Kill Bill: Volume 1 vs Volume 2 – Face Off

Last Updated on April 4, 2023

This might be a controversial Face Off. Kill Bill is – unquestionably – one movie. Yet, it wasn’t released that way, with Quentin Tarantino’s epic being released in two feature-length halves. In October 2003, we got Kill Bill: Volume 1 and then Volume 2 in April 2004. The wait between the two films felt eternal. Still, both were well-rounded enough that you had a satisfying cinematic experience after watching each movie on its own, even if (technically) it was only half a film.

Ultimately, the decision to split it into two films was brilliant, with the first movie making $180 million worldwide and Volume 2 earning $152 million. Together that added up to a pretty hefty grosser for the early 2000s, and one must imagine that the DVD sales of each were huge. While we never got the long-promised Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair, if you watch one of the movies, chances are you’ll watch the other. But which of the two is better? Of course, this is a controversial and perhaps even unanswerable question, as we’re essentially putting the first half of a movie up against its second half.

But, taken as two separate movies, which is better – the blood-splattered excellence of the first half or the more introspective second? Volume 1 is a kung fu epic, while volume 2 feels more like a spaghetti western, or, as QT himself would put it on his Video Archives Podcast, a “revengematic.” This episode of Face Off is written by Mathew Plale, edited by Adam Walton and narrated by Shawn Knippelberg. Which Kill Bill movie is the one you return to the most? Let us know in the comments below if you’re more into Volume 1 or 2 or if the Whole Bloody Affair is the only way to go.