Previously in Kill Bill Vol. 1: The Bride awakened from her four-year-long coma and took revenge on both her attempted rapist and on the orderly who allowed it to happen. She escaped from the hospital, restored function in her legs, and traveled to Okinawa to convince a legendary swordsmith named Hattori Hanzo to craft a weapon for her to use in her Roaring Rampage of Revenge against the people who left her for dead: Bill, her ex-boyfriend and leader of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, and her fellow assassins in that squad. After killing O-Ren Ishii and The Crazy 88, The Bride then went after Vernita Green, and killed her as well. That incident is witnessed by Vernita’s four-year-old daughter, Nikki, who sees her mother dying at The Bride’s hand, before The Bride makes her exit to go after the next three people on her Death List.
When writer-director Quentin Tarantino worked on Kill Bill, it was originally envisioned as a three-hour-long film. But during post-production, Miramax Films CEO Harvey Weinstein approached Tarantino about splitting Kill Bill into two films, so that he wouldn’t have to remove any crucial scenes and leave them on the cutting room floor. Vol. 1 opened in theaters in October of 2003, and Kill Bill Vol. 2 opened in theaters on April 26, 2004.
Vol. 2 takes us back to where the story began and why The Bride is seeking revenge in the first place: at Two Pines Chapel in El Paso, Texas, where The Bride and her fiancé, Tommy (Chris Nelson), are rehearsing their upcoming wedding while in the company of her three close friends. The rehearsal is interrupted by the arrival of Bill (the late, great David Carradine), who engages The Bride in conversation and seemingly accepts her apology for how their relationship ended, right before The Bride’s former colleagues walk into the chapel with assault rifles in hand, and kill everyone inside, leaving The Bride to suffer and die last. Fast-forward to The Bride putting her Hattori Hanzo steel to excellent use, and going after the other targets on her Death List Five: Budd (Michael Madsen), Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah), and last but not least, Bill. Her encounter with Budd goes very badly (which is putting it mildly, as The Bride practically held the Idiot Ball in one hand, and her katana in the other, when she ran through Budd’s front door to ambush him instead of using stealth and common sense), but her persistence and her training are what allows her to stay alive. After surviving her battle against Elle Driver, The Bride finally locates Bill, and is shaken to her very core when she discovers that her daughter, B.B. (Perla Haney-Jardine), is alive, and living her best life with Bill, who has been raising her.
Kill Bill Vol. 1 was largely inspired by martial arts films, and though Vol. 2 shares some of that same inspiration (particularly when we get to see a flashback of The Bride in training mode), it is mostly influenced by spaghetti westerns. For those who saw Vol. 1 and were unhappy with its seeming lack of characterization, and its intentionally stilted dialogue that mirrored the cadence of how characters often speak in martial arts films, Vol. 2 was a return to form for Tarantino. It gave additional layers to The Bride and company, and gave them more of the memorable dialogue Tarantino is known for.
As I previously mentioned when I wrote about Vol. 1, Kill Bill is not a simple revenge story, and it’s not a story where only the villains are made to suffer. When B.B. is explaining to The Bride how she stepped on her goldfish, Emilio, simply to find out what would happen to him, Bill explains to her how he also inflicted serious harm on The Bride and says, “Some things, once you do, they can never be undone.” This is something that Bill and his crew have been dealing with ever since the Massacre at Two Pines (except for Elle, of course, as her give-a-f-cks about The Bride — or any other poor, unfortunate soul who ends up in her crosshairs — are permanently on vacation). Vol. 2 is a quieter and closer examination of how and why this happened and how it affected everyone involved, not just The Bride. Budd is willing to be life’s punching bag for what he did to The Bride (and for everything else he did in his career as an assassin), and not do anything to defend himself from the constant disrespect he gets from his boss and his colleagues at a hole-in-the-wall strip club where he works as a bouncer. Bill was immediately overcome with sadness and regret the moment he pulled the trigger on The Bride, and has carried that regret ever since. As for The Bride, she is forced to admit to Bill, and to herself, that she has no regrets about all of the blood she has shed in her search for Bill, and that she probably wouldn’t have lived the best and happiest life as a regular-degular person instead of as an assassin jet-setting around the world. But she would’ve been a mother to B.B., which is what she truly wanted, and that would’ve been more than enough.
Vol. 2, much like the first volume, takes its time to examine how destructive and painful revenge can be, but that doesn’t stop the film from being fun to watch. Case in point, the eighth chapter, “The Cruel Tutelage of Pai Mei,” in which The Bride meets Pai Mei (Gordon Liu), the elderly but powerful martial arts master who teaches her everything she needs to know to sharpen her fighting skills and become the deadliest woman in the world, such as punching through thick blocks of wood like she’s Iron Fist. Her training is not easy, and is painful to watch at times, and it’s especially difficult to watch The Bride struggling to hold a pair of chopsticks with her injured hands so she can feed herself a bowl of rice. But when she finally does it? It’s hard not to smile from ear to ear with pride along with Pai Mei. Once we cut back to the present day, where The Bride literally punches her way out of the grave of Paula Schultz’s grave, her hand bursting through the dirt like a zombie in a George A. Romero movie, right before she emerges from the ground victoriously as the late, great Ennio Morricone’s “L’Arena” is blaring on the soundtrack? It’s the kind of moment to make you want to applaud and breathe a sigh of relief on The Bride’s behalf. Which is immediately followed by the hilarious sight of The Bride walking into a roadside diner like a real-life version of Pigpen to ask for a glass of water. (The only downside to this chapter? The exclusion of Bill clashing swords with a vengeful Michael Jai White after his fireside chat with The Bride, a scene which was unfortunately left on the cutting room floor by Tarantino.)
Despite Bill showing up at his home and offering his help against The Bride, Budd (codename: Sidewinder) makes it clear that he deserves the pain and suffering that she will bring to his doorstep. However, that doesn’t mean that Budd won’t fight back against The Bride when she comes after him, as he also believes that she deserves some pain and suffering of her very own. His sense of self-preservation is what allows him to survive against The Bride, but his greed and his ego end up being his downfall.
Pai Mei is every bit the xenophobic, misogynistic, and foul-tempered prick that Bill says he is before The Bride meets him. But he’s also a warrior of immense power and skill, who slowly becomes impressed by The Bride’s sheer perseverance at mastering his every lesson and becoming his greatest student, which results in him teaching her the deadliest fighting move in his entire arsenal.
Elle Driver (codename: California Mountain Snake) may respect The Bride and her skills as a warrior, and is disgusted at the thought of someone like Budd being the one to defeat her in battle. But none of that changes the fact that she is The Bride’s biggest hater, and how much she hates the way that she walks, the way that she talks, the way that she dresses, and most of all, Elle hates that Bill used to love The Bride the way he now loves her. The fight between both women is the complete antithesis of what we saw between The Bride and O-Ren, which was a fight between two combatants who liked and respected each other, and seemed to regret going from close friends to bitter enemies. This fight, however, is a no-holds-barred deathmatch between two women who despise one another, and one where Elle expresses her pleasure in delivering pain to The Bride not just physically, but verbally as well. If you ever wondered what it looks like when someone’s eyeball is snatched out of its socket, and then crushed until it becomes paste? This fight sequence is for you.
“I knew what would happen to Mommy if I shot her. What I didn’t know is, when I shot Mommy, what would happen to me.” From the moment we first see Bill (codename: Snake Charmer) and B.B. onscreen together, it’s evident how much they love each other, and that Bill is a good father to her. He’s honest and upfront about what he did to The Bride, why she’s been gone from her life for so long, and how sad he was about what he did that caused her to be gone for so long. But Bill isn’t the first man in history to be loving towards his child, while also being violent and abusive to his partner. His love and adoration of B.B. don’t change who or what he is, and his behavior towards The Bride (along with his explanation that he is a murdering bastard, and murdering bastards like himself don’t respond very well to having their hearts broken) is just one more reason why most women will always choose the bear.
After seeing all of the blood and sweat shed by The Bride (real name: Beatrix Kiddo) in her Roaring Rampage of Revenge leading to Bill’s doorstep, it’s a massive understatement to say that everything changes once she realizes that her daughter has been alive this entire time. It gives Beatrix (and the audience) even more reason to wonder “Now what?” when it comes to her final encounter with Bill, and what is expected to happen if she survives. The final confrontation between Beatrix and Bill doesn’t involve a swordfight between the two warriors on a moonlit beach near Bill’s home, as Tarantino had originally intended. Instead, it ends with a long and intimate conversation involving revolvers and truth serum, with Bill wanting to know why Beatrix disappeared from his life, and Beatrix explaining that he could no longer be the center of her universe once she realized that she was about to be a mother. It ends with Beatrix using the Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique to literally break his heart, and the two of them expressing their mutual affection for the very last time.
Not surprisingly, some people were incredibly disappointed by the end result. Three-and-a-half hours of Beatrix wanting to take her revenge on Bill, and this is how it all ends? Of course, it would’ve been awesome to see the two of them battle each other to the death. But this is a film made by Quentin Tarantino, and for him, the conversation has always been the action in much of his work. To see Beatrix and Bill lay it all on the table, and go back and forth on why their relationship ended, and what she was willing to do to settle the score, is the only way this conflict could be resolved before blood would be shed. It’s also impossible to rule out the possibility of The Bride battling Bill in an emotionally tense swordfight being seen as a repeat of her clash with O-Ren which ended Vol. 1, and not having the intended impact on the audience as a result. No matter how much Beatrix and Bill love each other, how much they both love B.B., and how brutally honest they are with one another and with themselves about who they are together and apart, their relationship can only end in bloodshed, as it has truly reached the point of “neither can live while the other survives.” (My apologies in advance for quoting the work of transphobic scat-muncher Joanne K. Rowling.)
Both volumes of Kill Bill were critically acclaimed box office success for Tarantino, and Vol. 2 received a Golden Globe nomination for David Carradine for Best Supporting Actor, and a win for Carradine at the Saturn Awards in that same category. Ever since Tarantino mentioned the possibility of there being a third volume of Kill Bill, fans have continued to wonder if and when it will become a reality.
QUENTIN TARANTINO I love the Bride. I love her, all right? I want her to be happy. I don’t want to come up with screwed-up scenarios that she has to fight the whole rest of her life. I killed myself to put her in a good place at the end of this long journey.
Somehow I don’t think we’ve seen the last of her. Have you thought about a Kill Bill: Vol. 3?
Oh yeah, initially I was thinking this would be my “Dollars” trilogy. I was going to do a new one every 10 years. But I need at least 15 years before I do this again. Uma won’t be the star, though she’ll be in it. The star will be Vernita Green’s [Vivica A. Fox’s] daughter, Nikki [Ambrosia Kelley]. I’ve already got the whole mythology: Sofie Fatale [Julie Dreyfus] will get all of Bill’s money. She’ll raise Nikki, who’ll take on the Bride. Nikki deserves her revenge every bit as much as the Bride deserved hers. I might even shoot a couple of scenes for it now so I can get the actresses while they’re this age. It’s exciting to know that somewhere there’s a little girl who’ll grow up to be my leading lady.
As for who else would possibly show up and be a part of Kill Bill: Vol. 3?
“Elle Driver is still out there, Sofie Fatale (Julie Dreyfus) got her arm cut off, but she’s still out there. They all got Bill’s money. Actually, Gogo (Chiaki Kuriyama) had a twin sister, and so her twin sister could show up.”
Tarantino mentioned his hope of bringing back Ambrosia Kelley, the actress who played Nikki in Vol. 1, to reprise the role in Vol. 3. But several actresses have been mentioned as to who could and should play adult Nikki instead, such as Zendaya, Zoë Kravitz, and Amandla Stenberg. The actresses suggested to play B.B. as an adult include Chloe Grace Moretz and, naturally, Maya Hawke (daughter of Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke). Former UFC fighter/WWE wrestler/Sandy Hook denier/transphobic scat-muncher Ronda Rousey also threw her hat in the ring in admitting that she’d like to play B.B. if Kill Bill: Vol. 3 ever gets the green light.
However, it looks more and more likely that Kill Bill Vol. 3 is yet another one of Tarantino’s ideas that will never see the light of day, right along with The Vega Brothers, Killer Crow, Django in White Hell, Silver Surfer, Luke Cage, and Star Trek.
For anyone who would prefer to see Kill Bill as one film instead of two, there is Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair. Its runtime is three hours and thirty-five minutes, it replaces the old Klingon proverb that begins Vol. 1 with a dedication to Japanese writer-director Kinji Fukasaku, features an intermission between chapters 5 and 6, and removes the epilogue that closes Vol. 1, and the black-and-white “Looked dead, didn’t I?” scene with The Bride that opens Vol. 2. It also shows The Bride vs. The Crazy 88 at the House of Blue Leaves in color instead of black-and-white, as the black-and-white cinematography for that scene was a necessity to prevent the MPAA from giving Vol. 1 an NC-17 rating, and features even more blood and gore of Sofie Fatale and the Crazy 88 being sliced and diced by The Bride and her Hattori Hanzo steel. Fans have waited for years for this version of Kill Bill to be released on Blu-ray/DVD, or to receive a special theatrical release. But for now, the only way to see Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair is to either order it on Blu-ray from Japan if you can find and afford it, or travel to Los Angeles to see it on the big screen, as Tarantino occasionally shows this version of Kill Bill at New Beverly Cinema, the movie theater he owns and operates.
After the release of Kill Bill, Tarantino went on to write and direct Death Proof (the second film of Grindhouse, his double feature collaboration with Robert Rodriguez), Inglourious Basterds, Django Unchained, The Hateful Eight, and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. His next and last film was expected to be The Movie Critic, about a movie reviewer who works for an adult entertainment magazine in the 1970s, and which was originally rumored to be loosely based on the life and work of Pauline Kael. But Tarantino announced earlier this year that he was scrapping the project, and deciding to work on an entirely different script for this final film. It remains to be seen whether or not Tarantino’s next film really will be the last film he ever writes or directs, as he is convinced that directors lose their touch once they enter old age. Which sounded ridiculous when he first said it, and sounds even more ridiculous now, especially with Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and George Miller proving that they’re just as talented in their old age as they were when they were in their youth.
As for Uma Thurman, I already discussed how and why her experience with shooting Kill Bill turned out to be far more unpleasant than anyone could’ve imagined. Since the release of both volumes, her career has continued to keep her busy as she appeared in films such as Be Cool, The Producers, My Super Ex-Girlfriend, Nymphomaniac, The House That Jack Built, and the upcoming films Oh, Canada and The Old Guard 2. Her television roles included guest spots on Smash (team Ivy Lynn for life!), Imposters, and The Slap, and in 2017, Thurman made her Broadway debut in the play The Parisian Woman.
Joe Russo (not the co-director of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Avengers: Infinity War, and Avengers: Endgame) shared this on Twitter not too long ago.
I know people say “it’s one movie” and “they like both” but I truly believe, deep down, you’re either a KILL BILL VOL. 1 *or* a KILL BILL VOL. 2 person. pic.twitter.com/nF7zRV5Nct
— Joe Russo (@joerussotweets) April 16, 2024
The majority of responses to that tweet showed Vol. 1 receiving more love than Vol. 2, though the latter film has plenty of defenders. And some fans really did find it impossible to choose between the two, as they love and enjoy both volumes equally. (One person on Twitter compared Vol. 1 to Renaissance, and Vol. 2 to Cowboy Carter, and honestly? I get it, and that comparison kinda works.)
As for my preference? It’s hard to choose, as I also love both volumes equally. But one scene that stays with me is at the very end of Vol. 2, as we see Beatrix lying on the bathroom floor, crying her eyes out from grief, exhaustion, shock, and gratitude, and then laughing as she says “Thank you” repeatedly. Kill Bill is one hell of a physical and emotional rollercoaster that Tarantino asks his audience to ride with The Bride to hell and back for almost four hours. But it’s this one moment of Beatrix appreciating every moment of the happy ending she has fought for and earned before she gets up to embrace B.B. that shows why that audience would choose to do so. There aren’t enough words to describe how fantastic Uma Thurman’s performance is (mostly because this article is long enough already), how she convinces us to strap ourselves in and prepare ourselves for wherever she’s willing to take us, and more importantly, how she deserved so much better from people she trusted like Quentin Tarantino and Harvey Weinstein. So I’ll just end this by expressing my own gratitude to Uma Thurman and simply say, “Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
Both volumes of Kill Bill are available to watch on Netflix and Tubi.
