John shows a bit of good street smarts when he tries to prove the first dead terrorist is no mere luggage thief and that the airport cops need to take things more seriously. With the help of a rent-a-car clerk, he manages to get the ink and paper to fingerprint a dead Mook on the fly and then faxes them to Powell to get a quick identification.
After Colonel Stuart's men had killed the S.W.A.T. team, they are about to kill Barnes when McClane pops up from the vent above and kills them one-by-one.
A villainous example. Colonel Stuart is the only villain in the series to completely and unambiguously curb-stomp McClane in a fight. As despicable as Stuart is, his fighting skills are pretty awesome to watch.
Despite being outmatched in skills and exhausted and bruised from the night, John still puts up a good fight against Stuart, getting a few good hits in and even biting off part of his hand, causing him to cry out in pain. Had the two fought when John was at his best, it's even possible John might have been able to beat him.
Even though McClane gets his ass kicked by Colonel Stuart on the wing of the plane that Stuart and his men are using to escape, he manages to open a fuel hatch before being kicked off. As the plane keeps speeding on the runway, McClane takes out his lighter, lets out one hell of a Call-Back ("Yippee-ki-yay, motherfucker!") and ignites the trail of fuel, which catches up to the plane in the midst of taking off from the ground, leading to a spectacular mid-air explosion. The trail of fire is then used by the planes to land safely.
At the church, McClane kills Baker by stabbing him in the eye with an icicle.
McClane uncovering Grant's treachery when he finds Stuart's men using blank ammunition against the special forces team. When Lorenzo refuses to trust him and tries to cuff him, McClane responds by unloading an entire magazine on him to prove his point. After having repeatedly stymied McClane's efforts to fight the terrorists, being handed the mother of all Shut Up, Hannibal! moments is very satisfying. Made even more so when Lorenzo finally decides to stop arguing and orders an assault on the terrorists.
Barnes figuring out how to use the outer marker to contact the captive planes above without Stuart's knowledge, buying them badly needed time to track down Stuart before he can crash another aircraft.
McClane rushing onto the runway right in the path of the landing plane to prevent it from crashing into the ground via Stuart's sabotage. He fails, but his desperate effort is something to commend when he knew the odds were against him.
After finding out what Thornburg had been doing in the lavatory, Holly borrows a stun gun from a fellow passenger and knock out the jerkass.
Thornburg's a real Dick, but goddamn you have to admit he's good at what he does.
At the end of the film, Thornburg, severely weak from Holly tasering him and still suffering a panic attack, is unceremoniously thrown out the plane and left lying on the ground being deliberately (and justly) refused help by all passengers and crew and abandoned. Not even the airport staff nor rescue teams bother to hear his pleas. To make his comeuppance all the sweeter, Holly's fellow elderly passenger calls Thornburg an "asshole" directly to his face and walks over him.
