{"id":45998,"date":"2024-12-25T18:00:41","date_gmt":"2024-12-25T23:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=45998"},"modified":"2024-12-22T03:39:20","modified_gmt":"2024-12-22T08:39:20","slug":"die-hard-2-1990","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2024\/12\/25\/die-hard-2-1990\/","title":{"rendered":"Die Hard 2 (1990)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I opened my Die Hard review with an apology to Bruce Willis for my unwavering belief that the film itself is a Christmas movie. That time comes once again. If Bruce didn\u2019t think Die Hard was a holiday flick, then I can\u2019t imagine he\u2019d think any differently about 1990\u2019s Die Hard 2. However, just like the original, we find our setting taking place during the holiday season, complete with decorations, music, and a snow storm. The movie even wraps up just as the first did, with \u201cLet It Snow\u201d playing over the credits. I\u2019m sorry, Bruce, but this is another holiday action-thriller, and that\u2019s all there is to it.<\/p>\n

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Die Hard 2 is a sequel releasing two years after the original, which is appropriate as it doubles down on a lot of what 1988\u2019s Die Hard did so well. This double dip approach is fairly on-the-nose, with John McClane once again starting his adventure at an airport. Not\u00a0quite the 30th floor of the Nakatomi Plaza, but still soon to be swarming with terrorists. Poor John McClane better have enjoyed Christmas in 1989, but I wouldn\u2019t be surprised to find out he spent an entire day in a McDonald\u2019s air duct, fighting off terrorists.<\/p>\n

The opening act features John McClane, now proudly sporting his wedding ring, on his way to pick up his wife from the airport in his mother-in-law\u2019s car. After the car is towed, and Holly\u2019s flight is delayed due to the events of the unfolding narrative, John finds himself stuck doing what everyone loves during the holiday rush hour… Waiting in an airport.<\/p>\n

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However, when John gets curious about some fishy behavior, he soon comes face-to-face with terrorists who are taking over the entire operation. John tries to reach out to the authorities but is spoken down to and becomes a one-man-army with allies \u201con the outside\u201d. He finds himself crawling through an air duct, muttering about how his vacation is ruined. When he needs some police intel, he reaches out to sergeant Al Powell, played once again by Family Matters\u2019 Reginald Johnson. If this sounds familiar, it\u2019s because that\u2019s the majority of the first film, and Die Hard 2 crams all of it into the opening act.<\/p>\n

Right when you start to fear that Die Hard 2 will simply be a retread of Die Hard, it starts to do its own thing. When the body of one of the terrorists comes back as a man who\u2019s already been dead for a couple of years, John insists that something worse is on its way. He\u2019s repeatedly dismissed by local authorities before the airport\u2019s runway goes dark, and the film\u2019s major threat comes into play. The terrorists of Die Hard 2 aren\u2019t in this for money. They want a prisoner who\u2019s being flown in and they aim to use the passenger planes in the sky as aces up their sleeve. As an added bonus, viewers can look for Robert Patrick playing a henchman just one year prior to his T2 appearance as the iconic T-1000.<\/p>\n

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Die Hard 2 struggles to keep the audience invested in the villains, who are sorely lacking the charm seen from Hans Gruber and his band of antagonists in the first movie. However, what they lack in personality, they make up for in sheer brutality. To prove that they mean business, the terrorists tap into communications and guide a passenger plane directly toward the runway at an aggressive speed and angle. John McClane does everything he can to try to signal the plane with some flares, but collides with the runway and explodes. John, and the audience, both witness an immediate body count that makes Die Hard look modest.<\/p>\n

The risk is suddenly evident. Holly\u2019s flight, still circling in the air space, could just as easily be guided to the ground below. John McClane must once again go up against all odds to save his marriage, and he has a short time frame in which to do it. That\u2019s where Die Hard 2 shines. Once it’s broken free of reminding the audience that it\u2019s a sequel, it delivers a story and the kind of action that places it right at home with the likes of Stallone\u2019s Rambo, or Schwarzenegger\u2019s Commando.\u00a0 Which is also kind of the film\u2019s shortcoming.<\/p>\n

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The film features some fairly over-the-top moments you\u2019d expect to see in a modern Fast and Furious installment. In this narrative, John escapes and explosion by jumping over it in an ejector seat, drives a snowmobile across a frozen lake, and gets into a brawl on the wing of a moving plane. The finale itself is somewhat comical, wrapping up in a far less realistic way than simply dropping the problem off of a tower. If you were looking for another story where a regular cop staggers his way to victory, you won\u2019t find it here. John McClane is now a modern day folk hero. This takes away a bit of the suspense, and reminds the viewer that things are likely going to be just fine. Low risk, moderate reward.<\/p>\n

Nothing in Die Hard 2 makes it a must-see film unless you loved the original and needed as much Die Hard as you could possibly get. Not a bad film by any measure but it has the unfortunate role as the \u201cmiddle child\u201d. Wedged between an absolute classic and fan-loved Die Hard with a Vengeance, Die Hard 2 stands on its own as a serviceable entry in a growing franchise. If you needed a double-feature this holiday season, Die Hard and Die Hard 2 are a solid way to go. Don\u2019t let the sequel get overlooked in this niche holiday sub-genre.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I opened my Die Hard review with an apology to Bruce Willis for my unwavering belief that the film itself is a Christmas movie. That time comes once again. If Bruce didn\u2019t think Die Hard was a holiday flick, then I can\u2019t imagine he\u2019d think any differently about 1990\u2019s Die Hard 2. However, just like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[58,200],"class_list":["post-45998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-action","tag-christmas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45998"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45998\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46001,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45998\/revisions\/46001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}