Character is key in the Quentin Tarantino universe. If anything, the characters are more important than the stories they serve. In an interview with Vulture, Tarantino said, “It’s all about my characters. I actually think my characters are going to be one of my biggest legacies after I’m gone.”
From Mr. Orange, the (spoiler alert!) undercover cop in Reservoir Dogs, to Sharon Tate, the waypoint for Tarantino’s examination of ‘60s Los Angeles in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, there are many significant characters in the Tarantino canon.
Reservoir Dogs – Mr. Orange
Although Tarantino’s debut feature Reservoir Dogs is an ensemble piece, some characters are more important than others. Mr. Blue and Mr. Brown are killed off quite early, while Mr. White becomes a reluctant father figure and Mr. Blonde gets a scenery-chewing torture scene.
Since the whole plot revolves around figuring out which of the robbers is an undercover cop, Mr. Orange is the most significant character in the movie. Around the midpoint, when the cop’s identity is revealed, Tarantino goes into flashback mode and Mr. Orange takes over as the lead protagonist.
Pulp Fiction – Marsellus Wallace
Tarantino’s sophomore feature Pulp Fiction, still widely regarded to be his finest film, is a curious case, because it’s an anthology film comprising three short stories. Vincent Vega is a major player in two stories, but he’s absent from one of them. Mia Wallace is on the poster, but she’s only featured prominently in one of the stories.
Crime lord Marsellus Wallace is the only character who plays a major role in all three stories. He sends Jules and Vincent to Brett’s apartment on a hit in “Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife,” he pays Butch Coolidge to take a dive and ends up trapped in a pawn shop basement with him in “The Gold Watch,” and he recruits The Wolf’s crime scene clean-up services in “The Bonnie Situation.”
Jackie Brown – Jackie Brown
It goes without saying that the most important character in Jackie Brown is the one that the movie is named after. Based on Elmore Leonard’s Rum Punch, Jackie Brown revolves around a flight attendant who uses the fact that people underestimate her to her advantage.
Jackie teams up with bail bondsman Max Cherry to pit gun runner Ordell Robbie and a couple of ATF agents against each other, allowing her to come out on top.
Kill Bill – The Bride
The singular focus of Tarantino’s two-part action epic Kill Bill is Beatrix “The Bride” Kiddo’s quest for revenge. After being left for dead in a wedding chapel by her old assassin squad, the Bride makes a list of all the people who wronged her and starts bumping them off, one by one.
The movie occasionally takes other characters’ perspectives, like O-Ren Ishii or Elle Driver, but the Bride is undoubtedly the main character and the one who drives the plot.
Death Proof – Stuntman Mike
Tarantino’s side of the double feature Grindhouse, the underappreciated carsploitation slasher Death Proof, is split into two halves, unified by the same bloodthirsty villain. Stuntman Mike, a Hollywood stunt driver who uses his death-proof stunt car to kill people, targets two sets of protagonists throughout the movie.
He wipes out the first set of protagonists in one fell swoop, but he underestimates the second set. After narrowly escaping Mike’s wrath, stunt performer Zoë Bell and her friends turn the tables on him. They track him down, drag him out of his car, and beat him to a pulp.
Inglourious Basterds – Shosanna Dreyfus
Tarantino’s darkly comedic World War II epic Inglourious Basterds revolves around two simultaneous attempts on Adolf Hitler’s life, both conveniently planned for the same night. The titular Basterds plan to blow up the movie theater where Hitler will be attending a Nazi propaganda premiere. Little do they know, the owner of the theater – Jewish refugee Shosanna Dreyfus – is planning an assassination attempt of her own.
Where the Basterds’ assassination plot fails, Shosanna’s is a resounding success. She burns down the theater using highly flammable film stock, killing Hitler and all his top brass, effectively ending the war in Tarantino’s alt-history reality.
Django Unchained – Django Freeman
In another case of the most important character being the one with his name in the title, Tarantino’s spaghetti western Django Unchained is told entirely from the perspective of slave-turned-bounty hunter Django Freeman. Django breaks free of his chains, learns the trade of killing for money, and heads to the Candyland plantation to liberate his wife Broomhilda.
There are many unforgettable characters in this movie – dentist-turned-killer Dr. King Schultz, sadistic plantation owner Calvin Candie, his sinister right-hand man Stephen – but they’re all there in support of Django’s story.
The Hateful Eight – Daisy Domergue
Tarantino’s second straightforward western, The Hateful Eight, traps its eponymous octet of nefarious gunmen in a snowbound haberdashery, where no one is sure they can trust anyone around them. Major Marquis Warren is the Poirot figure who solves the mystery at the end of the second act, but notorious killer Daisy Domergue is the reason there’s a mystery to solve to begin with.
Everybody that Warren and his travel companions meet at the haberdashery is a gang member in disguise, hoping to spring Daisy from the custody of John “The Hangman” Ruth. Without her, there’s no story.
Once Upon A Time In Hollywood – Sharon Tate
For the most part, Tarantino’s sun-drenched ‘60s-set opus Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is told from the perspective of fading TV cowboy Rick Dalton and his cool-as-ice stunt double Cliff Booth. But Rick’s neighbor, movie star Sharon Tate, is the focal point of the story.
Tate represents the crucial juncture in Hollywood history that Tarantino set out to capture. The glorious final act of the movie gives Tate the blood-soaked justice that she was denied in real life.