"Live Free or Die Hard" Part 1 Quiz

Answer: Daisy Duke

Daisy Duke was the name of the buxom, scantily clad star of the television series and movie "The Dukes of Hazzard". Matt's smart-mouthed response immediately identified him as having the same kind of attitude as McClean himself. The two characters played well off of each other.
McClane had been asked to pick Matt up and bring him in for questioning by the F.B.I. because they were experiencing computer problems and he was one of the hackers on the list considered good enough to have created the problem. Their problems were way more serious than they first imagined.
Bruce Willis reprised the role of John McClane and Justin Long was excellent in the role of Matt Farrell.

Answer: An action figure fell on it.

The terrorists were monitoring Matt's house, waiting to make sure that he was dead. McClane's arrival stopped him from hitting the appropriate key, so the terrorists opened fire on the apartment. In the resultant destruction, an action figure got knocked over, bounced off the keyboard and set off the bomb, but no one was sitting next to it at the time.
It was difficult to tell exactly which key was the trigger, but the camera kept focusing on the area containing the Delete and End keys.
Farrell didn't own a cat, so there wasn't one to be injured in the explosion!

Answer: French

It was interesting to hear the terrorists conversing in French, while Thomas Gabriel (the mastermind behind the act of virtual terrorism), and his girlfriend conversed with the henchmen. The conversation was easily and seamlessly bilingual. The men who committed the acts of violence pretty much all spoke French (initially) while our chief bad guys replied in English. Sub-titles were provided! At one point, after having killed a few of these, McLean asked Gabriel if he was running out of men or if he had called 1-800-henchmen for replacements. Thomas Gabriel was played by Timothy Olyphant and his very ruthless and effective girlfriend, Mai Lihn, was played by Maggie Q.

Answer: CCR

Creedence Clearwater Revival, or CCR as they are often referred to, were a bluesy rock group that had a string of hits it the 60s and early 70s. The song playing in this scene was "Fortunate Son" off the 1969 album "Willy and the Poor Boys". It peaked at number 14 on the US charts.
Farrell was not impressed with the music and started poking fun at McClane's age. He asked McClane about the last time he had regularly listened to new music on the radio, and asked if Michael Jackson was still black back then.

Answer: fear

At this point in the movie Farrell was still very much an angry young man with disdain for anything that even remotely hinted at establishment. His belief that the media manipulated stories to keep the public in fear was soon blown to bits, when he was confronted with the reality of terrorism.

Answer: transportation networks

The computer terrorists took control of the traffic lights, causing all kinds of accidents and problems around the city, grinding traffic to a halt. There were also reports of other transportation systems (like planes and trains) being interfered with to the point that they were no longer functioning either.

Answer: All traffic lights were green.

McClane commented on the fact that all of the lights were green and decided to abandon his car because of all the traffic snarls. Determined to fulfill his duty of bringing the kid in for questioning, they proceeded on foot.

Answer: The anthrax alarm went off.

The terrorists triggered the anthrax alarm in a number of government buildings. This was done to enable them to gain access to a particular building, disguised as a HazMat team. In triggering the alarm in so many buildings, they were able to generate enough confusion to disguise their true targets while clearing the building of more than a skeleton staff.

Answer: financial networks

Manipulation of the stock market led to extreme panic as stock prices plummeted. It appeared, to everyone involved, that a stock market crash was happening. We later found out that this started a download of all financial information into the computers at Woodlawn. This safeguard had been put in place so that true records would still exist.

Answer: a speech made up of clips from various US presidents

The speech was cleverly done, as clips of presidential speeches were spliced together to form complete sentences, warning that the situation was indeed going to get worse. The complete control that they had over the monitors and televisions made the threats that much more convincing.