20 Things You Didn't Know About Die Hard

16. In The Original German Release, The Terrorists Were Rogue Irish Activists

Die Hard Hans Gruber Alan Rickman
Fox

The film establishes that Hans Gruber is a West German terrorist, but for Die Hard's original German release, this was changed due to cultural sensitivity towards terrorism in the country at the time.

Instead, Gruber and his gang were changed to be Irish extremist activists turned freelance, with Hans Gruber renamed Jack Gruber, while Karl became Charlie, Heinrich was renamed Henry, and so on.

This inevitably caused a slight issue when Die Hard with a Vengeance was released in 1995, though, given that the film's antagonist is Hans' brother Simon (Jeremy Irons), and Hans' German lineage is again brought up.

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