The first season of Hannibal set a new quality level for television, offering a potent mix of police procedural, psycho killer and gothic horror stories that worked perfectly as an extended narrative allowing individual episode stories to be told while developing a season arc that was affective and gripping. The series immediately swept aside any memories of Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter, Mads Mikklesen’s portrayal of the character immediately becoming the definitive one, far removed from Hopkins’ increasingly camp portrayal.
The first season introduced us to the characters that were first portrayed in Thomas Harris’ Red Dragon, and this season continues with that pre-novel narrative development. The joy of a show like this, coming after the novel series has been (hopefully) completed is that it can reference things from the stories, telegraphing and expanding on moments that would be referenced as past events in the books (and films). This ensures that the series maintains a connection to the existing stories, even though it is telling a story that is new. So in this season, for instance, we get nods towards Lecter being interrupted by a census taker and are introduced to Mason Verger, a victim of Lecter’s who played a significant role in the novel and film Hannibal. This long goal approach – with the Hannibal Lecter narrative planned to be spread across several seasons – allows the story to develop nicely with what we know while bringing something fresh and new to the character.
At the end of season one, Will Graham (Hugh Dancy) was framed by Lecter as serial killer The Chesapeake Ripper and locked in a hospital for the criminally insane – the same location that we are used to seeing Lecter in from the movies. He’s determined to recover his lost memories, knowing that Lecter – the real ripper – has set him up, but not knowing how. Those who had worked with him as an FBI investigator in season one are understandably torn, unable to believe his accusations against Lecter yet wanting him to be proven innocent of the crimes – even though they believe him to almost certainly be guilty. And so much of the first half of the season follows Graham slowly convincing other people of Lecter’s possible guilt – or at least, of his own innocence. Jack Crawford (Laurence Fishburne), who brought Graham in as an investigator and feels guilt for having pushed the fragile investigator to breaking point, seems especially torn – wanting to believe, yet maintaining a friendship with Lecter that prevents him from seeing the true. Dr Alana Bloom (Caroline Dhavernas), Graham’s almost-love interest from season one is even more torn, especially when she starts a romantic relationship with Lecter. It’s Dr Frederick Chilton (Raúl Esparza), the arrogant psychiatrist in charge of the hospital, who first comes to believe that Lecter is a killer and a cannibal, while Lecter’s own therapist, Dr Bedelia Du Maurier (Gillian Anderson) also starts to fear her client. Lecter, meanwhile, does his best to sow seeds of doubt in Graham’s mind.
The second part of the season sees Graham freed, but his mental state becoming ever more fragile, as Lecter tries to bring him into his own world. It soon seems that Graham has indeed moved to the dark side, turning killer and possibly cannibal himself. Soon, the story twists into a game of bluff and double bluff, staying nicely ambiguous about which side Graham is actually on, all the way to the extraordinary and brutal final episode, which ends in a bloodbath as Lecter’s real personality is finally revealed. This is no spoiler – the show offer this upfront as the opening scene of the first episode, a spot of telegraphing that it can get away with because of our familiarity with the coming story. We know Lecter won’t stay undiscovered indefinitely, and this telegraphed opener – a powerful way to kick the season off – sets up our anticipation for a finale that still has plenty of twists to it.
The fear of a show like this is that it won’t be able to maintain the pace and the power of the first season, simply because we are already familiar with the storyline – all too often, TV shows will become variations on the same theme as they go along. That’s certainly not the case here. While it has the same overriding theme, the treatment of the characters and the narrative arc are a distinct development from the first season. This feels the same, but story wise, it’s rather different, with the imprisonment of Graham proving on ongoing story that is far removed from the first season. We get the introduction of new characters, most notably Mason Verger (Michael Pitt) and his sister Margot (Katherine Isabelle), both of whom become Lecter’s patients and pull the newly released Graham into their various schemes. We also see characters develop from the first season, notably Beverly Katz (Hettienne Park), part of the forensic team who agrees to investigate Graham’s case in exchange for his help in solving cases she is currently investigating (a nice twist o the familiar Lecter story). And people die. The loss of one established character is genuinely shocking and horrible – not only in the manner of the murder but in the loss of the character, but it certainly keeps the viewer aware that almost anything could happen here – and in this rewriting of the story, you don’t even feel secure that established characters from the novels like Crawford are safe. This series could easily kill them off.
As with the first season, Hannibal season two looks remarkably cinematic, and has some first rate talent involved as directors – Tim Hunter, David Slade, Peter Medak and Vincenzo Natali are among the people helming episodes. It’s deliberately paced – not slow, per se, but certainly less frantic than many a modern film or TV show – and remains eerily creepy throughout. As with the first season, it’s extremely gory. Most violence is off-screen, but the show certainly doesn’t hold back on showing the gruesome aftermath of murders, and has some genuinely grotesque moments that contrast nicely with the sophisticated look of the show. Of course, being a network show, it also exposes the lunatic nature of American television censorship – you can show brutal throat slashings, but naked female corpses have to have arms placed strategically and unconvincingly placed across breasts.
Like many shows these days, Hannibal seems to have been made with at least one eye on box set sales. At thirteen episodes, you could gorge on the whole season in a day – or at least a weekend, with a beak point nicely provided when Graham is released from the asylum – and the series certainly rewards multi-episode viewing, working as much like a single epic film as it does as a TV series.
Buy Hannibal Season 1 and 2 on Blu-ray from Amazon.co.uk
Hannibal may well be the best thing currently on television. The ambition of the series is admirable and I hope the ratings allow the completion of the story (Season Three will take us into Red Dragon). This is close to perfection as a series, and shows that television is now the place for daring artistic expression, at least in the US.
David Flint – a version of this review first appeared on Strange Things Are Happening
