MovieChat Forums > Die Hard (1988) Discussion > Karl right at the end....

Karl right at the end....

posted 7 years ago by foxhound-37781
5 replies | jump to latest

Ok, I may sound like i'm rambling here, so please bear with me...

At the end of Die Hard, we see one last encounter with Karl as he yells and burst out of the coat he's got around him, aims his rifle at McClane only to cop it off Sgt. Powell.

This raises multiple questions for me....

Firstly, how in the hell was Karl able to survive getting that steel chain wrapped around his neck and then being slammed into a concrete wall, surely he would have been choked to death from that, right? was he somehow able to get himself free of the chains after John left that room. Was he just holding his breath and faking that he died to make John believe that he killed him until he left the room? We see John wrap the chain around Karls neck multiple times but he doesn't actually tie the chain in a Knot before he slams Karl into the wall, so I guess it's plausible that Karl could have easily gotten out of the chain...

My next questions are... Who was it that helped walk Karl out of the building at the end of the movie? was it another terrorist who was helping him try to get down into the car park so he could take a final pot shot at John or was it a paramedic who somehow didn't realize that Karl was one of the terrorists?

And lastly, How did Karl manage to sneak his rifle all the way down to the car park without the person helping him notice? If it wasn't a terrorist helping Karl down, Did Karl manage to make it down to the lobby by himself and one of the paramedics spotted him and noticed him bloody and beaten up and they thought he was just a hostage and ran inside to help him not realizing he was actually a terrorist who had a rifle under his coat?

What do you guys think?

[–] [deleted] 7 years ago

Firstly, how in the hell was Karl able to survive getting that steel chain wrapped around his neck and then being slammed into a concrete wall, surely he would have been choked to death from that, right?

If you look closely while he's hanging there, you can see he has his fingers through the chain to prevent him from choking to death. How he got down though, I have no idea!

[–] IMDBrefugee (435) 6 years ago

Its a good question. A better question is how did he survive the explosion?? As best i can stretch it - he let himself down and crawled to safety right after the hostages ran downstairs escaping the explosion. When the rescue team found the hostasges he was among them and tucked his gun maybe under his shirt(?), they didnt check him and just draped a blanket on him. When he was coming out still consumed with getting revenge he blew his cover to try and kill Mclane. Obviously it didn't work. Its farfetched but its the best explanation.

[–] sneezer (166) 6 years ago

Check out the great Youtube channel Cinemasins. It's reason for existing is to nitpick at movies, and does a great job at it, especially nitpicking at Die Hard. The narrator of the channel asks this same question you ask, about how Karl got down to the ground floor, after having that chain wrapped around his neck. I think it is one of those "Don't pay too much attention to the details. It is ONLY a movie!" situations. I do usually do that, but I just love the commentary in the Cinemasins videos, as it is loaded with insults, humor and oftentimes, a quip of "That's racist!" Check it out!

[–] Etherdave (162) 3 years ago

I think you're overthinking the scene. The scene is an obvious homage to 'Fatal Attraction': notice the resemblance of a crazed Alexander Godunov to a crazed Glenn Close. Also the scene is a reference to the final scenes of 'Aliens' (note Alex's resemblance to the Queen Alien), and a chunk of that film's music even plays cheesily in the background. None of this is supposed to be analyzed particularly deeply. It's an action film, definitely not rocket science.

[–] Strazdas (2328) 3 years ago

Theres a reason real life hangings have you fall and break your neck on the rope. Too many people would actually survive the choking. Its realistically possible he may have survived that.