Die Hard (film series) reunite with separated wife Holly (Bonnie Bedelia) in Los Angeles at her company's Christmas party. Holly left to pursue her career with their two children, and uses her maiden name. At the fictional Nakatomi Plaza, East 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. In the finale, McClane shoots the terrorist leader, Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman), out the window to fall thirty stories. It was released on July 15, 1988
Die Hard between Hans and McClane for the return of the detonators. McClane refuses, prompting Gruber to execute Ellis. While checking explosives attached to the roof, Gruber encounters McClane; Gruber passes himself off as an escaped hostage. McClane offers him a gun and Gruber attempts to shoot McClane, but the gun is empty. Karl, Franco, and Fritz arrive; McClane kills Fritz and Franco, but is forced to flee, abandoning the detonators. FBI agents take command of the siege, ordering the building's power shut off; this, as Gruber anticipated, disables the vault's final lock. Gruber demands a helicopter on the rooftop for transport,