What does the scorpion represent in Drive?

Question

A scorpion is visible on the drivers jacket throughout the whole film. He even asks Albert Brooks' character "Did you ever hear the story of the scorpion and the frog?".

What does the scorpion represent?

Answer 1

From an interview with the director Nicolas W. Refn:

You talk about the idea of Drive as a superhero film, can you talk about where the idea for the scorpion symbol on Ryan’s jacket came from and the allusion to the scorpion and the frog story within the film?

• I knew I wanted a satin jacket because I knew I wanted him to shine at night.

  When you deal with very good actors, you often let them figure out their wardrobe themselves because that’s very much how they build their characters, through wardrobe. So Ryan would go out and find a jacket that he’d feel comfortable in and he’d bring it back and we’d make it satin. A lot of them were old military jackets with symbols of eagles and other iconic American symbols, and I thought “oh that would be great if he had a symbol on himself, like a logo!”

  We decided we were going to put some kind of animal on the jacket, but then by coincidence I was with the costume designer in a garage looking at how mechanics dress.

  Ryan was there working on his car because he was building his own car at the time, and he said that I should show the costume designer my visual reference for the Drive, which was Scorpio Rising. The film starts with the logo of a scorpion, and the telekinetic minds of myself and Ryan simultaneously said “it’s a scorpion!”

  Then Ryan had the idea that we could use this design to incorporate this story about the scorpion and the frog, and it turned out really great.