So yeah i saw this movie and there were a few cool moments. It was still ridiculous in the same way as 'Live Free or Die Hard' and after a point you have to turn your brain off from the ridiculousness. That said even though it wasn't as over the top in some ways *erm* the jet scene *erm* it also lacked as much action as the movie before it and seemed shorter overall. We're also treated to at least two big scenes where not only is something there to save our heroes conveniently placed but they didn't even plan it. In one scene they jump out of a building to avoid getting shot at by a helicopter and luckily land into some scaffolding and a series of other things to break their fall. Not only that but in another scene they fall through multiple parts of a building into a pool of water by complete chance without planning (that was also completely out of place) that saves them from a helicopter exploding. I do enjoy how john isn't a total idiot in this and basically realizes something is up with the dude's daughter being there early (not that it saves them). They also find some dude to be lying about something when certain things don't match up (they seemed to figure it out a little too easily in my mind). Speaking of this dude and his daughter i found it odd that there were 2 full cases of "OMG the good guy is really the bad guy! DUN, DUN, DUNNNNNN!!!!!!"

As far as comedy in the movie i found some parts to be interesting. John chases john junior trying to ask him why he never called like a worried parent in the middle of a shootout between some baddies. Also john's daughter asks about how her brother is doing over the phone which was interesting. My favorite scene i'd say comedy-wise (though somewhat done before in movies and tv) is the look of utter WTF you see in the taxi cab driver's face when john macclane butchers the russian language and is so obviously a foreigner. That look on the taxi cab driver's face was pretty priceless actually. He even seems like a good guy though i'm not sure i enjoyed listening to him sing but that was part of the humor.

I also have to wonder how does a little army jeep overpower a huge APC sized vehicle and push it to the side? I'll admit i don't know enough about all this but i'm pretty sure something that big can't be moved by a dinky little army jeep. I also love how a jeep is conveniently parked nearby for john to hijack in the first place.

I'm not sure how i felt about the whole chernobyl tie in with this movie. I find it a little hard to believe the baddies helped cause that. Oh and did nobody else feel kind of weird that john and john junior basically walked around in irradiated chernobyl with no protective gear whatsoever even though all or almost all the baddies did? I mean i'd doubt john would care about being sterile at this point in his life and he's already lost his hair but john junior might still need to be not sterile to carry on the insane explosion based movie series.

On the whole subject of john junior my friend said he was one of the worst actors he's ever seen. Prepare for a basic built up marine, special forces, CIA agent of sculpted masculine perfection with a perfect body and face that all women probably are going to fap to. The stereotype is pretty bad. Oddly enough he has the whole 'by the book' "God d*mn it macclane!!!" attitude that's typical for a stereotypical police chief or the main bad guy. My friend mentioned they never really said why john and john jr. hated each other so much that they just do. You know just because. I suppose john didn't spend enough time with the son and said son had daddy issues because of that. Meh. Typical stuff in these movies though understandable a bit even if over-done.

At the end we're treated to the macclane family walking away in a typical perfect american family "let's get along 5 minutes for the audience and then kill each other off screen type of way" and it was even complete with music to throw out a mood for a family we never see any depth to (i guess john is just the typical caring every-man father we can all relate to looking out for his kids that goes through infinite explosions because most average fathers do that for their kids). Considering the family it wouldn't surprise me.

The scaffolding scene was spotted by John, and it was said by Kamarov that the top floor was closed in 1989 and was under construction, so scaffolding wouldn't be a plot hole in that regard. They show that there are some injuries, but yes not the type of injuries that one might expect to see when falling 15 feet, hitting a piece of canvas, and then falling through a floor of wooden planks. When they leave this scene, they are very visibly injured and Jack even has a piece of metal sticking out of him, albeit a small piece. The pool of water was seen earlier in the final scenes when they walk by, and John comments to Jack, "What does this remind you of?" And Jack replies, "New York." So they definitely knew that it existed, aiming their jump to land in the pool? Yes, that was obviously movie magic, but this is John Fething McClane we're talking about here... excusing the strange events of the 4th film, this man has done some pretty extraordinary things, landing in a pool of water seems rather dull compared to the rest of his exploits.

The reason why John McClane was able to figure out that Kamarov was lying is because when he and Jack were bound up about to be executed, Kamarov was already in the hands of his daughter and the rest of the thugs on the helicopter. So Alik was able to bare a bit of himself to John and Jack before he killed them. It would have been a different story if Alik had been constantly tap dancing through the film, and When John asked him where the dancer was, he responded with something along the lines of, "Alik is in a different part of the facility." In fact, they didn't get anything out of Kamarov at that point until John saw the dead body, which no one bothered to remove, of course he was going to see it lying there.

Also remember, the Jeep wasn't parked, John was nearly run over by it as he was trying to commandeer a new vehicle after he wrecked the parked truck, which was parked near a building, and it's driver was in sight of the camera when he stole it. Conveniently placed? yes, but again this is a movie we're talking about, at least giant eagles didn't swoop in an take him to where he needed to get to.

As for Chernobyl, Russia tried their damnedest to hide that from getting out, they even said in the film they held a children's parade the next day to show people that nothing was wrong. And I'm sure that Jack, being the by the books Russian expert he seemed to be, probably would have known that while there is still a chance for radiation poisoning, he would know that some people still live in the area, even after the accident in 1986. And let's be honest, using a famous site for their plot was a lot better, than some fake Russian city or underground silo, I thought it added some nice background for the film, mostly because everyone knows something about Chernobyl, whether it was from the video games that take place there, the 1 or 2 missions in the few Modern Warfare games, or just knowing what happened there, I bet 75% of the audience have a basic knowledge of the place.

As for the relationship between John and Jack, I felt they did a good job explaining the stressed relationship between the two of them. John had no idea where his son was until that police report came through, he had a gun pointed at him, showing him that his son definitely did not want to see him there in Russia. This goes back and forth between the two of them, and comes to a bit of a climax in the ballroom scene where Jack tells John that John is not going to open up to him just before they die, meaning that Jack would have no reason to be angry at his father when he died, something that up until a few scenes later, was something that Jack was okay with.

If you dig into a little bit of Die Hard history, Jack was in the original die hard film as a young boy, so Jack was having to grow up with all of this rather strange stuff happening to his dad, couple that with his dad always working probably one of the reasons for the divorce between John and his wife, Jack probably went to live with his mother like his sister did. I felt the relationship was well done. Though I think the Jack's actor could have done a bit of a better job. Oh well

That still doesn't explain why they walked around in chernobyl with no protective gear even if the radiation is probably at somewhat lower levels considering all those years of waiting. It just also seems a little odd to me when some event in history is tied to some baddies in a movie. I suppose i could see it happening but it felt a little ridiculous to me.

I think you're right about some of this though esp. the jeep though a jeep should never over-power a huge freaking apc and knock it to the side in a car chase like that. It'd probably get wrecked like an empty soda can.

Did they see scaffolding in that particular area of the building when coming up though? For all they knew there was no scaffolding in the area they jumped to or it could've been many floors not in the right area. I dunno it just seemed a bit unplanned to me somewhat.

The radiation thing never bothered me considering that the big meaty muscle was walking around without a shirt on. I'm sure most of the people in protective gear were doing so simply for precaution. I understand that they sprayed down the inner vault with that "radiation nullifying" crap, and no one seemed to care after that point, not to mention that all of the nameless inept guards were wearing simple masks and combat fatigues, so it wasn't a major issue for me. As for the jeep hitting the APC, remember Bruce barely touched it when the chase scene ended, the reason why it flew of the side of the bridge and on to it's side was because of the concrete walk barriers, it had less to do with Bruce in the jeep, and more to do with the environment around them. I mean, the few times that the jeep ran into the APC, it barely moved it.

As for the scaffolding, yes you could see the frame of it when Bruce looked out the window. The shot was a split second, but you could clearly see it. Of course it was unplanned, this is the Die Hard series we're talking about, the man is truly lucky to be alive after all of the things he's done, and that's what makes rooting for McClane so much fun.

the gun fight with the big beefy guy had all those gas lines being shot, and then McClane delivers the grenade via the fork lift... And they didn't all burn to a crisp... that's the only thing that annoyed me about the film. The heat in the room would have been enough to take out the McClanes, there was even a shot where the flames wrapped around the column and partially engulfed Jack... oh well