Formerly NBC's Hannibal goes far off-book with this episode, taking us to a place where we smug book readers are just as uncertain about what is to come in the final two episodes of the season. The Red Dragon is thrown at Will's family in a tense scene of stalking, Hannibal spends as much time as possible fucking with everybody around him, and Will is absolutely done with both Jack Crawford and former BFF Hannibal Lecter.
All on this episode of Eat The Rudecast, a podcast about NBC's Hannibal, and the works of Thomas Harris.
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Thank you guys, it’s always so much fun to listen to you.
Thank you for listening!
Cooper, I’m picturing you in Nicholas Cage’s role in The Wicker Man. Instead of bees its teeth. “NO! NO! NOT THE TEETH! NOT THE TEETH! AHH! CGI! THEY’RE IN MY EYES! TEETH IN MY EYES!”
It’s exactly like that!
“The Wrath of the Lamb” is from the book of Revelation, which is also the inspiration for Blake’s Red Dragon watercolors. The phrase does not appear in Blake’s poetry, as far as I can tell.
Alana was probably on better terms with Will thane anyone else in season 2… until Will attempted to have Hannibal killed.
This show has long ignored travel times, even if characters had no known means of transportation. See Abigail going from Baltimore to Minnesota and back to dig up a body.
I think in Manhunter the footage Dolarhyde watches with Reba is of the next family he plans on killing.
Hannibal might have been able to guess the day Dolarhyde & Will would look at the watercolor, but not the time of day.
Hannibal’s skylight seemed so obviously generated by imagination/memory that it didn’t occur to me anyone might think otherwise.
The toilet paper message was not discovered due to Chilton ordering a random search. In the book it’s a regularly scheduled cleaning session which results in a worker using the toilet paper roll to clean the sink and inadvertently discovering the message. In Manhunter he tries to hide it in a book before a cleaning session. I know we’ve already seen the CSI-esque scene sparked by that message before, but I miss the chance for the science squad to do their thing.
I do think it’s unfortunate Molly doesn’t grab a gun as in Red Dragon. They live in a very rural area, and Will already had guns on hand in Wolf Trap, so it would be roughly what you’d expect. Molly is at least as badass as Lillian Gish in Night of the Hunter. It’s because of that climax that I don’t really think of this scene as being “original” to the show. Will is absent in this version and she doesn’t grab a gun, but otherwise it’s a similar setup of Dolarhyde attacking the house and Molly having to fend for herself.
You describe Will as saying what Wally “wants to hear”, but why would Will think he wants to hear that the Tooth Fair will be put in a mental institution rather than killed. I think it’s unfortunate that this version of the story attributes Will’s institutionalization to him being framed (and then acquitted). He can’t dismiss it to his stepson if it was due to his actual trouble with mental health.
Hannibal tells Alana he has always told her the truth “in my own way”, which is just another of his many lies (unless lying is what he means by his own way). He lied to her about Nicholas Boyle knocking her out, about what drugs he gave Abigail or food he gave his guests, about the clock Will drew for him or his whereabouts when Marissa Schurr disappeared.
The line about Dolarhyde being no more able to express his true feelings “than a scar can blush” is indeed in the book.
I’d caution Hannibal about defecating on the floor out of spite: Alana just might let it sit there.
It makes much more sense for Hannibal to be wearing the iconic mask than Will (even though Hannibal hasn’t bitten off a nurse’s tongue in this story). It was particularly absurd that Jack removed all of Will’s constraints, despite the fact that Will had previously overpowered his guard and escaped.
I took Molly as saying she knew it was the Tooth Fairy. She was surprised when Will mentioned Hannibal. You can refer to the newspaper article, but that was also about the Tooth Fairy.
Abel Gideon gives his take on how slippery life doth be in season 2, episode 6, “Futamono”. And he’s only broken his back and lost a leg at that time!
When Will makes the talcum powder realization in the book he says “YOU SON OF A BITCH” in all caps. If it sounds “very Manhunter” rather than very Fuller, it’s because Fuller so often gives characters prose lines. Manhunter did invent some cursing scenes, like when Will says “someone should blow the sick fuck out of his socks”, but that’s not in most releases of the film (and if someone could link to the clip, I’d appreciate it). And speaking of Manhunter, you mentioned the absence of a reflection in the dividing glass this episode, and that’s one of the arcing motifs Matt Zoller Seitz discusses in his video essay on the film.
Last weekend I watched Tom Noonan’s second directorial feature, “The Wife”, and now I’m struck by a connection to your comment about Hannibal “fixing” Will. The crazy awful titular character expresses a similar sentiment about being rejected after “fixing” another character. The viewer will note that if they had truly been “fixed” then the unhealthy codependent relationship she’s attempting to preserve would be over. Of course, that character is not particularly astute, so an analogy to Hannibal wouldn’t fully apply (although I suppose Noonan’s rationally awful schadenfreude-fueled therapist character bears some resemblance).
The “two souls” quote is from Goethe’s faust, not Shakespeare.
You talk of the sweeping changes made by Manhunter, but I’d say the show has made even larger changes. They are “mashup DJs” doing their own thing, while the film mostly just compressed it.
As I pointed out last week, the reason Michael Mann used Inna-Gadda-da-Vida was because it was of special importance to a schizophrenic murderer he corresponded with.
The CGI in Pushing Daisies looked fake, but I think it was a good look for the show. It’s a cartoony world, and going for something like photorealism would not have worked as well. In some ways it’s the tonal opposite of Hannibal.
Hannibal’s ‘two souls alas are dwelling in my breast’… bit is from Goethe’s Faust (remember, as a young man he rooted for Mephistopheles and despised Faust?)
“You are aware of only one unrest;
Oh, never learn to know the other!
Two souls, alas, are dwelling in my breast,
And one is striving to forsake its brother.
Unto the world in grossly loving zest,
With clinging tendrils, one adheres;
The other rises forcibly in quest
Of rarefied ancestral spheres.
If there be spirits in the air
That hold their sway between the earth and sky,
Descend out of the golden vapors there
And sweep me into iridescent life.
Oh, came a magic cloak into my hands
To carry me to distant lands,
I should not trade it for the choicest gown,
Nor for the cloak and garments of the crown.”
Wanna put your lit. hat on and tackle that?
Also, we may not get in a gadda de vida but we are getting that siouxsie sioux song written especially for the show!
RE: “It makes much more sense for Hannibal to be wearing the iconic mask than Will (even though Hannibal hasn’t bitten off a nurse’s tongue in this story). It was particularly absurd that Jack removed all of Will’s constraints, despite the fact that Will had previously overpowered his guard and escaped”
After listening to Hannibal and Jack’s conversation in 3X12 and if you adhere to the biblical references of this show, do you need to wonder why Jack removed Will’s restraints? Jack is God opposing Hannibal’s Devil, so why would Jack be afraid to remove Will’s restraints? Jack, like Hannibal, tossed Will out there to see if he would remain righteous. Will is the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the lamb who is the only one worthy to open the book with seven seals- resulting in the release of the four horsemen- an apocalyptic event.
From the King James Bible Revelation Chapter 6
6:1 And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see.”
And didn’t Hannibal say that the lamb is becoming the lion?
6:16 And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb:
6:17 For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?
Gads this show is fun, I actually looked up bible verses, thank you FictionIsn’tReal for making me think about it!
And thank you Socky for “Hannibal’s ‘two souls alas are dwelling in my breast’… bit is from Goethe’s Faust”..
RE: Molly,
I love what Molly did, the absolute first thing you learn in any self-defense class is that in the event of a home invasion get out of the house! Molly was calm, used her knowledge of her house and her son (he would listen, stay quiet and do what she said) to get them both out alive. A gun is used when you cannot get out, Molly was brilliant. It actually was a tactical mistake on the Dolarhyde’s part to shoot the driver, it would have taken Molly a little more time to convince the man to get back in the car, even a small delay would have enabled Dolarhyde to get close enough to shoot Molly as well; the poor man did not die in vain.
Jack isn’t God. God is omniscient & omnipotent. Jack was fooled into believing Will was guilty (unlike Alana, he even thought Will might have done it consciously) and Hannibal was innocent. God permits Satan to test man, Jack is often powerless to stop Hannibal or ignorant of what’s going on. If there is a God in the Hannibal universe, it’s one at best indifferent to the suffering of humanity, or more plausibly (given the ludicrously awful stuff on the show) delighting in cruelty.