Superhero Media: Die Hard

I honestly don't feel I really need to talk about how good a film Die Hard is, its one of best best films ever made in the Action genre, still highly influential thirty years after its release and possibly the best film to watch at Christmas. For quite a while I've had a John McClaine miniature in my Superhero collection, I've even used him in a few games if you look back through my AARs on this blog. When I'm running a game and I put McClaine down on the table, even next to characters like Robocop and Commissioner Gordon, I often get questions as to why he's there; simply put, is John McClaine really a superhero? I think the answer is yes, insofar as characters like Marv (Sin City) and Mister A can be considered superheroes merely because they're highly physically capable. Now, Marv and Mister A have the advantage of having originated in comics, rather than in film, but the character from which McClaine sprung was, himself, a pulp detective, of the kind from which many early superheroes grew. 

From a series of, not great, books by Roderick Thorp, about New York Detective Joe Leland, very much of the Joe Friday mold, Nothing Lasts Forever has an ageing Leland battling terrorists in a Los Angeles skyscraper whilst barefoot and cut off from help. Taken from that perspective, Leland isn't too far removed from characters considered comic heroes, like Mister A, The Spirit and the original Blue Beetle (Dan Garret was a police officer before being retconned into an archeologist). For my Ultimate Alliance games, McClaine has the ability to heal himself, like Wolverine or Deadpool, representing the dozens of injuries he will get throughout a film, as well as being able to trade health for increased damage. Strictly speaking, these function the same as actual "Superpowers" that other heroes have, but for me they fit the themes and feel of the Die Hard films perfectly, even if I'm primarily only taking Die Hard, Die Hard 2: Die Harder and Die Hard With A Vengeance into account, though we'll get to my reasoning behind that as the series progresses. 

So where would John McClaine fit into a broader superhero setting? Well, cops, especially exceptional ones have long had a role in superhero media, with Code Blue being a good example, or even SHIELD though the right lens. Though real life police violence, corruption and militarisation are major issues (and I'm personally in favour of defunding the police), so long as Police are a reality for the majority of comic audiences, how they react to superheroes in fictional settings will be something that needs to be considered. Assuming something like Code Blue existed in the NYPD, the heads of that department looking at a detective who took out 12 terrorists and rescued 30 hostages without the use of shoes or backup and thinking "this could be our guy" makes perfect sense. I don't believe that John McClaine has actual super powers, even taking post-With A Vengeance entries into account, that's basically just how action cinema works, but when compared to "costumed adventurer" types, like Batman, he takes the same absurd level of punishment on a regular basis. Next time you're watching Die Hard, have a bit of a lateral think about how all of this look in the MCU or another superhero setting.