Bruce Willis to Help Cast Young John McClane in Die Hard: Year One

Bruce Willis to help cast young John McClane in Die Hard: Year One

Director Len Wiseman (Live Free or Die Hard) spoke with /Film about 20th Century Fox‘s latest installment in the Die Hard franchise, Die Hard: Year One, which has been in the works for some time. Wiseman confirmed that we will be seeing a young Holly Gennero alongside a young John McClane through flashbacks, and that Bruce Willis (Glass) is helping with the casting process.

“There is [a young Holly], I will tell you there is,” confirmed Wiseman, who also said “There may very well be” a present day reunion between Bruce Willis and Bonnie Bedelia (Designated Survivor), who has not appeared in a Die Hard movie since the second film. It has not yet been confirmed if McClane’s children, Lucy (Mary Elizebeth Winstead) and Jack (Jai Courtney) who both appeared in previous sequels will appear in the new Die Hard installment.

Die Hard: Year One’s 1979 storyline would be an “origin story” of sorts for McClane, delving into the protagonist’s time as a police officer with the NYPD. McClane’s early years were also the focus of a Boom! Studios comic book series, Die Hard: Year One (pictured above). Published in 2009 and 2010, the first four-issue miniseries was written by Howard Chaykin and took place in the Big Apple during the 1976 bicentennial. Like the film series, Die Hard: Year One had McClane facing off against violent terrorists. It was followed by another four-issue story, set during the 1977 New York blackout.

The film will jump back and forth between past and present, working as a prequel and sequel and allowing fans to see the McClane we know and love as well as the younger version of the detective in flashbacks. Wiseman explained to the outlet that the premise of Die Hard: Year One is to see how “the ’70s has ramifications on present-day Bruce.”

Wiseman also pressed the importance of waiting on the script from Carey W. Hayes and Chad Hayes (The Conjuring) to be finished before they commence with filming.

“’Die Hard’ is going to be happening fairly soon,” Wiseman said. “No dates. I’ve been asked about dates before and I’m always wrong. The date is when the script is right which is when we all want to go. The script has taken quite a long time. I want it to be right, as everybody does. The truth is we started prepping ‘Live Free or Die Hard’ when the script was not ready. That process of working on the script as we were shooting the movie is not the funnest thing in the world to do. We pulled it together but nobody wants to go through that again. I think it’s also more so than any other time, [the script]’s very important. We’ve seen it all. We’ve seen a lot. I think even, say, 10 years ago, I think studios in general were a little bit more willing to put movies like that, franchise movies into production with a sense of ‘we’ll continue to work on the script.’ I think that attitude has changed.”

Who do you think should play the young John McClane? Are you excited to see the character’s origin story in the upcoming action movie? Let us know what you think in the comments below!

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