Widely regarded to be the greatest action movie ever made, 1988’s Die Hard is about as awesome as cinema gets. From the infinite supply of quotable one-liners to the explosive set pieces to Bruce Willis’ portrayal of John McClane as a relatable everyman faced with comically unfair odds, Die Hard is a virtually perfect action movie. It’s a Casablanca-level masterpiece of the often-disregarded genre.
As one of the most beloved classics in Hollywood history, Die Hard has plenty of iconic moments, from the hilarious to the emotionally engaging to the downright badass. So, here are the 10 most badass moments from Die Hard.
McClane Pulls Broken Glass Out Of His Feet
One of Die Hard’s most unique plot devices is that its ass-kicking protagonist is caught with his shoes off when the bad guys show up, so he’s barefoot for the entire movie. As soon as the bad guys figure this out in a shootout with McClane, they shoot the glass panes around him, so that he can’t escape without running through shards of broken glass.
Cut to McClane delicately removing giant shards of glass from his bare feet, with blood oozing out all over the floor. It’s difficult to watch, but it’s undeniably badass.
“Thanks For The Advice.”
John McClane is the master of the one-liner. ‘80s action cinema is littered with muscle-bound heroes spouting quips upon killing people, but they often fell flat or didn’t make sense as jokes. McClane’s one-liners, on the other hand, were always on point.
When he’s scrambling under a table, getting shot at by a terrorist marching across the tabletop, the baddie says, “Next time you have the chance to kill someone, don’t hesitate!” Then, McClane shoots him through the table and says, “Thanks for the advice.”
Powell’s Redemption
In today’s climate, a police officer shooting someone dead doesn’t sound like something an audience would cheer for. But at the end of Die Hard, as the one surviving terrorist pulls a gun on McClane, Powell is justified in shooting him, because it prevents further bloodshed.
This marks the end of Powell’s redemption arc, as he’s been torn up about accidentally shooting a kid who was carrying a toy gun in the dark.
McClane Crawls Through The Vents
One of the things that the later Die Hard movies lost – particularly the dreadful fifth one – is McClane talking to himself. In the first movie, when he’s crawling around in the air vents, he deals with his problems by complaining about them out loud.
The most memorable line from the scene is when McClane recites his wife’s invitation out to L.A., with the added context of how the visit turned out: “Come out to the coast, we’ll get together, have a few laughs…”
Argyle Rams The Terrorists’ Getaway Vehicle
All throughout Die Hard, the movie occasionally cuts to Argyle waiting in the underground parking lot in his limo, just in case McClane’s reconciliation with his wife goes poorly and he has to make a sharpish exit.
However, he ends up being integral to foiling Hans Gruber’s plot. As some of the terrorists try to escape in their getaway vehicle, an ambulance, Argyle springs into action and rams them with his limo.
“Welcome To The Party, Pal!”
After struggling to get the 911 operators to send a cop over to Nakatomi Plaza, McClane finally sees a police squad car, driven by Powell, heading into the parking lot. However, the terrorists cover up their plot well, and Powell is convinced that nothing’s going on.
As he gets in his car and starts to leave, McClane has to think fast to keep him around. So, he tosses a dead body out of the window, sending it soaring down onto the hood of Powell’s car. McClane quips, “Welcome to the party, pal!”
Hans Gruber Falls To His Death
When the team behind Die Hard was shooting Hans Gruber’s death scene, Alan Rickman was told that he’d be dropped on the count of three.
However, they dropped him before they got to three, creating the authentic look of shock and terror in his eye in the iconic slow-motion fall.
Now I Have A Machine Gun, Ho-Ho-Ho
During McClane’s first encounter with one of the terrorists in Hans Gruber’s team, he manages to kill the guy in a stairway scuffle. Unfortunately, the guy’s feet are too small for McClane to fit into his shoes. But he does have a machine gun that McClane manages to pilfer.
Then, he leaves the corpse in an elevator and sends it up to the room where Gruber is keeping all the hostages with a note on his sweater that reads, “Now I have a machine gun, ho-ho-ho.”
Jumping Off The Roof
One of the defining hallmarks of the McClane character is thinking on his feet. When an FBI helicopter mistakes him for one of the terrorists on the roof of Nakatomi Plaza, he starts getting shot at.
He has to think quickly on his feet and decides to jump off the roof, attached to a fire hose, and finds that he can’t break the window with his feet. So, he has to shoot it, and then he’s almost yanked back out by the falling hose.
“Yippee-Ki-Yay, Motherf*****!”
McClane’s walkie-talkie conversations with Hans Gruber throughout Die Hard are a lot of fun, with Gruber outlining the themes of the movie by comparing McClane to a lone-wolf hero from an old western.
This is how he ends up adopting the codename “Roy” (after Roy Rogers) and coining the most iconic catchphrase in the history of action cinema: “Yippee-ki-yay, motherf*cker!”
