, and that it was a lot of money to be had? Who cares if he thought he was an asshole! I mean, the two brothers who were terrorists in the original "Die Hard" seemed to hate each other yet found a way to work together!) I guess "Die Hard 1 & 2" producers the Gordon Brothers, Joel Silver and screenwriter Steven E. de Souza were the true gatekeepers of the McClane mythology, and for whatever reason (the failure of "Hudson Hawk", produced by Silver and co-written by de Souza?) Willis took the franchise another way.
Die Hard With A Vengeance... the scene where he throws the car into the helicopter, hello! sethrich AT hotmail DOT com
ReplyDeleteOops, I meant Live Free or Die Hard.
DeleteDie Hard 2. The first two were great.
ReplyDeletecelticsdraftee[at]aol[dot]com
Die Hard 3 - b/c the bad guys brother comes back. kwilson887@gmail.com
ReplyDeleteMy favorite sequel is Die Hard 2 because the reporter from Die Hard 1 is on the plane with McClane's wife.
ReplyDeletebasketgal917@hotmail.com
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteMy favorite sequel is Die Hard: With A Vengeance mainly because of Samuel L. Jackson. He makes every movie a little bit better. :)
ReplyDeletedeeg131 at gmail dot com
Die Hard with a Vengeance - I liked the part where McClane shoots a power line which hits the helicopter and destroys it. Carver joins McClane and convinces him to finish his call to his estranged wife at a nearby pay phone. It was all pretty funny.
ReplyDeleteDigicats {at} Sbcglobal {dot} Net
My husband's is die hard 2....me I have never seen them
ReplyDeleteaunteegem@yahoo.com
thanks
I like Die Hard With a Vengeance because of Samuel L Jackson.
ReplyDeletejfong1130 at yahoo dot com
Live Free or Die Hard! It's such a fun franchise
ReplyDeleteLove Die Hard with a Vengeance because Bruce works so well with Samuel L Jackson...it was a great move
ReplyDeleteshel704 at aol dot com
I would have to say die hard with a vengeance because of his complex and hilarious relationship with zeus
ReplyDeletetbarrettno1 at gmail dot com