FADE IN:

INT. POLICE FIRING RANGE

BRUCE WILLIS is firing a gun and maintaining a bored smirk.

BRUCE WILLIS

Now if I can find an excuse to frantically leap away from something, I'll have given the audience a preview of my entire performance in this movie.

SERGEANT EXPOSITION

Hey, Bruce. Bad news about your son.

BRUCE WILLIS

My estranged son, I'm guessing?

SERGEANT EXPOSITION

Yes, he will be providing your usual familial reconciliation subplot. Anyhow, he's in jail in Russia on a count of attempted murder.

BRUCE WILLIS

The FUCK?! When we didn't hear from him for a while, we were thinking drugs or something! This is way more bizarre and terrible than anything-

SERGEANT EXPOSITION

DUDE. Your image.

BRUCE WILLIS

Oh - right. I mean, kids, geez.

(sighs a little)

Guess I'm off to Russia.

INT. RUSSIAN COURTHOUSE

JAI COURTNEY and SEBASTIAN KOCH await their trials in SEPARATE PLASTIC HANNIBAL LECTER CAGES.

JAI COURTNEY

So what are you in for?

SEBASTIAN KOCH

God knows. I think I called this trial myself, so I can confess to a crime that me and this guy Sergei committed a while back?

JAI COURTNEY

You're just announcing some crime you did? That counts as a trial in Russia?

SEBASTIAN KOCH

Well, maybe that's not it, maybe Sergei arranged this trial to have me convicted on bullshit charges. But wait, since I'm already in prison and he's personally planning to sabotage this trial - shit, I don't know.

JAI COURTNEY

Is the whole plot going to be such a messy-

A WHOLE SIDE OF THE BUILDING EXPLODES. JAI and SEBASTIAN'S CAGES are broken open by the blast but they themselves are conveniently UNHARMED. MERCENARIES flood the courtroom.

JAI COURTNEY

Quick, Sebastian, follow me! I'm actually CIA here to extract you, surprise!

SEBASTIAN KOCH

So wait, the only way the CIA could think of to get an operative into this courtroom was to have him actually shoot an actual person, get arrested, and then try and weasel his way into being tried at the same time as me?

JAI COURTNEY

Solid plan, right? Now come on, I've got a really big, conspicuous van waiting outside!

JAI and SEBASTIAN pile into the van, but as they start to drive off, BRUCE jumps out in front of them!

BRUCE WILLIS

JAI! What the hell are you doing, fleeing these explosions and gunmen? We need to have a serious talk right here right now!

JAI COURTNEY

Dad, what in God's name-

SEBASTIAN wanders out of the van and starts tottering over towards the MERCENARIES.

JAI COURTNEY

SEBASTIAN! What the fuck, guys, is it International Be a Fucking Moron Day again already?

JAI hauls SEBASTIAN back into the van and drives off. One of the bad guys starts SHOOTING, but supervising mercenary RASHA BUKVIC stops him.

RASHA BUKVIC

Cut it out, we need Sebastian alive! He's the only one who knows where the incriminating evidence against our boss Sergei is hidden!

SHOOTER

Doesn't that mean that killing him would in fact solve everything forever?

RASHA BUKVIC

Shut up, wiseacre, we've got a boring car chase to get on with.

RASHA follows JAI'S BIG, LUMBERING VAN in his BIG, LUMBERING TRUCK, with BRUCE in close pursuit in another BIG, LUMBERING TRUCK. A car chase ensues, which consists of about ninety per cent INTENSE TAILGATING.

JAI COURTNEY

(on radio)

Hey, CIA, we're ready for you to land your big silver plane in the middle of Moscow and extract us now! This is apparently the plan!

CIA GUY

Sorry, too late! That one-minute delay your dad caused was more than our margin of error allowed for.

JAI COURTNEY

How can I POSSIBLY be too late? Mercenaries bombed the building and I had to get out of there before whatever we had planned even got off the ground!

CIA GUY

Look, if we extract you now it's Movie Over, just get to the "safe" house already!

BRUCE runs RASHA off the road, then he and JAI and SEBASTIAN get on over to the safe house.

SEBASTIAN KOCH

Okay, guys, I'll tell you where the incriminating file is if I can get my daughter out of the country. I'm worried that Sergei might go after her to get to me.

JAI COURTNEY

You know, that's probably what he should have done in the first place. Instead of sending in fifty guys in armored trucks to blow up a courthouse in the middle of the city. Just saying.

SEBASTIAN calls his daughter, but then MERCENARIES OPEN FIRE ON THE BUILDING, killing JAI'S PARTNER and injuring SEBASTIAN!

BRUCE WILLIS

Get down, Sebastian! The bad guys no longer want you alive for this scene and this scene only!

They FLEE.

BRUCE WILLIS

Okay, Jai, contact somebody, now! We need the CIA to bail us out!

JAI COURTNEY

No way! If that one safe house was compromised, presumably my phone is too. And your phone, somehow. And every means of communicating anybody. Much better to entrust this entire mission to me and my elderly father.

SEBASTIAN KOCH

Let's go to that meeting with my daughter. The one I set up by making a phone call from that obviously unsecured safe house, seconds before a million bad guys stormed the place. Nothing could possibly go wrong there.

They go to a HOTEL and meet up with SEBASTIAN'S DAUGHTER, who the audience realizes is YULIYA SNIGIR, SERGEI'S GIRLFRIEND FROM EARLIER IN THE MOVIE, TWIST!

BRUCE WILLIS

Hold it, Yuliya, the fact that you're standing here where you said you'd be, not acting even slightly suspicious, makes me suspicious for some reason. How'd you get here so fast?

YULIYA SNIGIR

I was nearby when Dad called me.

(pause)

No wait, that's a perfectly straightforward and plausible explanation. What I meant to say was, I got here quickly by taking the most notoriously gridlocked road in all of Russia.

BRUCE WILLIS

AHA! By idiotic coincidence, the fact that that road suffers from heavy traffic happens to be the ONE fact I've learned about Russia since I got here! YOU'RE A TRAITOR!

Sure enough, RASHA pops out of hiding with a dozen mercs! YULIYA takes off with SEBASTIAN, while the mercs stay behind with RASHA, BRUCE and JAI.

RASHA BUKVIC

Heh heh, now that you're unarmed, tied up and completely vulnerable, it's time to quickly shoot you and move ahead with our plan.

(pause)

Say, you know what I hate about Americans? How about EVERYTHING? Ooh, burn!

(starts dancing)

Should've been a dancer instead of a mercenary, oh well! Ha cha cha!

(punches Jai)

FUCK YOU, JERKFACE!

JAI COURTNEY

What the hell is going on?! Did you accidentally set your brain to "shuffle"?

RASHA BUKVIC

I'm not good at monologuing, okay? Come on, I've been stalling for like two minutes, have you finished cutting yourself free yet?

JAI COURTNEY

Cutting myself - OH FUCK, my hidden knife, I forgot all about that. Sorry.

(starts freeing himself)

RASHA BUKVIC

Oh, great, NOW you start. Do I have to start fucking dancing again?

BRUCE WILLIS

No, it's fine, we'll take over stalling duties from here. Um...

(stalling)

Ha ha ha ha. Hee hee heh heh haa! Ahh ha ha ha haaa!

JAI COURTNEY

(stalling)

Oh ho ho HAAA ha ha ha haaa!

BRUCE WILLIS

(stalling)

HA HA HA HA HAAA! HEE HO HO HAA!

RASHA BUKVIC

This scene is a fucking embarrassment.

Suddenly THE EDITOR HAS AN EPILEPTIC FIT, and once it's over BRUCE and JAI are safely behind COVER and RASHA is RUNNING AWAY LIKE A SISSY.

BRUCE WILLIS

Wait, what just happened?

JAI COURTNEY

I think we attacked all six armed mercenaries at once? That's the only way we could possibly have avoided getting shot, as I see it.

BRUCE WILLIS

But you had the knife, how did I even get out of my... ah, fuck it.

They SHOOT ALL THE BAD GUYS. Then YULIYA and RASHA show up outside in a HELICOPTER GUNSHIP and start SHOOTING THE ROOM TO PIECES. BRUCE and JAI leap out the window onto some SCAFFOLDING, then dive down the GARBAGE CHUTE.

JAI COURTNEY

OH FUCK WHAT WERE WE THINKING THIS IS A VERTICAL DROP TO OUR DEATHS!

BRUCE WILLIS

No, it's okay, it's one of those spatial distortion chutes. What looks clearly like a fatal vertical drop on the outside, is a fun slippery slide on the inside! WHEEEE!

BRUCE and JAI get away from the MERCENARIES! Or, the MERCENARIES get away from BRUCE and JAI! Whatever, everybody gets away from everybody.

BRUCE WILLIS

This is turning into a real clusterfuck. What is this file we're all so worked up about anyway?

JAI COURTNEY

It proves that Sebastian and Sergei caused the Chernobyl meltdown by embezzling uranium.

BRUCE WILLIS

...That's it? Oh COME ON. Say what you will about these movies, each sequel has managed to have a larger-scale terrorist threat than the last one. Now we're just protecting one corrupt and negligent businessman from another corrupt and negligent businessman? LAAAAME.

JAI COURTNEY

Um, well, what if we say that if Sergei isn't stopped now he'll become president and turn Russia into a nuclear superpower that'll destroy the world?

BRUCE WILLIS

Sounds like the ravings of a paranoid right-wing nutjob, but I guess it'll have to do.

JAI COURTNEY

Let's go to Chernobyl. They'll be going there to get the file from Sebastian's vault.

BRUCE WILLIS

At least we'll have a smaller force to deal with there. No way they could have slipped a small army of machine-gun toting thugs and a fucking Mil Mi-26 helicopter across the Ukraine border. Unless this movie has completely stopped giving a shit.

INT. CHERNOBYL VAULT

SEBASTIAN opens the VAULT for YULIYA and RASHA. It is full of CRATES OF URANIUM.

YULIYA SNIGIR

Hold it, this room is full of radiation. Let's spray it with our anti-radiation spray!

They DO THAT, then YULIYA takes off her RADIATION SUIT and starts STICKING HER FACE in the URANIUM CRATES.

RASHA BUKVIC

We're really working overtime to outdo the level of stupid the last movie's "hacking the whole world" plot brought us, aren't-

SEBASTIAN SHOOTS RASHA! Then YULIYA HUGS SEBASTIAN!

YULIYA SNIGIR

Aha, we were working together the whole time! What a shocking twist!

(pause)

No, wait. This doesn't make a damn bit of sense.

SEBASTIAN KOCH

Sure it does! See, there was no file. I just pretended there was so Sergei would break me out of prison, and I could come get my secret stockpile of weapons-grade uranium! After all, only Sergei had the resources to get me out.

YULIYA SNIGIR

What? These are obviously YOUR men, their only reaction to you shooting Rasha was to start loading up the uranium like this was the plan all along! You had the ability to have yourself broken out of prison at any time, you moron!

SEBASTIAN KOCH

But-

YULIYA SNIGIR

And couldn't you have killed Rasha much earlier? Everybody else was in on the plan, if we'd killed Rasha back in Russia we wouldn't have had to go through with this idiotic charade we've been putting on entirely for his sake.

SEBASTIAN KOCH

Well-

YULIYA SNIGIR

Also, you realize, in making sure everyone knows about this "file", you've created a situation where the fucking CIA knows you have an important vault in Chernobyl? Me and the mercs could've quietly emptied the vault a year ago, right now you and I would be living it up in Monte Carlo or somewhere-

SEBASTIAN KOCH

ENOUGH! The plan was to quickly spring this plot twist and then jump straight to the climax before the audience had time to think. STICK TO THE PLAN.

YULIYA and the MERCS go and load uranium onto a truck inside the helicopter, while SEBASTIAN stays in the vault. Then BRUCE and JAI show up!

BRUCE WILLIS

Sebastian, your vault is full of uranium! You're a bad guy! I see it clearly now!

(pause)

No, wait. This doesn't make a damn bit of-

SEBASTIAN KOCH

OH FOR GOD'S SAKE! Why can nobody see how clever we've been here? Don't you see, in a normal movie the audience might have been clued in when they wondered why I made sure Sergei knew I was about to incriminate him, instead of just slipping the file to the press. Or why I didn't at least warn Yuliya to get out of town first. But the audience accepted all that, because we cleverly disguised it as this movie just being a shoddily-written turd!

BRUCE WILLIS

How come none of the other characters questioned any of those things, though?

SEBASTIAN KOCH

Because the movie IS a shoddily-written turd! Layers upon layers, man!

Suddenly, a MERC comes back down, and starts fighting BRUCE and JAI while SEBASTIAN makes a run for it! A nearby GASLINE gets shot up, and thinking fast, BRUCE ignites the gas with a GRENADE!

JAI COURTNEY

Did we really just set off an explosion with an explosion?

BRUCE WILLIS

Sure sounds like this franchise. Now, go after Sebastian while I go after the uranium!

JAI COURTNEY

So the athletic young CIA agent will take on the old businessman with a bullet in his arm, while the worn-out old police detective tries to fight a helicopter gunship with a pistol. Smart.

They SPLIT UP. BRUCE manages to get on board the helicopter and find the URANIUM TRUCK.

BRUCE WILLIS

All right, I get to kill a helicopter with a vehicle again! Three times the helicopter, three times the vehicle, one tenth the excitement! YIPPEE KI-YAY, MOTHERFUCKER!

He drives the TRUCK so that it dangles out the back of the HELICOPTER, which starts to spin in crazy circles but steadfastly refuses to CRASH.

BRUCE WILLIS

Aw man, I wasted my catchphrase.

Meanwhile, JAI catches and disarms SEBASTIAN!

JAI COURTNEY

Okay, I've captured an international arms dealer, go me! Now to take him in, debrief him, start tracking down his buyers and... ah, that sounds like way too much work.

(throws Sebastian into helicopter blades)

YULIYA flips out and tries to murder JAI and BRUCE via HELICOPTER CRASH, but they JUMP AWAY and they CRASH THROUGH A ROOF and the helicopter CRASHES THROUGH A WALL and the truck CRASHES TO THE GROUND and EVERYTHING CRASHES AND EXPLODES.

BRUCE WILLIS

Hooray, we did it! We finally killed this die-hard Die Hard franchise! Right? Awful reviews, terrible box office, I'm fucking fifty-eight years old, surely we're done? I don't even have any more family members to alienate.

JAI COURTNEY

Don't worry, Dad, we just exploded about fifty crates of weapons-grade uranium right in our faces. Chances are we'll both be dead of radiation poisoning within the hour.

They both LAUGH and WALK OFF INTO THE SUNSET.

END.