60 Fun Facts About Kill Bill

Who wrote and directed the Kill Bill films?

It was Tarantino's fourth feature and his first film in six years after Jackie Brown.

Which actress plays the Bride?

Thurman and Tarantino dreamed up the character together while making Pulp Fiction, and the credits attribute the Bride to "Q & U".

What is the Bride's real name, withheld until Volume 2?

Thurman supplied the first name and Tarantino the surname; a parasitic wasp, Cystomastacoides kiddo, was later named after her.

What is the name of the elite group of assassins the Bride used to belong to?

Every member carried a snake code name, from Black Mamba to Cottonmouth to Sidewinder.

Who plays Bill?

Carradine, best known as Caine in the 1970s series Kung Fu, is heard but not seen for all of Volume 1.

Tarantino originally wrote the role of Bill for which actor, who turned it down?

Beatty did not want to be away from his family while shooting in China; Bruce Willis was also considered before the part was rewritten for Carradine.

In which city does the Bride confront O-Ren Ishii and the yakuza?

The miniature skyline used for her arrival was a redressed Yokohama model borrowed from a 2001 Godzilla film.

The wedding chapel massacre takes place in a rural chapel near which city?

The rehearsal is set in 1999, and Texas Rangers Earl and Edgar McGraw are the ones who find the bodies.

How many years does the Bride spend in a coma after being shot in the head?

She wakes to find she is no longer pregnant, and only learns in Volume 2 that her daughter survived.

Which actress plays O-Ren Ishii, the Deadly Viper who becomes head of the Tokyo yakuza?

O-Ren's voice in the anime backstory sequence is provided by Ai Maeda, not Liu.

What is O-Ren Ishii's Deadly Viper code name?

The Bride mutilates O-Ren's lawyer and lover Sofie Fatale before their duel in the snowy garden.

Vernita Green, now a suburban homemaker, goes by which Deadly Viper code name?

She lives in Pasadena under the alias Jeannie Bell, a nod to one of the first Black Playboy Playmates.

Where does Vernita Green hide the pistol she tries to shoot the Bride with?

The Bride answers by throwing a knife into her chest, just as Vernita's young daughter gets home from school.

Which legendary swordsmith breaks his oath never to forge again in order to arm the Bride?

He agrees only after learning her target is Bill, his former student.

The Bride travels to which Japanese island to obtain her sword?

The swordsmith is running a sushi bar there when she finds him.

Which Japanese action star plays the sushi chef and retired swordsmith?

The character's name is a tribute to Chiba's role as the historical ninja Hattori Hanzō in the 1980s TV series Shadow Warriors.

What is the name of O-Ren's schoolgirl bodyguard, who fights with a meteor hammer?

A cut chapter had the Bride facing Gogo's vengeful sister Yuki; it finally surfaced as an animated short in 2025.

Which actress, who had starred in Battle Royale, plays the schoolgirl bodyguard?

Meiko Kaji, one of the distractors, is the Lady Snowblood star whose songs appear on both soundtracks.

What is O-Ren's masked personal army called?

Their leader Johnny Mo is played by Gordon Liu, who returns in Volume 2 as Pai Mei.

What does the Bride cut off Sofie Fatale, O-Ren's French lawyer, at the House of Blue Leaves?

She then leaves Sofie alive so she can carry a warning to Bill.

How many weeks did the House of Blue Leaves fight sequence take to film?

That was six weeks over schedule; the blood spurts were done with fire extinguishers and condoms rather than CGI.

Why does part of the Crazy 88 fight switch to black and white?

Weinstein was known for pressuring filmmakers to cut, but splitting the film in two let Tarantino keep every scene.

Which Wu-Tang Clan producer composed the original score for Volume 1?

For Volume 2 he shared scoring duties with the director Robert Rodriguez.

Which Ghost in the Shell studio produced the anime sequence telling O-Ren's backstory?

The sequence was directed by Kazuto Nakazawa and pays homage to the ultraviolence of Golgo 13: The Professional.

Which choreographer, fresh from The Matrix, served as martial arts advisor?

The film was shot in sequence even though the finished story is told out of chronological order.

The Bride's yellow tracksuit and motorcycle pay homage to which martial arts star?

The look comes from Game of Death; VLC media player even turns its cone logo yellow with black stripes after a Kill Bill file finishes.

Kill Bill's plot resembles which 1973 Japanese film about a woman avenging her family?

That film's star Meiko Kaji has songs on both Kill Bill soundtracks, and its snow-garden finale is echoed in the O-Ren duel.

In what year was Kill Bill: Volume 1 released in theaters?

It opened at number one, beating School of Rock and Intolerable Cruelty, with the biggest opening weekend of any Tarantino film to that point.

How many months separated the releases of Volume 1 and Volume 2?

The DVD of Volume 1 hit shelves the same week Volume 2 opened, and within a week its DVD sales topped its entire US box office.

Volume 1 was Tarantino's first film in six years. Which film had come before it?

Both Jackie Brown and Pulp Fiction had opened to $9.3 million; Volume 1 more than doubled that with $22 million.

What is the title of the single combined cut of both films, released to theaters in December 2025?

It first screened at Cannes in 2004, and Tarantino held its full release until he personally owned the rights.

How does Bill's brother Budd stop the Bride when she comes to his trailer?

He then seals her in a coffin and buries her alive, which sets up the Pai Mei flashback.

What is Bill's brother called?

Michael Madsen plays him as a washed-up strip club bouncer living in a trailer.

What was Bill's own Deadly Viper code name?

His brother was Sidewinder, and Elle Driver was the California Mountain Snake.

Elle Driver kills Budd with a snake hidden in the case of money. Which species?

It is a pointed choice: Black Mamba was the Bride's own code name, and Kobe Bryant later borrowed it as his nickname.

Which actress plays the one-eyed Elle Driver?

Tarantino cast her after seeing the TV film First Target, and her physical resemblance to Thurman shaped the rivalry.

Elle Driver's look is based on Madeleine, the heroine of which 1973 Swedish exploitation film?

The film is also known as Thriller: A Cruel Picture; Elle likewise wears an eyepatch after Pai Mei plucks out her eye.

What is the name of the death blow Pai Mei refuses to teach his students?

A victim can take only five steps before dying, which is exactly how Bill goes.

Which Shaw Brothers veteran plays Pai Mei, having already appeared in Volume 1 as Johnny Mo?

Michael Parks pulls the same double duty, playing Ranger Earl McGraw in Volume 1 and the pimp Esteban in Volume 2.

How did Elle Driver kill Pai Mei?

It was revenge for him plucking out her eye after she called him a miserable old fool.

What is the name of the Bride's daughter, whom she discovers alive at Bill's home?

She is four years old, and Tarantino once floated casting Thurman's real daughter Maya Hawke as a grown-up B.B. in a sequel.

How does Bill get Beatrix to talk honestly before their final fight?

She admits she left the Deadly Vipers on discovering she was pregnant, so her child could have a better life.

In which country does Beatrix finally track Bill down?

A retired pimp named Esteban, the first of Bill's father figures, points her the right way.

Samuel L. Jackson has a cameo in Volume 2 as Rufus. What is Rufus's job?

He is at the rehearsal in the Two Pines chapel when the Deadly Vipers arrive.

Michael Parks's Ranger Earl McGraw originated in which earlier Tarantino-written film?

He played McGraw again in both halves of Grindhouse.

Which director co-composed the Volume 2 score with RZA?

The soundtrack also leaned on Ennio Morricone and Luis Bacalov, fitting the film's spaghetti-western half.

In Tarantino's long-discussed sequel idea, who would seek revenge on the Bride?

He wanted a decade of peace to pass for the Bride and B.B. first, and by 2023 he said the film would not be made.

Which NBA star adopted the Bride's code name as his own nickname?

The name also went to a parasitic wasp species, Cystomastacoides kiddo, in 2013.

Which singer's 2023 hit "Kill Bill" was inspired by the films?

The Bride's truck had already cameoed in the video for Lady Gaga and Beyoncé's "Telephone" at Tarantino's request.

Kill Buljo, a 2007 parody of Kill Bill that Tarantino reportedly approved of, comes from which country?

It is set in Finnmark and satirises stereotypes about the Sámi.

The Tokyo skyline the Bride flies into was a miniature borrowed from a 2001 film in which franchise?

The swap was arranged by Shinji Higuchi, who worked on both films and later co-directed Shin Godzilla.

The Bride's near-silent turn was modelled on Clint Eastwood's Blondie in which film?

She said Eastwood "says almost nothing but somehow manages to portray a whole character".

Tarantino first developed many of the Bride's traits for Shosanna Dreyfus, a character in which later film?

Shosanna was originally going to be an assassin crossing Nazis off a list; the list idea went to the Bride instead.

How does Elle Driver plan to kill the comatose Bride in the hospital before Bill calls it off?

Bill aborts the hit because he considers killing a defenceless woman dishonourable.

As a child, O-Ren watched the yakuza murder her parents. Which boss did she later kill in revenge?

She replaced him after training as an assassin, and later beheads Boss Tanaka for mocking her heritage.

Volume 2 premiered on April 8, 2004 at which Los Angeles landmark?

The Whole Bloody Affair later had a limited run at the Vista, which Tarantino owns.

What was the total budget for shooting both Kill Bill films together?

Shooting ran 155 days, and Volume 1 alone earned back $180.9 million worldwide.

The Bride's fiancé, killed in the chapel, has what name?

Bill ordered the massacre because he assumed the "jerk" she was marrying was the father of her child.

According to studio exit polls, what percentage of Volume 1's audience wanted to see the second film?

The film was restricted to over-17s in the US, which made its $22 million opening notable.

The Bride's truck, the Pussy Wagon, later cameoed in the video for which 2010 Lady Gaga and Beyoncé song?

The cameo happened at Tarantino's request; he still owned the truck.