When Quentin Tarantino’s martial arts/exploitation saga Kill Bill was written and shot, it was intended to be one film.

But Miramax was unwilling to gamble on a four-hour epic, and didn’t want to force Tarantino to cut the film down. Instead, Kill Bill: Volumes 1 & 2 were released in 2003 and 2004 to great financial and critical success, spearheading Tarantino to further dazzling heights with follow-ups Inglourious Basterds and Django Unchained. Yet, Tarantino was never satisfied with the split releasing of his blood-soaked masterpiece, and as early as 2006, had reintegrated them into one single narrative. Having only seen them separately, Roger Ebert wrote, "Tarantino has made a masterful saga that celebrates the martial arts genre while kidding it, loving it, and transcending it. ... This is all one film, and now that we see it whole, it's greater than its two parts.”