Idea: "Die Hard" in a church?

Maybe your 'villian' is one of the founders of your mega-church, back before it got 'mega'? He was the leader, up until the other founders got away from whatever he thinks is the 'true word of God, or works of Jesus'. They started gathering money, selling salvation, cheating widows of their mites, to support a lavish lifestyle for the new leader, and the building of the mega-church.
He, and his ragtag band of followers believe the church's leaders have finally gone over to The Other Side, and must be stopped before the new Megachurch's multi-million dollar broadcasting system (all languages, all day) kicks off, and sends what he believes is the Devil's Word all over the planet.
Because he was one of the insiders, he knows the plans, and the weakpoints, etc.

Don't know if this is any help, but maybe it will put ideas in your head.

Maybe your villain was molested by a priest as a child, and he wants revenge. People could empathise with a villain like that.

I'd argue that most of the murderous attacks on places of worship are not without context. They might be perpetrated by individuals, but those individuals are driven by ideology and are supported by others of the same ideology.

How would you make Die Hard work in the context of a church, though? Nakatomi Plaza provided a lot of places to hide, while being easy to defend, and the focus was on a small group of people. Isn't a megachurch more like a stadium? (I haven't seen one.)

Helix said:

Isn't a megachurch more like a stadium? (I haven't seen one.)

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The one I grew up next to (Saddleback Church) was a HUGE complex; there was the stadium and an entire office block, a whole big park, and more annexes than I can count. It was also surprisingly well-isolated for being in the middle of the suburbs, with one bridge you had to go over to get to it. You could write a whole thriller series just set in that location. And this was back in the 90's when megachurches were still a new thing, I can only imagine they've grown just more brobdingnagian since then.

We also had Bob's Schuller's Crystal Cathedal (now owned by the Catholic Church, I'm not saying one is better than the other but HA!) and the Trinity Broadcasting Building, both bizarre high-concept structures that were kind of huge and feverish, great locations for thrillers.

LeviSweeney said:

Precisely! I envisioned this hypothetical story taking place in a church like Saddleback or Willow Creek. Thanks for the info!

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Of course. I think it's a clever idea.

What if the villains have something to do with diamond smuggling? I'm not gonna dig up cites, but I know there are a few televangenlists who's names have been occasionally tied to smuggling diamonds out of conflict zones through their African ministries. What if the villains, ala Die Hard 3, begin the siege apparently for sectarian reasons, but actually just want at the head pastor's diamond horde?

ETA- That is only IF you want to go in the corrupt church direction, I should be clear. The megachurch could be pure & saintly and the story would be just as good.

I had no idea. Sounds like they've found a way to serve both God and Mammon.

LeviSweeney said:

Hello!

I'm not a huge fan of thrillers, though I used to love Artemis Fowl, which was sort-of-a-thriller (the author, Eoin Colfer, called it "Die Hard with fairies."). But I had this idea while I was at work for a story which was "Die Hard in a church." I was kicking around the idea for a while, and then decided, as a member new to the forums, to field it to you guys.

In sum: I've got the basic idea of "'Die Hard' in a church." My main problem is formulating a pretext for such a situation occurring in a church. I'm thinking that it amounts to some evangelical megachurch getting invaded by a squad of terrorists or something who raise havoc while a parishioner or somebody tries to quell the problem with a gun he had in the back of his car or something.

The problem I keep running is like this: How do I make the villain interesting? In the real world, most of these mass-shooting disasters that we see in the news are the results of deranged lone-wolf attackers whose mad rampages are quickly squelched by the police. But in keeping with a bit of advice which I believe is attributed to Bruce Willis, "A story is only as smart as its villain." Therefore, how to make a villain who is both a.) Smart and b.) Would have a plausible motivation for attacking a church?

I'd appreciate any help I can get on this.

Cheers,

Levi

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I'm not sure where you're getting either the 'deranged' or 'mad rampages,' or that they're quickly squelched by police, honestly, though I'm also not sure what you're counting as mass-shooting disasters. This is, as I've mentioned elsewhere on AW, not a single thing. There are many discrete sub-groups to mass homicide and even mass homicide by gun.

I don't know what you mean by deranged, but a lot of people who carry out mass attacks of some kind are perfectly well grounded in reality. They may have beliefs that you might consider odd (or they might not), but deranged, to me, suggests not being particularly at one with reality. My point though, is if you want to write about crimes like this, it'd probably help to do research -- actual research -- instead of thinking a general kind of assumption people make is correct.

LeviSweeney said:

That's kind of an interesting thought, but I kind of had this idea where the bad guys weren't some variety of Christians gone bad. IRL, Christians aren't known for orchestrating mass terrorist attacks, and actual Christians highly resent depictions of them as such in the news and what-not. (I say this as a recent convert to Catholicism who grew up Evangelical.)

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Really? I mean, again, this depends on your definition of mass terrorist attack, but in fairly recent memory there's Christchurch, Pittsburgh, Breivik, Rudolph....

LeviSweeney said:

Yes, it is a clever idea.

Again, I'm not particularly enthused with the whole "corrupt church" thing. I get that the phenomenon exists (in certain stratas of churchdom), but it kind of turns me off. If I write this thing, I'll obviously write the church staff as well-rounded, genuinely flawed characters, same as the rest of the cast. I'm just not particularly fond of the Christians-gone-bad trope. It just doesn't jibe with my understanding of this particular subculture.

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Fair enough, I see the argument you're making there. Any time I think of a thriller my mind goes immediately to corruption, since it seems like theme in the genre. I like the weird scary cult idea, but I think the trick is making them believable.

LeviSweeney said:

Look, I don't want to start a flame-war or anything, but do you seriously think that any of these guys have ever even heard of the Ten Commandments? (Commandment #6: You shall not murder. See Exodus 20.) I seriously doubt that half of these guys have ever so much has cracked open a Bible, or can even read at all.

By "deranged," I didn't mean "psychotic." If you really want to split hairs, I meant "psychopathic."

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I'm not trying to start any kind of war -- I think if you want to write about something specific it's best to do research. I don't know how many are psychopathic either, but not sure who or what we're actually discussing in the specific. If you want to get more granular, I'm happy to.

Yes, I think the people I mentioned were pretty familiar with the Bible, as they demonstrated. I'm not so well-versed in a couple, beyond the basics, but the others were certainly not dumb.

LeviSweeney said:

Look, I don't want to start a flame-war or anything, but do you seriously think that any of these guys have ever even heard of the Ten Commandments? (Commandment #6: You shall not murder. See Exodus 20.) I seriously doubt that half of these guys have ever so much has cracked open a Bible, or can even read at all.

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You posted asking for feedback. Do you really not want someone to speak up if they see problems in your concept or presentation of it? Dismissing opinions by belittling the subject is really not a great way to encourage genuine discussion.

LeviSweeney said:

That's kind of an interesting thought, but I kind of had this idea where the bad guys weren't some variety of Christians gone bad. IRL, Christians aren't known for orchestrating mass terrorist attacks, and actual Christians highly resent depictions of them as such in the news and what-not. (I say this as a recent convert to Catholicism who grew up Evangelical.)

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Northern Ireland.

Anyway, your problem is giving a reason for your setting. Why set it in a megachurch if you're not going to tie that into the theme of the story?

Helix said:

Northern Ireland.

Anyway, your problem is giving a reason for your setting. Why set it in a megachurch if you're not going to tie that into the theme of the story?

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I agree setting it in a megachurch-type deal suggests, to me anyway, something to do with the church or someone identified with.

There's the other way, though, that a church might be where someone wants to die. I wouldn't think that'd work in one of those modern megachurch places though -- they double as other things and don't, to me at least, read as a place with a 'sacred' feel. Older churches though...

LeviSweeney said:

IRL, Christians aren't known for orchestrating mass terrorist attacks,

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The Crusades, anyone?

You know what might work though - using that idea of 'sanctuary'. What if your bad guy runs into the church (pick whatever style of building suits your purpose) and there is an immediate schism in the congregation about whether to surrender him to the people who are chasing him, or whether to uphold the ancient idea of the church as a place of sanctuary?

That could be very interesting as well as getting all kinds of violent.

Disclaimer: I have no idea what Die Hard is. But it sounds pretty violent.

Okay, no corrupt church officials: straight-up suspense in a church. Mega-church is hosting some sort of exhibition of jewels - Herod's Hoard, or whatever, in one of their halls or arenas.
A gang of thieves has a plan to steal the jewels, but something goes wrong, and they have to take hostages. The outside media and the police are treating it like 'crazed gunmen', speculation about a church-hater, some kind of extremist, etc.
Even if he needs the cops for manpower, it's his idea, he has to lead the raid because he knows the layout of the access corridors, and he gets to punch out the lead (or largest) bad guy at the climax.

It's your hero who understands that it's greed at work, and, because he knows the complex well, figures out how to get in, rescue the hostages, catch the crooks and not blow up the church (this was the thieves' final threat).

mccardey said:

Disclaimer: I have no idea what Die Hard is. But it sounds pretty violent.

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It's a very good Christmas movie.

And I wish Hans Gruber had won, because he's the best character in the movie.

Helix said:

It's a very good Christmas movie.

And I wish Hans Gruber had won, because he's the best character in the movie.

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*cough* As far as I and my large adult sons are concerned there will only ever be one Christmas Movie.

Helix said:

Anyway, your problem is giving a reason for your setting. Why set it in a megachurch if you're not going to tie that into the theme of the story?

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Strongly agreed. That said, the key twist in Die Hard is that terrorism is a front for a basic robbery - so consider how you can play with your villain's motivation and subvert your readers' expectations. Does the invasion only initially appear to be religiously motivated, but it turns out they're just there to steal money that's been raised by the church for charity?

Another thing to play with is how individuals can use others beliefs to their own ends. Look at cults - once the leader has his followers believing, he can get them to do anything, no matter whether it seems to fit with the original doctrines they bought into.*

LeviSweeney said:

… while a parishioner or somebody tries to quell the problem with a gun he had in the back of his car or something.

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I'm cautious about this part, not least because it reinforces the "all we need is more good guys with guns" fallacy, but also because one of the reasons Die Hard works is because McClane has so little power compared to the bad guys. It's not just that he's outnumbered - he doesn't even have any shoes! The wider you can make the initial gulf in power between your hero and your bad guys, the more satisfying it will be when they overcome the odds. If your hero does have to use guns - and seriously, not all heroes have to use guns - then consider ways that they can begin unarmed and arm themselves as they go along.


*: it's always interesting to me when the cracks begin to show and people in the organisation/cult/whatever start to question their motives. It might be fun to have the hero not be a bog standard parishioner, but perhaps one of the invading terrorists... when he finds out that the leader is only after material gain rather than a spiritual reckoning, might he start to question everything and switch sides?

mccardey said:

*cough* As far as I and my large adult sons are concerned there will only ever be one Christmas Movie.

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I have the same discussion with my mother-in-law every Christmas - I've even suggested Lethal Weapon as an alternative Christmas movie , however we invariably end up watching "Christmas with the Kranks" or similar

Back on topic...

There are a few ways you can go if you don't want the leader of the church to be corrupt - off the top of my head...

Instead of an urban mega-church, you could set it in a remote, old, sprawling church that edges onto a forest/lake etc. The bad guys cut off the church by blocking the roads (which would mean the authorities wouldn't be able to get there and might not even know straight away), they could knock over the cell tower so there is no phone service, cutting down rescue options. A more isolated church wouldn't leave you with hundreds of hostages to manage throughout the story, meaning you could have a couple of interesting parishioners, rather than a cardboard cut out army. It would also mean the same for the police presence - you could have some interesting small town police trying to outsmart trained mercenaries, rather than be knee deep in SWAT teams. Maybe you have one of the congregation carrying a concealed weapon and they try to intervene and fail (they could even be law enforcement). That would get over how evil the attackers are early on.

The MC could be the groundskeeper/gravedigger etc which gives them a valid reason for not being in the church when it is taken over. You could have fun coming up with an interesting back story as to why they are there. Digging tools make pretty good weapons and that would mean they don't need their own gun/CCW/background as a special forces sniper - perhaps they can disarm one of the bad guys who is sent out to check the graveyard is clear. Depending on how gory you want to make it, you've also got lawnmowers/chainsaws etc

With the remote setting, the MC could disappear into the trees/dive into a lake to escape at some point (you could do the whole "treats own gunshot wound" at the same time, while the bad guys think they are dead). They could also use a secret passageway to get in and out of the church, they could also hold up in the spire/bell tower etc etc. (which would be relatively easy to defend) and climb down the outside to escape (very Die Hard!)

As for the reason why it is under attack, you could make the church the target for property development, with the bad guys in the employ of a property developer who wants the land and the priest/church has refused to sell. Perhaps they are waiting for a storm to arrive, so they can claim the church has been hit by lightening and burnt down. As the storm sweeps in you have imagery of the isolated church in darkness, the wind, rain, lightening flashes etc against the still of the church.

For a bit of back story, the main bad guy (who you'd introduce mid-way through), could be a local person and the descendent of the original owner of the land. Maybe they are disgruntled because the land was left to the church, rather than they're parents/grandparents (insert sad childhood story here). You could go ex-wife/husband if you want it to be a little more recent and have the antagonist have suffered infidelity/abuse at the hands of their supposedly benevolent and upstanding ex - that would give it a bit more bile and make it less Scooby Doo (perhaps the priest married them?)

Anyway - the idea has lots of possibilities, I've come up with the above over the course of typing a response, so with a bit of thought you should be able to come up with a great plot complete with twists, suspense and reveals!

Good luck!

Agree Die Hard works so well because McClane has nothing (but the walkie) -- he's got to outwit the bad guys who have all the tech, the bldg, etc. Same thing in like Terminator (and T2, which has a similar building scene --'how many cops?' 'uhm, all of em, I think?'), Kahn, Girl with the Spider Tattoo, tons of stuff.