Live Free or Die Hard, aka Die Hard 4.0, is sitting on the balance line between good and bad right now, the news to date hasn't been convincing it's going to be a great Die Hard film, nor has it said it's not. Now you can see for yourselves as two rather long clips of the opening scenes appear online.

Unfortunately the footage is streaming in Windows Media format, that means terrible quality, jumping frames, freezing video, and the only format that plays decent is tiny with plenty of dropped frames.

However online it is, and I've just watched them. I have to say the first opening clip is a little weird as there are these intentional black screens that seem to be in the wrong place and last too long, however the rest of it looks pretty good. That's the first clip, the introduction to the whole setup, and it seems to be getting to the action pretty quickly.

The second clip is edited right on the end and is our first glimpse of Bruce Willis as Detective McClane, and immediately we're into the relationship with hacker character of Justin Long.

I like the way things kick off so quickly, I like the quieter McClane character, and what I can see of the action looks pretty good. What do you think? Good early sign for Die Hard 4.0? Has Len Wiseman brought it back?

You can see the Windows Media streams in High Resolution, Medium Resolution or Low Resolution from Yahoo through Coming Soon and Cinema Blend.