20 Movie Franchises That Carried On For Way Too Long

2. Die Hard

The Movies: Die Hard (1988), Die Hard 2 (1990), Die Hard With A Vengeance (1995), Live Free or Die Hard (2007), A Good Day To Die Hard (2013) In 1988, audiences were introduced to John McClane, an ordinary cop who found himself in extraordinary circumstances. Contained within a single building, the well-worn story of a lone hero overcoming insurmountable odds is given a new dimension thanks to a strong vein of humor, Alan Rickman's iconic Hans Gruber and some standout action scenes. The success of the first movie led to an inevitable sequel and although Die Hard 2 was pretty much more of the same, this time at an airport, it remains a worthy entry in the franchise. Die Hard With a Vengeance tinkered with the formula, giving Bruce Willis a sparring partner in the form of a typically-charismatic Samuel L Jackson. The buddy-movie dynamic was a refreshing change of pace, and the end result was satisfying enough to cement the Die Hard series as one of the all-time great trilogies. For a dozen years, at least. Live Free or Die Hard managed to forget everything that makes the series unique; McClane is now just another indestructible supercop, taking down fighter jets single-handedly and spouting off one-liners after each increasingly-ridiculous set-piece. A solid genre flick, just not a Die Hard movie. However, A Good Day to Die Hard makes the previous entry look like the original by comparison. Director John Moore sucks the life out of the franchise with a vapid entry that ignores things such as plot, character and logic to deliver a series of action scenes that continually defy the laws of both physics and gravity. Bruce Willis has claimed he wants to make one more Die Hard movie before calling it quits, and let's hope he doesn't bother. Unless the movie can recapture the spirit of the first three as opposed to the generic Hollywood trappings of the latter two, the franchise risks slipping further into ignominy.