Die Hard (franchise)
series of action movies beginning with Die Hard in 1988
Die Hard is an American action film series and media franchise that originated with Roderick Thorp's 1979 novel Nothing Lasts Forever. All five films revolve around the main character of John McClane (Joe Leland in the original novel), a police detective who continually finds himself in the middle of a crisis where he is both the only hope against disaster and the culprit's target.
Per the franchise's name, McClane confounds repeated attempts to kill him, driving his enemies to distraction, by adding up and exploiting dumb luck. The films have grossed a combined $1.4 billion worldwide, with Bruce Willis as the only actor to appear in all five films.
Films
Die Hard (1988)
The first film takes place in Los Angeles at the fictional Nakatomi Plaza (portrayed by Fox Plaza). It begins on Christmas Eve when McClane (Bruce Willis) comes to reunite with separated wife Holly (Bonnie Bedelia) in Los Angeles at her company's Christmas party. Holly, who now has her own career, lives with their two children and uses her maiden name.
At Nakatomi Plaza, West German terrorists break in and take the celebrants hostage. McClane escapes detection and hides throughout the building. He kills off the gang and learns their real plan, to steal $640 million in bearer bonds from the building's vault.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Die Hard (franchise)” as series of action movies beginning with Die Hard in 1988. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q2716420. VIAF identifies the subject as 2156251607907990716. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1979 and 1988.
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This entry incorporates text from “Die Hard (franchise)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.