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Die Hard 2

year 1990decade 90sdirector Renny Harlingenre Actiongenre Thriller

124 minutes

Cast

Selected cast credits · Film reference

Bruce Willis John McClane
Bonnie Bedelia Holly McClane
William Sadler Colonel Stuart
John Amos Major Grant
Franco Nero General Ramon Esperanza
William Atherton Richard Thornburg
Dennis Franz Captain Carmine Lorenzo
Art Evans Leslie Barnes

Die Hard 2 | The Rewatchables

host Bill Simmonshost Chris Ryanhost Sean Fennesseyproducer Craig Horlbeck theme Bruce Willis retirement tribute
Explore episodeClose episode

Roger Ebert's review

In the discussion (3)
Approx. transcript time · 00:23:09Read transcript
  • The critic the hosts call "our guy" (transcribed as Raj/Rush) loved it, giving three and a half stars and calling it terrific entertainment; no rating scale is spoken.
  • The review compares it with the Indiana Jones films as a thriller that leaves your forearm bruised where your date grabbed it during suspense.
  • Siskel reportedly had it in his top five or six of the year, and the film is described as broadly well reviewed; a Terrific Entertainment spinoff pod is joked about.

Most Rewatchable Scene

Baggage-area fight; first McClane-Lorenzo meeting; painters shootout and ramp standoff; ejection and parachute escape; runway fight and fuel-trail landing

In the discussion (9)
Approx. transcript time · 00:25:08Read transcript
  • First listed: McClane fighting two men in a restricted baggage area, with Vondie Curtis Hall; the cluttered, climbable set is praised and the airport raised as a possible Apex Mountain for airport movies, though it was not actually shot at Dulles.
  • The first McClane-Lorenzo meeting is quoted, with both actors bringing it; it sets up the trope of an official who is unimpressed by a proven hero, riffed on through an imagined Sully Sullenberger being brushed off.
  • The metal-detector insult to Carmine is noted as a likely ad-lib whose joke nobody fully understands.
  • The paintball-style shootout, with sinister painters (including Robert Patrick) ignored by the airport SWAT team, and the suspenseful moving-ramp standoff are nominated.
  • The plane crash is called the craziest and most horrifying scene in action-movie history; with some 220 deaths quickly moved past, it is judged memorable rather than rewatchable.
  • After 9/11 such a scene would never be made; the movie is one of the most violent mainstream films, mixing sight gags with a British plane crash that kills about 200 people, after which everyone at Dulles keeps drinking and waiting, and making the passengers unlikable British travelers is called a weird choice.
  • McClane pushing the crate, taking on Esperanza on the transport plane and ejecting leads to a shot of him parachuting at the camera, called one of the better action-movie shots, though the villains oddly fail to finish him.
  • The final fight with John Amos and Stuart ends with the plane blown up on an improbably long runway and controllers using the fire trail to guide landing planes.
  • Additional favorites: the news helicopter pilot saying he is crazy but not that crazy, repeated blueprint-reading scenes with Art Evans, and the William Atherton-Bonnie Bedelia first-class feud.

Probably Unanswerable Questions

McClane's fame; a Netflix series; Christmas-movie status; recreational taser origin; post-crash calm; the towed car; alternative McClanes

In the discussion (8)
Approx. transcript time · 00:28:48Read transcript
  • Earmarked as an unanswerable question: whether McClane would have become famous after Nakatomi in the pre-internet era, with talk shows, Saturday Night Live cameos and commercials.
  • Could it be remade as a 10-episode Netflix show is raised as a probable unanswerable question.
  • Is Die Hard 2 a Christmas movie: one view holds that neither Die Hard nor Home Alone is a Christmas movie and neither is this sequel.
  • The opposing view insists it is, since it captures holiday travel anxiety and ends with a Christmas song; the skeptic calls the Christmas setting shoehorned and says negative reactions only strengthen the take.
  • Did this movie invent the recreational taser? No earlier comedic taser use is recalled.
  • Would the airport crowd really stay calm after a massive crash, and should the ending be more somber?
  • Why McClane's car is towed: he left it at the curb expecting a quick pickup before the flight was delayed.
  • Could anyone else have been McClane: Treat Williams lacks the humor, Jeff Bridges is plausible though he never did the everyman thing apart from Blown Away, and Dana Wheeler-Nicholson is a joke.

What’s Aged the Best?

Naked tai chi; the That Guy ensemble; "I taught him everything he knows"; the profane reporter brush-off; "How can the same shit happen to the same guy twice?"; airports at Christmas

In the discussion (7)
Approx. transcript time · 00:40:10Read transcript
  • Naked tai chi instantly establishes the villain, prompting a joke about reclaiming naked tai chi for the good guys.
  • The That Guy record is revisited: Fred Thompson, William Sadler, Vondie Curtis-Hall, Leguizamo, the doomed pilot, Don Harvey, Dennis Franz, Robert Costanzo, Sheila McCarthy and Art Evans.
  • The line about having taught the villain everything he knows is a favorite action trope, spun into a First Blood-style bit about a rogue colleague turned terrorist.
  • A reporter asking a colonel (transcribed "Colonel Stewart") for a few words and getting a two-word profane brush-off as he walks past her is chosen and jokingly recommended for office use.
  • The line about the same thing happening to the same guy twice is praised for self-awareness and noted as sampled in Positive K's I Got a Man.
  • Airports at Christmas are chosen for the chaotic, nostalgic vibe of parkas and drinking before flights, though the same behavior also counts as aged worst.
  • McClane leaving his car at the curb, drinking and spotting trouble across the terminal is contrasted with a real traveler watching a Bulls game with a bet on it.

What’s Aged the Worst?

Forgotten plane-crash trauma; lax airport security; waiting at the gate; indoor smoking; the chlorine line; the TV reporter casting; control-tower access; SWAT resuscitation; grenade count and timing; widescreen framing on old TVs

In the discussion (9)
Approx. transcript time · 00:44:48Read transcript
  • Christmas airport behavior is listed under aged worst as well, since the experience has completely changed.
  • The trauma of the incinerated passengers coming and going in minutes, and the lack of secured airports, lead the list.
  • Hanging out at the airport or gate to meet arrivals is now inconceivable, illustrated by a father meeting the family at the gate in Philadelphia and friends greeting a roommate off the plane in 1994; the romantic-comedy airport chase is gone too.
  • Smoking indoors is aged worst, spawning a SigPod spinoff joke and a tangent about bad movie smokers and Regarding Henry.
  • The pissing-in-the-pool, fresh-out-of-chlorine line is called bad and incomprehensible.
  • The TV reporter is judged poorly cast, with ideas held for the Recasting Couch.
  • Anyone, apparently armed, can walk into the air-traffic control tower, and medics try to resuscitate a SWAT officer who has obviously been shot many times.
  • The grenade scene is cut bizarrely: an announced three grenades becomes five going in, partly explained by three each, and the delay before they explode is interminable.
  • Belatedly, the super-wide framing was hard to follow on old square TVs but plays well on modern sets.

Recasting Couch

Markie Post, Dana Wheeler-Nicholson or Sandra Bullock as the TV reporter

In the discussion (3)
Approx. transcript time · 00:51:19Read transcript
  • Recasting the TV reporter is deferred from the aged-worst discussion to this segment.
  • An early-1990s option is sought for the reporter: Markie Post and Dana Wheeler-Nicholson are proposed.
  • A young Sandra Bullock, around the time of Love Potion No. 9, is proposed as an up-and-coming reporter; the film is judged unkind to the press.

Casting What-Ifs

John McTiernan as director

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:53:24Read transcript
  • John McTiernan was supposed to direct but was committed to The Hunt for Red October; otherwise the team was simply run back.
  • The film is not thought significantly better with McTiernan: Harlin's goofier, grander tone suits a sequel, while McTiernan takes material more seriously.

The Ruffalo / Hanna / Rubinek / Partridge Overacting Award

In the discussion (3)
Approx. transcript time · 00:54:38Read transcript
  • The award goes to Franz, with a joke that Pacino studied this performance before playing Vincent Hanna.
  • Franz plays the most obviously Chicago cop imaginable as the Dulles airport police chief, prompting speculation about a backstory; his little-pond rant about Shriners, lost kids and a reindeer is quoted.
  • D.C. accents are discussed: a Baltimore accent is detectable but Washington is full of transplants.

Half-Assed Internet Research

First digital composite with matte painting; Black & Decker lawsuit; reduced Leguizamo role; Amos-Willis tension; wet prints; Valverde shared with Commando

In the discussion (6)
Approx. transcript time · 00:57:54Read transcript
  • It was the first film to digitally composite live-action footage with a scanned matte painting, used for the final runway scene.
  • Black & Decker paid for a cordless-drill placement in a Willis scene, sued Fox for $150,000 when it was cut, and settled out of court.
  • Leguizamo's autobiography says his role was meant to be bigger until the filmmakers realized how short he was.
  • John Amos described real tension with Willis during filming and said Willis would never humiliate him in public again; he is compared with an old wrestler airing grievances.
  • The film was finished so late that it shipped to theaters as a wet print, a phrase proposed as a band or pod name.
  • Esperanza is a general from Valverde, the same fictional country as Commando, prompting a mock announcement of a Valverde drug-war book.

Apex Mountain

Die Hard 2 for Renny Harlin; Oliver North-style villains; evil John Amos; Bruce Willis's pre-thinning hair; Bonnie Bedelia; icicle eye stabbings; public airphones

In the discussion (9)
Approx. transcript time · 01:00:08Read transcript
  • The segment opens with a death-toll question: the internet says 114, though the crashed flight alone seemed to hold about 200.
  • Valverde appears in both films, but Commando remains its apex because that movie actually goes there.
  • An apex case for Willis rests on this film outgrossing the first, but the earlier Die Hard verdict is unresolved; he spent the capital on risks such as Bonfire of the Vanities, Hudson Hawk, Billy Bathgate, Mortal Thoughts and Last Boy Scout.
  • Snowmobile chases are raised, with The Living Daylights and Inception offered as rivals; for Franz, NYPD Blue has to be the apex.
  • For Harlin, The Long Kiss Goodnight is the favorite, but this, his most successful film, is his apex; Deep Blue Sea may be what he is best known for, Cliffhanger is loved, and Cutthroat Island pulled him down.
  • More apex picks: Oliver North-style villains, evil John Amos, Willis's pre-thinning hair, and Bonnie Bedelia at her 1990 peak with this and Presumed Innocent; airport-set movies come down to this or Airplane.
  • Icicle eye stabbings get a yes, but Single White Female keeps the top eye stabbing; X is mentioned as a current horror film with a notable one.
  • Two late additions: public airphones, and the debate over whether Sadler's fully nude tai chi tops Swayze's half-nude tai chi in Roadhouse, left unsettled.
  • Die Hard 2 may have invented the recreational taser, but The Hangover, or possibly Jackass, is its apex.

Picking Nits

Confusing plot and villain motives; faxed fingerprints; glide-slope sabotage; uncharismatic Esperanza; no diversions to other airports; non-igniting jet fuel; villains' escape plan; blanks fired in an office; double agents on the detail

In the discussion (10)
Approx. transcript time · 01:07:30Read transcript
  • Faxing fingerprints from a corpse is questioned as flawed 1990 technology.
  • The plot is found confusing; Wikipedia's synopsis of Esperanza's extradition and Stuart's sympathizers raises the question of why anyone would kill hundreds for him.
  • Only two Justice Department officials meet the plane even though cable news covers the extradition constantly; who pays the villains, the anti-communist explanation, the extradition treaty and the destination all remain murky.
  • Internet sources say changing the glide-slope value would not crash a plane because instruments have safeguards.
  • Esperanza lacks the charisma of Rickman or Jeremy Irons, and splitting villainy among Sadler, Nero and Amos causes overload.
  • Circling planes are not diverted to nearby airports such as Baltimore or Philadelphia; the Christmas-week crowds are questioned.
  • Nobody recognizes McClane, and online sources say jet fuel at that temperature would not ignite from a thrown lighter.
  • Had McClane not ignited their plane, what was the villains' plan: would military planes not shoot them down, and did they really expect to retire to the tropics?
  • McClane proves the guns hold blanks by firing a clip at Lorenzo in an office full of armed people.
  • How John Amos's team of double agents got assigned to Dulles, and why the one loyal soldier was brought along only to be killed, go unexplained.

What Piece of Memorabilia Would You Want From This Movie?

White snowsuits; blue-taped blank gun; plane phone; shawl-collar sweater

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 01:20:56Read transcript
  • A tasteless joke about the crash victims is rebuffed; the white snowsuits those guys wear are the pick. — Chris Ryan
  • The gun loaded with blanks, marked with blue tape, would be fun to bring out at parties.
  • The plane phone is relayed as another pick; making calls from a 1990 flight is noted as no longer possible.
  • Willis's shawl-collar sweater from the first hour is a very early-1990s item nobody would wear now.

Producer review

Loves it; plane crash horrifies a first-time viewer

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 01:24:21Read transcript
  • Invited to weigh in, the producer loves Die Hard 2, has seen only the first two films, and watched it with Liz, who liked it but was horrified by the plane crash. — Craig Horlbeck
  • The crash may explain why this sequel airs less than the first and third films; a last-second rescue like The Rock is proposed as the easy fix, while Harlin apparently wanted the real crash.

More from the conversation

Opening ad block (Recipe Club promo, Adobe Firefly, Carvana) is followed by Ringer network cross-promotions for The Big Picture, The Watch, the NBA show, The Bill Simmons Podcast and The Town.
Approx. transcript time · 00:00:00Read transcript
A trailer clip introduces Die Hard 2; the episode was taped on a Friday shortly after Bruce Willis announced his retirement from acting, and the film was chosen as an homage to him.
Approx. transcript time · 00:02:27Read transcript
The Los Angeles Times report is read as suggesting Willis was used as a cash cow in recent years, working on straight-to-streaming action films with lines fed through an earpiece.
Approx. transcript time · 00:03:55Read transcript
Willis was still headlining major productions such as The Expendables and a Wes Anderson film until around 2017-2019, when titles like Precious Cargo and Hard Kill appeared; the story explains the change and prompts sympathy for his cognitive condition.
Approx. transcript time · 00:04:50Read transcript
The 2018 Death Wish remake is called his last big movie and disappointing; he then appeared in seven films in 2021 and six in 2022, the kind that show up in the VOD box beside a lesser Baldwin brother.
Approx. transcript time · 00:05:30Read transcript
His career is hard to chart because each hit sits beside several turkeys; he is framed as an old-Hollywood-style high-volume star rather than a Cruise-style curator.
Approx. transcript time · 00:06:59Read transcript
He is praised as uniquely good at both action stunts and comedic one-liners and ad-libs; John McClane and Butch are named as favorite roles.
Approx. transcript time · 00:07:31Read transcript
His taste in filmmakers is highlighted: Pulp Fiction, Death Becomes Her, 12 Monkeys, Breakfast of Champions and The Sixth Sense, alongside Armageddon and Tears of the Sun, plus self-mocking cameos in Ocean's Twelve and The Player.
Approx. transcript time · 00:08:21Read transcript
A career timeline runs from Die Hard and Moonlighting through Look Who's Talking, Die Hard 2 (which outgrossed the first), Bonfire of the Vanities, Mortal Thoughts and Hudson Hawk, Last Boy Scout, Striking Distance, the Pulp Fiction revival, North and Color of Night, and Die Hard with a Vengeance.
Approx. transcript time · 00:10:05Read transcript
A 1988-1999 run of hits is listed and placed alongside Costner, Harrison Ford and Hanks, with Hanks distinguished by his batting average.
Approx. transcript time · 00:11:28Read transcript
His persona is described as splitting the difference between Clint Eastwood and Paul Newman, with music performing, a famous marriage and Planet Hollywood making him part of the pop-culture wallpaper.
Approx. transcript time · 00:11:55Read transcript
Early memories include a charismatic Seagram's Golden Wine Coolers ad, a menacing arms-dealer guest role in an early Miami Vice episode, and the Moonlighting phenomenon with Cybill Shepherd.
Approx. transcript time · 00:12:32Read transcript
Willis is framed as the epitome of middle-aged cool even when young (thinning hair, a stained white tank top, constant smoking), unlike stars such as Tom Cruise or Chris Pratt who keep chasing youthful action roles.
Approx. transcript time · 00:13:55Read transcript
The Willis-Demi Moore relationship made them a power couple, with Moore briefly the biggest actress in the world through A Few Good Men, Disclosure, Striptease and G.I. Jane.
Approx. transcript time · 00:15:01Read transcript
The show has covered Last Boy Scout but not yet Pulp Fiction or Die Hard with a Vengeance; the Die Hard films may be covered in order.
Approx. transcript time · 00:15:52Read transcript
Die Hard 2 dents McClane's everyman quality with Fast and Furious-style stunts such as the ejector-seat parachute landing, though it still feels more realistic than many current action films.
Approx. transcript time · 00:16:08Read transcript
The first and third Die Hard films are rooted in specific places, while Harlin's sequel is more generic action filmmaking with steam and thrown bodies; it still plays well, with six or seven set pieces.
Approx. transcript time · 00:16:31Read transcript
A running joke about naked tai chi; research reportedly says William Sadler did not initially realize the scene required nudity and asked to film it late so he could train for about two months.
Approx. transcript time · 00:17:31Read transcript
The film is called one of the greatest That Guy movies ever made, with several performers, such as Fred Thompson, who were unknown then but later became names.
Approx. transcript time · 00:18:09Read transcript
Released July 4 two years after the original amid a run-it-back sequel era like Lethal Weapon 2; there was buzz about production trouble and a date shift, and Willis was allowed to ad-lib heavily.
Approx. transcript time · 00:18:36Read transcript
The Dennis Franz and Willis exchanges are suspected to be almost entirely unscripted; Franz's role previews his NYPD Blue turn, and the name Carmine Lorenzo is mocked as maximally Italian.
Approx. transcript time · 00:19:35Read transcript
Harlin's box-office breakout came after A Nightmare on Elm Street 4, with Ford Fairlane the same year; the screenplay adapts Walter Wager's novel 58 Minutes, and a co-writer is cited as borrowing from Iran-Contra and Noriega for General Esperanza.
Approx. transcript time · 00:20:31Read transcript
Franco Nero, who plays Esperanza, later appears in Django Unchained and John Wick: Chapter 2 and is praised for one of the greatest beards in movie history.
Approx. transcript time · 00:21:17Read transcript
Box office: a $70 million budget and $240 million worldwide with $117 million domestic; it ranked eighth in the 1990 top 14 behind Home Alone, Ghost, Dances with Wolves, Pretty Woman, TMNT, The Hunt for Red October and Total Recall, and nearly all of that list was seen in theaters.
Approx. transcript time · 00:21:45Read transcript
The Thornburg-Holly subplot is convoluted, apparently shot separately on a soundstage, and could be cut; a fantasy Rewatchables channel would re-edit movies to remove boring plotlines.
Approx. transcript time · 00:36:50Read transcript
William Atherton's career turned from a Sugarland Express lead compared with Redford to 1980s heels such as Walter Peck in Ghostbusters and Thornburg.
Approx. transcript time · 00:37:51Read transcript
A tangent about recutting Pulp Fiction and Boogie Nights: a Maria de Medeiros channel, the donut-shop money, splitting Boogie Nights into two episodes, and Little Bill's breakdown as a distant cousin of the Will Smith slap.
Approx. transcript time · 00:38:08Read transcript
Regarding Henry is jokingly scouted as a future pick, described as one of the worst and now unintentionally funniest early-1990s films, with Harrison Ford among the worst A-list screen smokers.
Approx. transcript time · 00:49:26Read transcript
Janine Turner's Cliffhanger looks and a hypothetical 'why weren't you a bigger star' podcast are joked about; Anne Archer (now in The Dropout) and Guy Torry are named as performers who should have been bigger.
Approx. transcript time · 01:04:09Read transcript
Die Hard with a Vengeance is called a perfect movie by two participants while the third needs to rewatch it; Live Free or Die Hard, watched on the day of the 2007 Durant draft, spoiled a draft diary, and the fourth and fifth films are called weak.
Approx. transcript time · 01:22:06Read transcript
Fred Dalton Thompson's roles in The Hunt for Red October and Die Hard 2 may have helped make him a senator, which did not work for Dennis Franz.
Approx. transcript time · 01:26:02Read transcript
Closing credits: the podcast was produced by Craig Horlbeck (ASR 'Horlebeck'), with thanks to Sean, Chris and Bruce Willis and wishes for his retirement and health.
Approx. transcript time · 01:26:20Read transcript