As the film opens, it's Christmas Eve, and John McClane is on a flight headed to Los Angeles, hoping to reconcile with his estranged wife, Holly.

John carries a giant stuffed teddy bear, presumably a Christmas gift for his daughter. This same bear would later appear in The Hunt for Red October, another film directed by John McTiernan.

Paulina watches Lucy and John Jr. while Holly is at work. She is implied to be an illegal immigrant when reporter Richard Thornburg threatens to call INS in order to get into the home and interview the children.

Argyle is the limo driver assigned to pick John up from LAX. It's his first day on the job, and he's a little nervous.

When Argyle asks John why he didn't just follow his wife to L.A., he responds: "I'm a New York cop. I got a six-month backlog on New York scumbags I'm still trying to put behind bars. I can't just pick up and go that easy."

Nakatomi Plaza is a high-rise office building in Century City, Los Angeles, California that houses the headquarters of the California branch of the Nakatomi Corporation, a Japanese company Holly works for.

Holly is listed under Gennero, her maiden name, rather than McClane.

He claims he was "making a call," but he was actually snorting cocaine. McClane, a trained detective, isn't fooled. "You missed some," he says as Ellis wipes his nose.

The security guard working the front desk at Nakatomi Plaza speaks briefly to John McClane when he arrives. Later, when two terrorists enter the building casually talking about basketball, he takes a shot to the head from a silenced Walther PPK pistol.

Bearer bonds, because they are unregistered, are technically owned by whoever is holding them, thus Hans Gruber's interest in the $640 million in bearer bonds stored in the vault.