Die Hard: WIth a Vengeance
part of Die Hard

Die Hard begins on Christmas Eve with New York detective John McClane traveling to Los Angeles to spend Christmas with his wife Holly, who is now living in LA with their two children and going by her maiden name. The party was being held at the fictional Nakatomi Plaza. During the evening, German terrorists break into the building and take the partygoers hostage. McClane escapes detection after having an argument with his wife and leaving to an upstairs bathroom. He manages to hide throughout the building, killing off the terrorists one by one. After a reporter reveals that McClane's wife is one of the hostages by interviewing their children, the terrorists take Holly in order to persuade McClane into giving up. He finally meets the leader Hans Gruber and throws him out of the window.

Die Hard 2 takes place a year after the events of the first film, once again on Christmas Eve. This time, John McClane is in Washington D.C. at Dulles Airport awaiting the arrival of his wife. While waiting, a group of terrorists planning on rescuing a drug lord have taken over the control tower of the airport. This strands several planes in the air, including the one McClane's wife is on.

In Die Hard with a Vengeance, set several years later, McClane is back in New York. He is now separated from his wife, suspended from the police force, and two steps away from being a full-blown alcoholic. A terrorist who goes only by the moniker "Simon" threatens to blow up various locations in the city unless McClane will play his twisted version of Simon says. McClane must solve a number of riddles and challenges in order to keep the bombs from going off. He receives the reluctant help of Zeus Carver, a shopkeeper from Harlem who had saved McClane after the first challenge "Simon" had put him through. The FBI finally reveal that "Simon" is in fact Simon Peter Gruber, the brother of Hans Gruber.

In Live Free or Die Hard,McClane and Holly are now divorced. His daughter Lucy, now in college, is going by her mother's maiden name and telling people that her father is dead. A group of cyber-terrorists begin hacking into FBI computers. The FBI then sends McClane to bring in a known hacker, Matt Farrell. In the process, a group of assassins hired by Gabriel attempts to kill the pair. Farrell tells McClane that the terrorists are actually in the middle of performing a fire sale. Lucy is captured by the mastermind behind the terrorists, Thomas Gabriel.

John McClane travels to Russia to help out his seemingly wayward son, Jack, only to discover that Jack is a CIA operative working to prevent a nuclear-weapons heist, causing the father and son to team up against underworld forces.