This week we’re going over probably the best Christmas film of them all, Die Hard and it’s first sequel Die Hard 2.

The first film, Die Hard (1988), was directed by John McTiernan, and based on the Roderick Thorp novel Nothing Lasts Forever. 

This was a sequel to his previous book, The Detective. It also got adapted into a film by the same name, The Detective, in 1968 and starred Frank Sintara, but that film has nothing to do with the film Die Hard. 

The plot of Die Hard is just like many other Christmas movies.

John McClane (famously played by Bruce Willis), is a New York cop who’s visiting his estranged wife, Holly (Bonnie Bedelia), at her work party in California during Christmas Eve. However things get out of hand when a crew of thieves pretending to be terrorists, led by Hans Gruber (expertly played by the late Alan Rickman), takes the entire party hostage. Thankfully John manages to escape when the ruckus startes, so it’s up to a random New York cop to contact the outside for help, defeat the thieves posing as terrorists, save the hostages, and maybe patch things up with his wife if he can find the time.

What makes this film not only such a great Christmas film, action film, or just film in general is the main character of John McClane. He’s very likeable with enough flaws to ground to reality, and make him relatable. 

Many action heros like (specifically those played by Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger) were characters that were played by actors that had abs on top of their abs. 

McClane on the other hand is balding, has a beer gut, hates flying, constantly gets injured whenever he’s in a fight, constantly tells himself what he’s doing is crazy, and doesn’t have shoes to wear for most of the film. Which, again, helps the audience sympathise and relate to him.

Another thing that makes the film such a Christmas classic is Alan Rickman. He does such a great job making the audience fear what he’ll do next while at the same time respect his charisma and intelligence.

Throughout the film our two leads are talking to each other over walkie talkie, playing a high stakes game of cat and mouse, both trying to figure out more about the other in order to use it against them, and both trying to undermine the other’s plans.

The two leads are not the only memorable characters in this film. Two in particular that stand out are a desk cop named Sgt. Al Powell (played by Reginald VelJohnson, who’s also well known for playing Carl Winslow in Family Matters) and a news reporter named Thornburg (William Atherton, or Walter Peck from the original Ghostbusters).

Powell is the only friendly voice McClane hears and he’s outside the building and they never see each other face to face, but even so the two grow a convincing friendship. Powell also has an arc where he needs to get over the mistake he made while he was a street cop, that’s actually pretty investing.

Thornburg is memorable because of just how much of a jerk he is. He’s a sensationalist reporter who will do whatever he wants to make it big, even making a delicate situation worse if it means he’ll get the big scoop.

The action and effects have aged very well, with fight scenes in which the protagonist is just always scraping by, and never seems invincible, adding tension to every fight. 

The effects meanwhile were all practical, meaning that it’s actually there and the actors can really interact with it, meaning when John McClane steps on and takes out broken glass from his foot the audience winces right along with him.

Die Hard is one of those Christmas classics that should be watched every year and that the whole family can enjoy. It’s got it all, action, suspense, comedy, romance, and even a Christmas miracle.

A mere two years later, in 1990 John McClane (played by a returning Bruce Willis) is back in Die Hard 2.

It’s Christmas Week and McClane is waiting at Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C. for his wife, Holly (still being played by Bonnie Bedelia), to land. However things take a turn for the worse when ex-soldiers, led by Col. Stuart (William Sadler), manage to take control of all electrical equipment of the airport from a far away location. With no runway lights, and the control towers being unable to contact the planes in the air, the terrorists are esentially holding the entire airport hostage. Their demands are simple: the release of a drug lord by the name of Esperanza (Franco Nero), who’s been scheduled to land at the airport as well.

It’s up to McClane to figure out how to defeat these terrorist before his wife’s plane falls out of the sky.

Die Hard 2 is one of those film sequels that instead of putting the characters in a new setting with a new story, just puts the same or similar characters into the almost the exact same story.

There are some small differences, like the terrorists actually being terrorists, and taking place in an airport instead of an office building. But the rest of the film is just the original, just a bit more over the top and sadly, not as good. 

A good example of the film trying too hard to be the original is the return of Thornburg (still played by William Atherton). In the film he just so happens to be on Holly’s plane, and still serves the same purpose of making a bad situation worse. 

Setting aside the fact that, what are the odds that he’d just so happened to be on the same plane as Holly? In the film itself he could have been written out and not much would have changed, they just put him in there because he was in the first one. 

Similar to the first film there’s a police chief who doesn’t trust or like McClane, therefore making things harder for him.

In the first one it made sense, he could only talk him over walky-talky and McClane couldn’t give him much information about himself because he knew Hans was listening in and he didn’t want to tip him off that his wife was one of the hostages. 

In this film that role is filled by airport police chief Carmine Lorenzo (Dennis Franz). The character is just plain stupid and is only their so the terrorists’ plan can actually go through. And make sure McClane doesn’t immediately save the day.

It also doesn’t help that villains’ plans could be easily foiled if anyone in the control tower simply went to a Radio Shack, bought a service transmitter and simply told the planes in the air what was going on.

Despite the criticisms, the film isn’t bad by any means. 

McClane himself, while a bit more of your generic action hero, still has his down-to-earth charm to keep him relatable and likeable.

Bruce Willis and the rest of the returning cast do a good job slipping back into their previous roles, with the rest of the new cast doing well playing their characters.

The action is a little more over the top, but still is grounded enough to not take the audience out of their suspension of disbelief.

And the film still has that Christmas spirit and charm to it.

At the end of the day, Die Hard 2 is still an adequate sequel that has good action, and keeps the characters true to themselves. But it has a problem with trying new things and the plot itself just isn’t as good.

The series onwards dropped the Christmas backdrop and themes, therefore making them no longer Christmas films. 

Which is a shame because the third film, Die Hard with a Vengeance, is actually a pretty good film, and the fourth film, Live Free and Die Hard, is all right. 

The fifth film, A Good Day to Die Hard, however, no — just no.