I don’t know... the explosion at the end of the lobby gunfight scene in The Matrix was also pretty impressive (OK, so that entire scene is probably my all-time favorite movie scene) - actually, lots of things blew up in spectacular ways in those movies, although the last two weren’t good for much except the fight scenes and explosions IMO. I tend to enjoy movies with spectacular explosions, but I honestly can’t think of any off the top of my head (other than other Star Wars movies, and though it’s not a movie there are still lots and lots and lots of explosions in Stargate SG-1) that are stunning on that level. I also seem to remember Cloverfield as having some nice explosions, too...
Anyways, since we’re on the topic of movies with cool explosions, and since my Netflix queue is starting to get low, if anyone’s got any recommendations for good movies - namely, movies with lots of explosions and maybe special effects or spaceships - let me know!
How about Hong Kong Action films?
In Police Story 2, Jackie Chan has to escape an exploding fireworks factory, no?
Stunts in proximity to pyrotechnics always add a degree of danger.
And for gunfight sequences, The Killer and Hard Boiled (both by John Woo) are hard to beat. But I don’t recall many explosions.