SF Debris's thoughts on Die Hard franchise?

[Yukaphile]

This is just sort of loosely connecting what he's said on the Die Hard franchise over the years and then adding my own observations to ask a final question, which is what do you guys think that he, Chuck thinks of the Die Hard movies?

In "Power Play," he compared it to McClane just sitting back and letting the "fat cop" (clearly referring to Sergeant Al Powell in the first movie) do all the work.

In "Basics" he voiced over Suder going "Yippee-ki-yay," clearly a shout-out to the action elements and McClane's catchphrase, lol.

In "Starship Mine," he said it was "DIE HARD IN SPAAAAACE!" but then later added it's "less Die Hard and more Home Alone."

In "Deadlock," he said it was comparable to Live Free or Die Hard - if you turn off your brain for the next hour, it wouldn't be entirely unpleasant.

And finally, in "First Contact," the movie, he said their plan was "high on testosterone, low on common sense," and "if only they could find a way to crash a car into a helicopter while doing it."

There might be others, but I forgot them. However, this completely ignores the two in between Die Hard and Live Free or Die Hard, which is Die Harder and With A Vengeance, which I personally think were damn fine sequels. The part where McClane and Zeus use their truck's tow cable to get onto the cargo ship and slash a henchman in half still ranks up there in my mind as one of the most believable "WTF HOLY SHIT!" moments in cinema without going too far into the "WTF HOLY SHIT that's unbelievable nonsense" the way Live Free or Die Hard did. I'm curious, what do you guys think Chuck's thoughts on those movies are? He never seems to have referenced them, which is weird, given that he's referenced how awesome Samuel L. Jackson (who played Zeus) was in Pulp Fiction twice, with Voyager's "Nemesis" ("ENGLISH, MOTHERFUCKER, DO YOU SPEAK IT?!) and also "First Contact," when talking about how Sisko couldn't be in the movie for Reasons of Awesome. And it's so perplexing given that Colm Meaney and William Salder of DS9 fame played significant roles in Die Harder. Meaney was the pilot the main villain, played by Sadler, tricked into crashing. And then there's the fact Die Hard 5 seems to be playing tribute to the Klingons with the title of A Good Day to Die Hard. I dunno, what do you guys think? What do you think Chuck's thoughts on the franchise is past these throwaway shout-outs?

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

and also "First Contact," when talking about how Sisko couldn't be in the movie for Reasons of Awesome.

I don't get it.

Yeah that's a nice little pair of coincidence. Though with DH5's titling, that's not exclusively a Klingon thing, apparently originating from the Oglala (Daktoa) tribes around the midwestern United States in the 1800's. Klingons are the prominent conveyor of the phrase though, so it might work.

Remember all scores are relative to the series, so I'm gonna go out on a limb and say final score for Die Harder is 5 out of 10. It's an average piece weighted evenly between its strengths and its weaknesses. Remember, 5/10 is an average here. Final score for Die Hard 3 is an 8/10. A great comeback for McClane with welcome accompanying by Jackson's Zeus. While it's moments begin to stretch thin here and there, the new premise was a welcome change, averting the cliché formula that the original started that set the trend for other movies for years to come.

edit: He probably gave a point extra for DH2 for Reginald coming back in a cameo.