# Die Hard 2 question (spoilers, but who cares? the movie is 30 years old) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 21, 2018, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491 "2018-12-21T14:16:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2018, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/21 "2018-12-22T15:26:00Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > … Assuming the bad guys hadn’t messed with them. Yeah, but it’s easy enough to pick apart what’s actually in this movie without having to extrapolate to what might have happened. It’s not an error of the movie that the planes didn’t fly into each other by accident; the Dulles controllers had some warning and would have assigned each plane a holding pattern that wouldn’t intersect with any other planes. The bad guys could have directed two planes into each other, and did direct one into the ground, but their goal wasn’t just to create chaos; they wanted to leverage the threat to those passengers so they could get Esperanza. The more planes they crash, the less leverage they have. Now that I think about it, there was a whole lot simpler way to get what they wanted. If they’d never taken over all the airport systems, Esperanza’s plane would have landed and he would have been turned over to the U.S. military. Rather than taking over the airport and secretly having compatriots in the unit that was sent to stop them, why didn’t they just plant their own people in the unit that was sent to accept the prisoner. John Amos says to his boss “my squad isn’t busy, we’ll go pick up Esperanza for you.” They do that, load him on a truck, and drive to who-knows-where. Oh, just one more thing. After circling around all evening because they couldn’t see the airport, all the pilots land safely by following the fire trail that’s laid out along the runway. How? It’s been instrument conditions all night, and it turns out they just needed lights on the runway? ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2018, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/22 "2018-12-22T18:06:58Z")
> [@Fenris](#): > > What, exactly, is Special Forces guy William Stewart (and his flunkies) plan? What happened to turn a group of say, 50 or so people (including the second squad led by John Amos’s team) to Eeeee-vil? I could see a few people tempted to hang out in some Panama-esqe nation for the rest of their lives, but 50 trained, ostentably loyal soldiers? Bwah? Yeah, this is why conspiracy theories flop in real life. Fictional villains need lots of faceless mooks and henches for the hero to beat up. As you’ve observed, they almost invariably skip over the recruitment part. Some shows actually use it as a point of comedy (eg The Simpsons, Venture Brothers). One would have to meet the potential recruit, identify some motivation powerful enough to override their established loyalties, recruit them into your organization, and then have them continue to work their day job while you recruit more people. And then you would need to be in a position of influence where you can assemble all of your recruits onto the same squad or platoon. Intelligence agencies and terrorists can do this, but it takes a long time and there are many things that can go wrong. It’s hard enough to recruit one guy. I can’t even imagine trying to recruit ten or twenty or fifty while simultaneously maintaining the secrecy of your organization. (This is something I always think about when people mention conspiracies that would logically require hundreds or even thousands of people acting in perfect unison while being completely amoral). There are social and psychological factors that work against being able to organize large groups of bad guys like this. Organizations that do it successfully are neither covert nor clandestine. For example, page one of every cult or terrorist indoctrination manual is that the potential fanatic has to be isolated from their friends and family while they are radicalized. They are cut off from society and live in remote training camps or communes. Real life bad guys often have an advantage in that they have places that accept volunteers. Robert Hanssen, for example, he access to a list of known KGB agents that he could approach. Others recruit at embassies, mosques, or the internet. But in the OP’s example (a criminal conspiracy among American soldiers) it’s not as if you can just put up a sign. “Now Hiring Evil Henchmen.” You might actually be better off doing it the other way around. For example, terrorists and criminal gangs have been known to send their members to the military in order to acquire training or information, with the expectation that they would remain loyal to the parent organization despite being indoctrinated into the new one. It’s much easier to hand-wave it and assume the bad guy “somehow” accomplished this, without actually bothering to explain it to the audience. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2018, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/23 "2018-12-22T18:39:27Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Oh, just one more thing. After circling around all evening because they couldn’t see the airport, all the pilots land safely by following the fire trail that’s laid out along the runway. How? It’s been instrument conditions all night, and it turns out they just needed lights on the runway? You mean, they could have just dumped lights on the runway, like in Airplane!? (It’s surprisingly hard to find an image or clip of that.) ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2018, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/24 "2018-12-22T22:45:52Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > You mean, they could have just dumped lights on the runway, like in Airplane!? > > (It’s surprisingly hard to find an image or clip of that.) Sure, as long as Johnny doesn’t pull the plug again. He’s such a kidder. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2018, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/25 "2018-12-22T23:23:21Z")
> [@Barbarian](#): > > I just never understood why none of those planes were diverted to other airports that are a few minutes away. It’s not like landing in Baltimore is a fate worse than death. Clearly you haven’t seen _The Wire_. “McNulty, you’re an asshole!” > [@Alessan](#): > > I hate this movie. HATE it. I mean, I concede that some movies are worse than it, objectively speaking, but there is no movie I hate more. It’s very existence offends me. It was very clearly an attempt to take everything that worked about the first movie and shoehorn it somehow into a plot taken from some kind of rejected _Airport_ sequel, and like a similar effort on the second series of _Veronica Mars_, it just doesn’t work in any way, and makes you dumber for trying to count out all of the logical inconsistencies. Still not my most hated movie of all time, which is, of course, the final Brosnan Bond movie _Die Another Day_, with that Indiana Jones Vs. Close Encounters movie being a close second. As for the _Die Hard_ franchise, I just treat it like _Highlander_ and ignore all sequels and spinoffs. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2018, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/26 "2018-12-22T23:26:56Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > I hate this movie. HATE it. I mean, I concede that some movies are worse than it, objectively speaking, but there is no movie I hate more. It’s very existence offends me. > > Nothing in this movie makes sense. There’s that, of course, and there’s also the idea that the airport is the only one who can communicate with planes in the air. you know who else can communicate with planes in the air? Other planes in the air. All they had to do was launch a couple of F-18s out of Norfolk and have them lead the airliners to safety. > > But then, the inaction of the U.S. government is the biggest mystery of the film. They sent one team? One FUCKING team? Terrorists have taken a major airport - the U.S. capital’s airport - and thousands of people hostage. You don’t send one team, you send everyone. [EVERYONE!!!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74BzSTQCl_c) > > … sorry. Got carried away there a bit. But I really do hate this movie. Bruce Willis hates more than you this movie and considers it the worst one hes ever done rumor is hes never seen it ……. He has said "he didn’t understand a damn thing of the plot (apparently no one else really did either ) and there were extreme budget problems which led to really stupid errors (like the afore mentioned Pac\*bell badges on what was supposed to be a Washington dc airport it was really a part of LAX that was being refurbished ) > [@Loach](#): > > Nitpick alert: its Stuart not Stewart. > > As for motivation, I can’t find it streaming to rewatch. Didn’t Stuart work with the General before the US decided he was a bad guy? I always figured it was a cult of personality thing where they became loyal to the general and felt betrayed when the US turned on him. It was only partially about the money. > I find it interesting that this is based off of a book that had nothing to do with the first movie or the characters. Bruse willis hates more than you this movie and consideres it the worst one hes ever done Believe it or not there has only been one originally written die hard movie and that was the 4th one the first 3 were other screenplays that were "salavaged " for the series ---
**Author:** ![Mars\_Horizon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mars_horizon/32/2804_2.png) [@Mars\_Horizon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mars_Horizon)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2018, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/27 "2018-12-23T02:38:19Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > After circling around all evening because they couldn’t see the airport, all the pilots land safely by following the fire trail that’s laid out along the runway. How? It’s been instrument conditions all night, and it turns out they just needed lights on the runway? Keep your disbelief suspended, much like Windsor 114 wasn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2018, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/28 "2018-12-30T19:31:21Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > But of course it was all redeemed when a line of jet fuel spilling into the snow was lit and behaved exactly like a Yosemite Sam gunpowder trail. My favorite part of a profoundly stoopid movie: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0Tt7VUMLs8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0Tt7VUMLs8) ---
**Author:** ![Patch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a183cd/32.png) [@Patch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patch)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2019, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/29 "2019-01-01T03:12:58Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > My favorite part of a profoundly stoopid movie: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0Tt7VUMLs8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0Tt7VUMLs8) Like, was the fuel door at the bottom of the fuel tank? When I open the fuel cap on my car it doesn’t start gushing out. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2019, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/30 "2019-01-01T04:52:02Z")
> [@Patch](#): > > Like, was the fuel door at the bottom of the fuel tank? When I open the fuel cap on my car it doesn’t start gushing out. 😕 I think it was where the fuel was fed into the engine. Is this really a thing with the 747? :dubious: 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2019, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/31 "2019-01-01T05:26:09Z")
> [@Barbarian](#): > > It’s not like landing in Baltimore is a fate worse than death. I suppose that’s a matter of opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/32 "2019-01-02T22:29:03Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > I think it was where the fuel was fed into the engine. Is this really a thing with the 747? :dubious: 😕 No. Not in the slightest. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/33 "2019-01-02T23:52:46Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > My favorite part of a profoundly stoopid movie: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0Tt7VUMLs8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0Tt7VUMLs8) Gods, I had forgotten how stoopid that scene was. A trail of cold JP8 (which won’t ignite if you flip your lighter onto it) catches flame (whilst being blown by close jet exhaust) accelerates said flamage (against said jet exhaust) leaping into the air to catch up with a jet during takeoff, where it (manages to get into a gushing fuel spout, against pressure, to ignite the fuel in the tank) causing an empty airplane to explode as if it were filled with C4), with flame shooting though the empty cargo compartment, through cargo doors and into the cockpit. I can see how that might happen. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2019, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/34 "2019-01-03T00:24:40Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Well, they weren’t just flying around at random. Before they lost their communications, the Dulles tower would have assigned each plane a location (based on navigation transmitters on the ground) and the pilots would fly an oval holding pattern around that point. Multiple planes would be assigned the same hold point, but at different altitudes, hence the term “stacking”. Even if they were just flying around at random, a few dozen passenger jets take up about 0.00001% of the space within a few miles of an airport. It’d be hard to crash them into each other if you were _trying_ to. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2019, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/35 "2019-01-03T01:20:10Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Gods, I had forgotten how stoopid that scene was. A trail of cold JP8 (which won’t ignite if you flip your lighter onto it) catches flame (whilst being blown by close jet exhaust) accelerates said flamage (against said jet exhaust) leaping into the air to catch up with a jet during takeoff, where it (manages to get into a gushing fuel spout, against pressure, to ignite the fuel in the tank) causing an empty airplane to explode as if it were filled with C4), with flame shooting though the empty cargo compartment, through cargo doors and into the cockpit. > > I can see how that might happen. 😛 Scenes like that remind me what I’d heard in some interview with someone connected with _The Godfather_. The scene where Sonny (James Caan) is riddled with bullets from several machine guns but somehow manages to keep on charging. The guy interviewed said the experts explained to Francis Ford Coppola in minute detail how that could never, ever happen in real life, why it would be physically impossible. And Coppola sat there, listened politely, nodded his head, remarked, “Uh-huh,” and “I see,” from time to time. Then at the end he finally said to the experts, “But I want to do it.” ---
**Author:** ![DWMarch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dwmarch/32/1010_2.png) [@DWMarch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DWMarch)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2019, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/36 "2019-01-03T06:24:29Z")
> [@JB99](#): > > Yeah, this is why conspiracy theories flop in real life. > > Fictional villains need lots of faceless mooks and henches for the hero to beat up. As you’ve observed, they almost invariably skip over the recruitment part. Some shows actually use it as a point of comedy (eg The Simpsons, Venture Brothers). They’ve even hung a lampshade on this within the franchise in Live Free or Die Hard, courtesy of some snark by John McClane himself. “You have got to be running out of bad guys by now. What, do you have a service or something? 1-800-HENCHMAN?” ---
**Author:** ![TaoPilot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/77aa72/32.png) [@TaoPilot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TaoPilot)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2019, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/37 "2019-01-04T16:25:06Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Just so you know, a glideslope transmitter is a dumb radio thing mounted on the ground next to the runway. No software or computers are involved. The only way to move the signal is to physically move the transmitter. > > That was only the second most egregious offense against aeronautical reality in the flick, behind “Why didn’t they just all divert to BWI or PHL?”, already well-discussed here. > > But it’s always cool seeing John Amos get sucked into a jet engine. Gotta give it that. 😃 Even if they could lower the glide slope, it still bothered me that the pilots blindly followed that down without referencing the altimeter. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2019, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/38 "2019-01-04T16:30:08Z")
> [@TaoPilot](#): > > Even if they could lower the glide slope, it still bothered me that the pilots blindly followed that down without referencing the altimeter. Actually, shit like this happens a lot on \*\*\*Mayday \*\*\*(aka _ **Air Crash Investigation** _). ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2019, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491/39 "2019-01-05T04:36:48Z")
> [@TaoPilot](#): > > Even if they could lower the glide slope, it still bothered me that the pilots blindly followed that down without referencing the altimeter. (My experience is with small planes only; don’t know if the big iron follows the same rules and procedures.) Air pressure changes with the weather. Pilots approaching an airport get certain weather information from the local controllers, including a setting for their altimeter so that it will be accurate for the airport they’re landing at. If the controllers gave the pilots the wrong setting, the altimeters on the plane could make the pilots think they were 300 feet higher than they actually were. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/die-hard-2-question-spoilers-but-who-cares-the-movie-is-30-years-old/826491.md?page=1)