Simon Says
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Die Hard with a Vengeance
gbean2397 — 9 years ago(January 31, 2017 06:01 PM)
Of course as we all know, each
Die Hard
film originally began life as an entirely different story. For
Die Hard
, it was the 1979 novel
Nothing Lasts Forever
, which was a sequel to
The Detective
. It was also said to had almost been made as a
Commando
sequel with Arnold Schwarzenegger, but Arnie backed out and it was reworked into a standalone film.
But how about
Die Hard with a Vengeance
, which originally began life as a standalone script titled
Simon Says
by Jonathan Hensleigh. It's been said that it almost became an action vehicle for Brandon Lee, whether a standalone film or a
Rapid Fire
sequel. Then it was said to had been almost considered as the basis for
Lethal Weapon 4
by producer Joel Silver.
Hensleigh said that the first hour of
DHwaV
is literally based on his original
Simon Says
script, with minor differences. Of course, the main protagonist was also a New York cop; but Zeus was originally a female, leading to a romantic relationship with the NY cop. His script was incomplete, so the film's second-half was written specifically for the film to make it more
Die Hard
.