TheRetroCritic

You'd think a Die Hard film in which John McClane rides a plane, flies a car into a helicopter and runs Maggie Q over into an elevator shaft would be pretty darn classic. Well, somehow Die Hard 4.0 (or Live Free Or Die Hard ) found a way to not make that into the best THING that 2007 had to offer. This sequel sees Bruce Willis' NYPD cop (now detective) being assigned the task of picking up some computer hacker, played by a grating Justin Long, and bringing him to the FBI for questioning. As it turns out, the kid was used as a pawn by a terrorist organisation (run by Timothy Olyphant) to set-up a "firesale", basically a cyber attack resulting in financial meltdown. McClane and Matt (Long) are soon under fire and instead of sticking with the FBI they decide to take on Gabriel (Olyphant) themselves, which doesn't really seem like the most reasonable solution but hey. There'd be no movie otherwise. But this is partly why 4.0 doesn't really cu

Yippee... well, you know.

Die Hard . How do you beat that movie in terms of action and sheer gripping suspense? I'll tell ya. With a vengeance, that's how. Don't get me wrong, I love Die Hard and it is a classic but when it comes down to it, it's pretty claustrophobic taking place mostly in that skyscraper and all. For me, Die Hard: With A Vengeance is just that little bit more glorious in that the entire city is at stake this time, you've got a villain which would give even the likes of Batman chest pains and it all takes off instantly. You thought Die Hard 2 lacked a certain je-ne-sais-quoi? Well here it is. That's another point: With A Vengeance continues the franchise without feeling like a retread, which Die Hard 2 was a bit, to a certain extent. This time around, John McClane's not exactly at the top of his game. He's been suspended from the police force, his marriage has gone down the drain once again and he's got a bad hangover. So when a new villain on

With Die Hard maestro John McTiernan not onboard for this sequel, it could have all gone wrong and our beloved McClane could have been left carrying a mediocre retread over his shoulders leaving the franchise to slowly go downhill after that. Thankfully, what we got was a retread, for sure, but a decent one with enough action and enough lols to carry us through to the next, superior, round. Arguably the least memorable of all Die Hard flicks, this sequel is commonly known as "the airport one" and, indeed, there's not much more to it. Once again it's Christmas and once again John McClane is stuck in one place trying to stop terrorists from pulling off some elaborate plan which just happens to involve his wife, kind of. This would all be much too familiar and dull if it weren't for the likes of Bruce Willis himself, who still does a top job as the iconic put-upon cop, a brilliantly creepy bunch of villains (including a chilling William Sadler) and some kicka