One Kill Bill Theory Changes Everything In Tarantino's Film - Including The Title
It's not exactly a spoiler, at this point, to reveal that Bill (David Carradine) dies at the end of Quentin Tarantino's two-part epic "Kill Bill." What if he didn't, though?
A popular theory floating around on Reddit posits something quite fascinating that would change both "Kill Bill: Volume 1" and "Kill Bill: Volume 2" — and make the titles completely wrong in the process. Throughout both films, The Bride (Uma Thurman), whose name is eventually revealed as Beatrix Kiddo, is searching for Bill, her former boss and lover who sent a team of assassins after her when she tried to leave the profession behind. After mowing down several people in the process, Beatrix finally finds Bill ... and their daughter, B.B. (Perla Haney-Jardine), whom she always assumed was dead. She kills him and leaves with her daughter. Or does she?
As u/Rhodie114 writes on a thread about wild movie theories, "Bill didn't die at the end of Kill Bill. Both he and Beatrix knew that the 5 point palm exploding heart technique was fake. Using it on him was Beatrix's way of saying 'if you play along and play dead, I'll just take my daughter and go.'"
Okay, let's break this down. What this theory is saying is that the kung-fu move Beatrix uses to kill Bill, known as the "5-point palm exploding heart technique," is completely fake, and that Bill simply let her leave with B.B. as an apology for his wrongdoing years prior. So does this hold up?
Another Reddit thread fully unpacks this fascinating Kill Bill theory
This might seem a bit far-fetched at first, but truthfully, this theory has some intriguing evidence behind it. On a different Reddit thread, u/jordanlund presents a full case complete with screenshots, and it's honestly quite convincing.
Here's the gist: while Beatrix does, in fact, set out to kill Bill, the bloody trail that leads her towards her former beau ends up making her feel guilty. After killing O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu) in the first volume — if you twist the on-screen events into chronological order — she then travels from Japan to California to take out another former Deadly Vipers assassin Vernita Green (Vivica A. Fox). When Vernita's daughter Nikki (Ambrosia Kelley) discovers the bloody aftermath, Beatrix is uncharacteristically bashful, even apologizing to the young girl and offering her a rematch one day.
So, as the theory goes, Beatrix doesn't directly murder anyone from that point on. Michael Madsen's Budd gets bitten by a poisonous snake at the hands of Daryl Hannah's Elle Driver, and Beatrix elects to remove Elle's one remaining eye instead of killing her. (It's reasonable to assume that she either succumbs to that injury or is bitten by the still-present snake, though.) Not killing Bill at the end would certainly fit within this theory, and there's more!
Do the end credits of Kill Bill: Volume 2 confirm this theory?
There's one last thing that lends a little more credence to this theory, and that's the end credits. As the previous Redditor u/jordanlund points out, all of the people killed throughout both "Kill Bill" movies are shown during a scene where their character is still alive except for Bill, and they also claim his foot may have shifted a bit since he "died." Most damning, though, is the fact that Beatrix's death list has every name crossed off ... except for Bill.
So is this theory true? Probably not, considering that it would invalidate Beatrix's journey throughout both films in many ways. Wronged by everyone in her life, Beatrix embarks on a violent, revenge-fueled rampage that takes her around the world, and it would be utterly unsatisfying if Bill is just still alive at the end. Still, it's a pretty fascinating take, and could provide a fun twist next time you sit down and enjoy Quentin Tarantino's beloved two-parter.