As a Fridge subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.
- Vincent uses heroin, and one side effect of being a dope fiend is constipation. This explains why Vincent is so backed up that he's constantly trying to relieve himself, and also why he habitually takes so long that he brings a book everywhere to read on the can. Eventually, his habit catches up with him.
- Vincent monologuing that "being loyal is very important" as he's convincing himself not to sleep with his boss's wife. It's actually an important maxim for him: Vincent's brother served four years in prison for refusing to give the cops his boss's (or rather, business partner's) name.
- Vince calls out the Wolf for not saying "please." Vince's brother calls out Mr. Pink for not leaving a tip.
- Butch's choice of a samurai sword seems to fall completely in line with Katanas Are Just Better. He's awed by the sword's majesty, and it symbolizes the honorable decision he's made to rescue Marcellus. However, the sword is also the most practical weapon available: the hammer and baseball bat wouldn't be as damaging as a blade, and the chainsaw would make a lot of noise to forewarn the rapists. The samurai sword is also the only item he sees that was designed to be a weapon rather than a tool.
- Koons' words to Butch: "Hopefully, you'll never have to experience this yourself, but... When two men are in a situation like me and your dad were, for as long as we were, you take on certain responsibilities of the other." This is probably one of the reasons Butch chose to return and come to Marsellus' aid.
- In his first appearances in "Vincent Vega and Marcellus Wallace's Wife" and the beginning of "The Gold Watch", we only ever see Marcellus Wallace from behind. This distances us from him and dehumanizes him; he's an unknowable, almost inhumanly threatening presence, in constant command and control. Pretty much the first time we see his face is when Butch runs him over, and then during his experiences in the pawn shop. This 'humanizes' him, bringing him down from his pedestal of all-powerful crime lord to vulnerable human being. Fittingly, when we see him in "The Bonnie Situation", although the segment is set before these experiences, we see him from the front, demonstrating the humanity he developed in the earlier segment. Character Development — it doesn't have to happen in linear order.
- Jules' habit of sarcastically calling Pumpkin "Ringo" in the final scene can be taken as a subtle clue that he's a fan of The Beatles, referencing the deleted scene in which Mia states that "You're either a Beatles man or an Elvis man," and she correctly concludes that Vincent is an "Elvis man." So much of Jules's and Vincent's character dynamic is centered around the fact that they're polar opposites of each other (one's black, the other's white; one's religious, the other's a skeptic; one's a serious and intense professional, the other's a casual, irresponsible druggie; one goes straight, the other dies in a bathroom… like Elvis), and the fact that they're "a Beatles man" and "an Elvis man", respectively, ties into this.
- It seems like a long shot at first, but the events of the film are shown in a perfect mirror, with the gold watch scene (which, if you think about it, started it all, and indirectly led to every character's final fate except for Jules) in the middle:
- The diner scene
- Jules and Vincent's journey to Brett's place
- The scene where Jules kills Brett
- Marcellus and Butch make a deal
- Vincent and Butch have a nasty encounter
- The first romantic story, ending in disaster
- The gold watch
- The second romantic story, ending in disaster
- Vincent and Butch have a nasty encounter
- Marcellus and Butch (ending up with them making another deal)
- The scene where Jules kills Brett
- Jules and Vincent's journey from Brett's place
- The diner scene from a different point of view
- During the first Ezekiel 25:17 scene, Jules slowly turns around, surveying the room. When he gets to "the finder of lost children", who's he looking at? Marvin, who's later revealed to be their informant.
- In the opening scene, Vincent tells Jules that he doesn't really watch much television. In virtually every subsequent scene he's in, he makes a reference to a TV show.
- Zed's chopper that Butch gets away on is named Grace. Grace can be defined as "a favor rendered by one who need not do so" or as "a temporary immunity; a reprieve," which is exactly what Marcellus gives Butch after the incident at the pawn shop. This is his karmic reward for doing a good deed.
- Jules pointedly refuses to let Marvin, his informant, tell him where the briefcase is, saying, "I don't remember asking you a goddamn thing!" Jules doesn't ask Marvin for any help because he's getting a sadistic kick out of intimidating the men he's about to kill. Since Jules isn't going to kill Marvin, he doesn't want to interact with him.
- Butch never got to meet his father because he died in a POW camp, and his most prized possession is a memento of his father. Fittingly, his story arc in "The Gold Watch" ends with him deciding to rescue his worst enemy from a hellish imprisonment in the pawn shop, even though it means delaying his own chance at escape. After being haunted by his father's death and imprisonment for most of his life, there's no way that Butch could ever have left another man to die as a helpless prisoner, even if he has every reason to leave him behind.
- In the '50s style restaurant, when Mia orders a milkshake, the waiter asks her whether she wants the "Martin and Lewis" milkshake or the "Amos 'n Andy" milkshake. Martin and Lewis are white, meaning vanilla, while Amos 'n Andy are black, meaning chocolate.
- At Jackrabbit Slim's, Vincent orders a Vanilla Coke, while Mia orders a vanilla ("Martin and Lewis") milk shake, which could hint at their compatibility.
- In a very subtle moment of foreshadowing: Jules' very first scene in the movie has him enthusiastically saying that he wants to go to Europe after hearing Vincent's many stories about his travels there. The very last scene in the movie has him planning to walk the Earth after quitting his life of crime. With his past behind him, now he has a reason to make good on his promise and take that trip.
- In the pawnshop there's a neon sign for Killian's Irish Red lager. Some of the letters on the sign are out, causing it to read "Kill Ed." When coupled with the silver "Z" on Zed's keychain, it reads "Kill Zed." Which is exactly what's going to happen offscreen.
- Steve Buscemi plays a waiter. In the previous Tarantino film, Buscemi's character explains why he doesn't like to tip wait staff, essentially making this Laser-Guided Karma.
- The three main stories in the film all involve the three main characters, in turn, killing (or almost killing) three people who literally or figuratively "fucked" Marsellus Wallace. Brett betrays Marsellus, and gets murdered by Jules in retaliation. Mia is Marsellus' lover, and Vincent very nearly kills her by leaving heroin for her to overdose on. And Zed, the Big Bad of "The Gold Watch", rapes Marsellus, and ends up being cornered with a samurai sword by Butch, then led away to be tortured to death by Marsellus' men.
- When Vincent goes to buy the heroin from his drug dealer, Lance, the dealer, mentions that he's out of balloons, and offers a baggie instead, which Vincent accepts. Since cocaine is usually stored in baggies, it makes perfect sense that Mia would assume the heroin she finds is cocaine, which explains why she snorts it and subsequently suffers an overdose.
- Vincent's reaction when Butch kills him makes logical sense when one realizes that the MAC-10 Butch finds on the counter isn't his, but Marsellus's. Vincent and Marsellus were staking out the apartment together, since it was a job that Marsellus was interested in carrying out personally. Vincent went to the bathroom while Marsellus headed out to get coffee and donuts for the two of them (Marsellus is carrying a pink box with two coffee cups on top when he encounters Butch later on at the intersection). Vincent most likely heard someone entering the apartment; he just assumed it was Marsellus returning from his errand, which explains why Vincent didn't react. Vincent is also a heroin addict, which can seriously cloud one's better judgment.
- Bora Bora is part of French Polynesia; they speak Fabienne's native tongue. Of course, American-bred Butch doesn't know that.
- Butch's apparent reverence for the katana he uses to save Marsellus doesn't just underscore his samurai-like commitment to honor. Since his father died in a Vietnamese P.O.W. camp, it also shows that he's capable of respecting people he should have every reason to hate... which may be part of the reason why he goes back to help Marsellus.
