Hannibal has traditionally been a solitary figure. Though he enjoys the company of others, he is usually among them rather than of them, observing from the vantage of superior refinement. He does not trust anyone with his secrets. He does not rely on others to fulfill his base desires, and seems to regard doing so as a form of weakness.

That consistent drive towards self-actualization at the expense of others makes “…and the Woman Clothed with the Sun” an unexpectedly communal pleasure. The episode is devoted almost entirely to the concept of family. Despite his finer tastes, Hannibal genuinely craves the simple intimacy that has eluded him throughout the show, and it’s perhaps the first time that we’ve seen him be truly vulnerable.


The episode begins with a reunion between Will and Hannibal, during which Hannibal immediately claims Will as family even as Will withdraws. He’s moved on, as has everyone else after three years. Will has Molly and Walter. Alana has a fantastic Beetlejuice jacket and a son with Margot. Francis Dolarhyde has been murdering families to replace the one that was denied him as a child. Hannibal, meanwhile, sits alone in prison, clinging to his dignity while waiting for phone calls from his ‘attorney.’ (Spoiler alert: His attorney is a Great Red Dragon.)

Everyone’s happiness amplifies Hannibal’s sense of personal tragedy. During season two, the plotline with Abigail Hobbs seemed more a manipulation of Will than a rescue of her. Through flashback, we finally find out how Hannibal staged Abigail’s murder in scenes that flesh out their father-daughter relationship in astonishingly affectionate detail. Hannibal mentors her like a parent. She’s his child, a creature molded in his psychological image following her rebirth through violence.

The scenes give us a keener understanding of Hannibal’s motivations and lend added weight to his betrayal. Hannibal thought he’d be able to share life with Will and Abigail, and his sense of loss is more profound than we previously realized. All the family business makes “…and the Woman Clothed with the Sun” a surprisingly bawdy episode, and Hannibal feels hurt because all of his friends seem to have forgotten him. He exposed aspects of himself that he typically keeps hidden. His friends did not reciprocate the favor.

Of course, Hannibal has strange ways of displaying affection, so if he’s lonely, he has only himself to blame. He ate his sister and killed Abigail. He also believes that love and death are intertwined. He may have Will’s interests at heart, but that’s seldom remains the case for very long. He’s an unusually high-risk lover.

However, it does cast some doubt over his intentions as we enter the season’s final few episodes. Alana assumes that Hannibal is playing a game designed to hurt Will, but “…and the Woman Clothed with Sun” suggests that Hannibal’s actions may be sincere. If anything, Jack is the villain of the episode, acknowledging his callous manipulation of Will while dangling him as bait in front of the Tooth Fairy. Only Hannibal seems to recognize the danger and he may not do anything to stop it.

That’s the trouble. Hannibal may desire a family, but he still loves to play his games and Francis Dolarhyde’s quest to become the Great Red Dragon is the kind of self-realization that Hannibal adores. If Will is going to push him away, it may not be long before the doctor succumbs to the temptation of another student.

It helps that Richard Armitage is playing Dolarhyde like a scarred youth searching for a parent. He’s childlike in the sense that his emotional development is incomplete, and there’s a strange mix of innocence and menace in his interactions with Reba McClane (Rutina Wesley). She can hear his pain, and her kindness offers a healthier road to evolution.

Unfortunately, she may not have enough time to guide Dolarhyde through the transformation. Freddie Lounds (Laura Jean Chorostecki) has told the Dragon that Will is getting closer, and on Hannibal, people can only be born through violence.

Hannibal Recap: Season 3, Episode 9, "And the Woman Clothed with the Sun"
BY CHUCK BOWEN ON AUGUST 1, 2015 IN TV GO TO COMMENTS (5)
Hannibal
Hannibal operates as a full-tilt relationship melodrama this week. The actual hunt for Francis Dolarhyde (Richard Armitage), a.k.a. the Tooth Fairy, a.k.a. Red Dragon, takes an emotional backseat to a variety of couples who're sorting through almost comically elaborate assemblies of skeletons in the closet. As with nearly every other episode of this series, "And the Woman Clothed with the Sun" is composed of alternating duets of escalating intensity. In the pre-credits scene, Hannibal (Mads Mikkelsen) and Will (Hugh Dancy) discuss—what else?—the thin ideological line separating their respective positions in society, which now parallels the fragile boundary separating Will from Francis (a doubling that the series repeatedly emphasizes by likening Will's investigation to Francis's preparation for the acts that have triggered it). Will's a killer almost like these men, who has pivotally funneled his emotional trauma and estrangement into law enforcement, deriving his predatory thrills from the hunt of other predators. That text has always powered Hannibal and Will's duets, but, now that Hannibal's imprisoned in the world's poshest lunatic asylum, a certain brittleness has crept into the former's parrying and jousting. Mikkelsen plays Hannibal with a layer of spurned torment here that's naked even by the standards of his distinctive interpretation of the character: His eyes sing with dashed erotic bitterness, which quietly primes the well for a betrayal down the road that's inevitable if creator Bryan Fuller intends to follow Thomas Harris's Red Dragon.
The show's narrative structure now resembles a sort of love octagon. There's Hannibal and Will, of course. For reasons that aren't yet apparent, Abigail (Kacey Rohl) has turned up again in flashbacks that unsurprisingly reveal her to have been complicit with Hannibal in the ambush that concluded the second season. There's also Francis, who admires Hannibal and calls him under the pretense of being his attorney in the highly unlikely development that serves as this episode's final stinger. Alana (Caroline Dhavernas) may still be with Margot, raising a "Verger baby" with the latter's family money, but she's slept with Hannibal in the past, and has had a pronounced "will-they-or-won't-they" thing with Will—an electricity that still exists between the two on some subterranean level in their brief duet here. And, remember, she also conspired with Hannibal to murder Mason—information that hovers, un-lanced, above Alana's power negotiations with Hannibal, of which she's now the dominant party due to his incarceration. (Dhavernas now plays Alana as a closeted woman freed, reveling in a newfound element of sexual confidence, dressing as a kind of modernized cross between an American professional and a French aristocrat. Scene to scene, the character still doesn't make much sense, but the actor keeps you watching.) Will's married to Molly (Nina Arianda), a coupling that's roused class insecurities in him that parallel Francis's exclusion from the nuclear family structure he simultaneously envies, seeks the approval of, and actively aims to destroy. Now complicating matters further is Reba McClane (Rutina Wesley), a blind film developer who works with Francis and seeks out his companionship. Jack Crawford (Laurence Fishburne) isn't kidding when he tells Hannibal that "we're all in this stew together, doctor."
There's quite a bit of accomplished, bitchy verbal game-playing in the marvelous "And the Woman Clothed with the Sun," one of several high points of an adventurous and sterling season. Three duets, described below, best illustrate the shifting power dynamics between the characters as well as the surprisingly straightforward pathos. Though that straightforwardness is distorted when one remembers that three of the characters are multiple murderers. The first, between Hannibal and Will, informs the show's increasing emphasis on dejection from the outset. Hannibal wasn't on screen much last week in "The Great Red Dragon," as quite a bit of the episode's running time was devoted to introducing Francis. This week, however, we see him enough to notice details about his incarceration, such as the institutional jump suit that Hannibal must wear, which has a comic effect, emphasizing a declawed, condescendingly infantilized quality that only renders the former doctor scarier; you know he's biding his time, looking for opportunity for escape or retribution.
This duet has a second part, in which Hannibal and Will mentally visit the Jacobi family home, the site of one of Francis's murder sprees. In their minds, they walk the grounds of the estate and we see them do so, Hannibal pointing out to Will that the killer might be targeting families with enclosed yards, so as to savor the moon. This scene is an inspired example of the showrunners using Hannibal's abilities of mental projection as a pretense for freeing him from the confines of his cell. The device emphasizes the touristy distance that Hannibal and Will both feel from regular family arrangements, while, more practically, allowing episode director John Dahl and his collaborators to visually spice up scenes that could've merely existed as exposition traded between characters in two-shots (though the two-shots in the institution are always subtly varied, using the glass panel that exists between the characters as an elegant, image-enriching plane). A vision of Will naked, covered in blood, looking up at the moon envisioning himself as Francis, prepares us for his duet with Molly.
Will and Molly's phone conversation is a case of Hannibal rendering a heartbreaking scene from a moment that scanned as obligatory character work in the book. Certain macho relics from the story's 1980s roots remain. We don't believe Molly, for instance, when she calls Will a "hot shot," even facetiously, because this show's sensibility couldn't be farther away from the tone of derring-do that occasionally characterized the book and its first film adaptation, Manhunter. The series in general, and this scene particularly, is wounded, unexpectedly warm (the key to the show's success), sad, and essentially hopeless. Fuller and his collaborators, riffing on Harris, clearly believe that outsiders can never really join society; the best they can hope for is to limit the extent of their destruction, either to themselves or to others or to all of the above. Will envisions himself sitting on his bed with Molly, the disjunction between reality and fantasy crushingly epitomizing the cliché of being so close yet so far away. A telling line of dialogue suggests that Will may be married to Molly, but that he may never be intertwined with her spiritually as many couples might appear to be (normally only from the vantage point of lonely people like Will). Molly makes a flippant reference to Will's "criminal mind," wounding him—and a woman married to this man for even just a spell should know that it would. Does Molly truly love Will, or are her feelings for him a complicated embodiment of pity? Is he just another of the strays they take collectively in?
As rich as these scenes are, the duets between Francis and Reba take Hannibal to a level of intensity that honors the best, most surprising portions of Red Dragon. We've seen the carnage that Francis has wrought, especially this week in those unmooring close-ups of Mrs. Jacobi in bed, spread out in a quasi-crucifixion pose, engulfed in geysers of blood stains, and now we're to somehow find a way to understand him as the most pitiful, tormented human being this series has offered. Francis speaks for the first time this week, after only uttering guttural moans previously, and we can hear the profound speech impediment caused by his cleft palate. The way Francis utters "Mrs. McClane" from his van, garbling it yet determined to verbally push it out so as to reach out, when he offers her a ride home, is the most moving gesture in the entire series. Considering the context of who Francis actually is, the scene is flabbergasting for its empathy and awareness of vulnerability, bringing to mind some of the vocal effects that Charles Laughton landed in The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
Armitage plays this role in the tradition of some of the 1930s-era Universal Studios movie monsters: with an acknowledgement of the grace that arrives almost inadvertently from the purity of the effort to overcome physical damage—a grace that Francis hates himself too much to recognize. When Francis eats a piece of pie that Reba offers him as they sit in her home, quickly, like a hungry dog, we share his relief in being able to eat with someone while remaining alone and unwatched in equal measure. It's training-wheels companionship for a man who's long been lost in the figurative cold.

Hannibal season 3 episode 9 recap: 'And the Woman Clothed with the Sun...'
By Emma Dibdin
Sunday, Aug 2 2015, 04:30 BST
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Season 3, episode 9
| Airs Wednesday, Aug 5 2015 at 22:00 BST on Sky Living

"Family entertainment" isn't the first phrase that springs to mind when you think of Hannibal, but 'And the Woman Clothed with the Sun...' is very much about happy families, and what it takes to make or break them.

Francis Dolarhyde targets only the most idyllic of families, watching them for days as though trying to comprehend what he never had. Alana and Margot are now a family and seem to have found stability, but the shadow of Hannibal's promise looms large (all the more so now that Alana has taken on Chilton's role from the canon, surely spelling her doom). And the scent of Will's new family drives Hannibal to reminisce about the one he tried to build for himself and Will.

Hugh Dancy as Will Graham in Hannibal S03E09: '...and The Woman Clothed With The Sun'
© NBC Universal / Ian Watson

"I gave you a child, if you remember," he says bitterly, and finally we get to see what happened to that surrogate daughter. It's far less coercive than we probably expected; rather than holding Abigail prisoner and brainwashing her as he did Miriam Lass, Hannibal spent those months nurturing the dark passenger within a very willing Abigail.

She seems almost drunk on Hannibal's presence, completely under his spell as he expertly extracts her blood for dramatic effect – "Abigail Hobbs is dead", "Long live Abigail Hobbs" – and has her slit the throat of her father's corpse. Kacey Rohl is so, so good in this role that I'm thrilled we get to see her playing actual Abigail again, as opposed to the projection in Will's mind that we saw in 'Primavera'. And I had forgotten, actually, how dark and compromised the real Abigail was back in season one, which doesn't take away from how tragic her story is. The fact that Hannibal killed her by slitting her throat really stings in retrospect.

It's Abigail, in part, who is on Alana's mind when she tells Will that she's worried about more than just him. The fallout was extensive last time Will got too close to Hannibal, and he's clearly playing with fire here, the lines between himself and Dolarhyde already blurring in far-too-vivid ways. Hannibal warned him away from the case last week and he hasn't changed his tune, now telling Jack that he might just as well "eat Will's brain right out of his skull" for all the psychological damage he's doing. And if anybody would know…

Richard Armitage as Francis Dolarhyde in Hannibal S03E09: '...and The Woman Clothed With The Sun'
© NBC Universal / Brooke Palmer

But as Jack says, Will is never more effective than with Hannibal inside his head. So he's making progress with identifying the Tooth Fairy, slipping in and out of the killer's persona as he watches the Leeds family in their final weeks of life, and stands caked in blood outside their darkened home. Will can try to avoid getting too "personal" with Hannibal all he wants, but the two of them even appear to be sharing a mind palace now, their shifting surroundings – from Hannibal's office, through the Leeds home, out into the moonlit garden – transformed what could have been a too-lengthy dialogue scene into something sprawling and cinematic.

And while Will is intermittently becoming Dolarhyde, Dolarhyde is becoming The Great Red Dragon, which can only mean his next murder is imminent. Now that they're in touch, surely Hannibal has to be planning on pulling Dolarhyde's strings and seeing where he can direct him – towards Will's ready-made new family unit, for instance?

Richard Armitage remains incredibly affecting in this role, and his transformation is now made even sadder by the introduction of Reba (Rutina Wesley), a blind co-worker who listens to Francis when he talks and likes him because he doesn't pity her. Their romance is already so compelling that, by design, you're rooting for Dolarhyde to get the better of his demons.

But this shy boy has chosen his murder mentor well, and after three years Hannibal is surely more than ready to take on the role of puppet master again. Mikkelsen was absolutely mesmerising throughout that scene where he was foregrounded with Alana behind him, the subtle ways in which he's changed and hardened so prominent in that moment.

He's spent so much of the show up until this point dissembling that it's thrilling to see him at liberty to say exactly what he wants to people – specifically to Will, with whom he's ruthlessly sharp-tongued in this episode. Strange though it sounds, Hannibal has never seemed more dangerous than he does behind bars.

Rutina Wesley as Reba McClane in Hannibal S03E09: '...and The Woman Clothed With The Sun'
© NBC Universal / Brooke Palmer

Other thoughts:
- Okay, I'm going to need audio of Mads Mikkelsen saying the phrase "moral dignity pants" on a loop ASAP, please. MORAL. DIGNITY. PANTS.
- Of course Will adopted the dog. Adorable.
- "I love a good finger-wagging." "Yes you do. How is Margot?" HA. Hannibal is picking up the innuendo slack left by Mason, but it seems so much classier coming from him.
- I am both thrilled that Alana and Margot are still together, and unsure how to feel about the idea of Alana giving birth to A Verger Baby. Particularly given that conversation between Hannibal and Will about choosing not to breed so as to avoid passing on "terrible traits". Shudder.
- "Hannibal's never been… great… with boundaries." There were just a a lot of actual laugh-out-loud lines this week.
- So… um… I feel like we're very much meant to take from this episode that Will is well-endowed? Say what you will about Freddy Lounds, but she's got the scoop.
- "I'm particularly fond of cats. I'm not particularly fond of children." I see zero problems with Jimmy's outlook here.
- "You called us murder husbands." "You did run off to Europe together." Preach, Freddy. And yes, that sound you just heard was the good people of Tumblr collectively imploding.



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'Hannibal' Season 3, Episode 9, 'And The Woman Clothed With the Sun'

“That’s the same atrocious aftershave you wore in court,” says Hannibal Lecter as his old friend Will Graham approaches his extravagant cell.

The characters on Hannibal, even the well-adjusted ones, are some pretty lost souls. We have never heard of Will having any sort of family. We know what happened with Hannibal and his sister. Jack is a widower. Even Alana is a bit of a loner. Together, these characters formed their own twisted family. They were bound together through violence and melodrama. But after Hannibal was captured, the family fizzled. Will was able to find a new family, one that makes him happy. Alana has started a family with Margot. But, Francis Dolarhyde is bringing this family back together, and the closer they come together the farther they fall from the reach of their new families.

Hannibal is so much to Will: a friend, a father, a mentor, a tormenter. Being with him opens something up inside of Will that he had long closed off. In the episode ‘And The Woman Clothed With the Sun,’ many of the lines between Hannibal and Will are directly from the book, and Hannibal’s in particular read as more contemptuous than we have known Mads’s Hannibal to be. But this is also a Hannibal that feels like he’s been betrayed by his only friends and family. Not to mention, he’s in a cell. He’s angry. So much of the best parts of this show have just been Hannibal and Will talking in a room, and the adaptation of The Red Dragon allows the show to potentially end with that focus in mind.


Despite palatable tension between the two, Hannibal is glad to see Will and vice versa. Hannibal asks Will if he got his note, “Did you read it before you destroyed it?”


“I read it and then I burned it,” says Will.

Will asks Dr. Lecter for help, and Hannibal notices that will is no longer calling him by his first name.

“I’m more comfortable the less personal we are,” says Will.

Hannibal does his creepy smell detection, and immediately discerns that Will must have a child in his life. Nearly upset by this, Hannibal points out, “I gave you a child once.”

But Will is here for help catching The Tooth Fairy.

Hannibal is still butt hurt over the events of three years prior. He devolves to simple manipulation, asking Will what kind of father he is.

“I expected more of you Dr. Lecter,” says Will, “That routine is old hat.” But of course Hannibal will have a look at The Tooth Fairy files, after all, Will is family.

A flash back from season 1, when we were led to believe that Hannibal murdered Abigail, shows what actually happened between her and Hannibal. As means of giving her re-birth, Hannibal had to give her a symbolic death. Abigail, who was portrayed as damaged and timid in season one, is in her element in this scene. She was a much more willing participant in the atrocities around her than Will could accept. She asks Hannibal how he would have murdered her, “I would have cut your throat like your father.” Hannibal asks Abigail if it’d be so difficult to accept him, as she accepted her serial killer father.

After collecting Abigail’s blood, Hannibal sets up the crime scene that would have Will framed for Abigail’s murder. Her and Hannibal, pressed tightly together, spew her blood all over the room. They have an odd erotic tension that belies the emphasized father and daughter relationship.

“Abigail Hobbs is dead,” says Hannibal.

“Long live Abigail Hobbs.”

Will and Alana re-unite, and Will tries to sort out his feelings about seeing Hannibal again “I had the absurd feeling that he walked out with me,” says Will.

Apparently Alana and Margot are still together, and Alana did in fact carry the Verger heir to birth. They have a son.

Alana is worried about Will letting Hannibal into his psyche again, “I’m not worried about just you,” she says, “Last time it didn’t end with you.”

Back with in the world’s most luxurious cell block, Hannibal suggests to Will that the killer might be disfigured.

“This is a very shy boy, Will,” says Hannibal, “I would love to meet him.”


Will thought of the disfigured angle already, of course, due to the shattered mirrors and shards placed on the victims’ eyes post-mortem.

Hannibal believes that, like Will, The Tooth Fairy needs a family to distract himself from the monster within. He instantly draws parallels to The Tooth Fairy’s need for a family to Will’s need for a family. Like Will, Hannibal believes, that The Tooth Fairy wants a ready-made family of a wife and step-children. He is fearful of the terrible traits that he could pass on. “You know better than to breed,” says Hannibal.

Hannibal is chalk full of hints. He asks Will about the victims’ yards, because he believes that a killer with a special relationship to the moon would like to go outside and look at it. Thus, the victims would need to have a yard that provided privacy.

Alana visits Hannibal for a good “finger wagging.” She is concerned that Hannibal is going to mess with Will’s head, but she knows how to leverage with him, “It’s not solitude that you fear, it’s indignity,” she says, “I’ll take your books, I’ll take your drawings, I’ll take your toilet.”

More flashbacks of Hannibal and Abigail show us how Hannibal trained her to be his pupil. It started with getting Abigail to accept her love for her father, despite what her father was. Hannibal actually gets the body of Garret Jacob Hobbs, and tells Abigail she must love him like he loved her. She then cuts the corpse’s throat, it’s disgusting. “Never be ashamed of who you are, Abigail,” says Hannibal.

Francis Dolarhyde, imagining himself at a table with a massive family, eagerly awaits his next murder. Screaming in agony, the camera pulls back and shows us a dragon tail.

Back at the lab, a strangled cat allows Jack, Will, and the gang to discern that The Tooth Fairy is now murdering victims’ pets before he murders the victims. Will wants a veterinary report in Buffalo and Chicago, but Jack doesn’t see it. These families lived states apart, what do they have in common?


“They were both happy,” says Will.

Freddie Lounds approaches Will at the crime scene. Will is still aggravated that she called him and Hannibal “Murder husbands,” in an article a few years back.

“Well you did run off to Europe together,” says Freddie

Freddie is curious about the arrangement that Hannibal and Alana have, that has seen Alana grow rich and Hannibal stay in her care.

“A complicated relationship,” says Will.

“No more complicated than your relationship with Hannibal,” says Freddie.

Freddie threatens Will with bad press and tells him that he’d be smart to use her. On some level, he agrees.

Dolarhyde reads Freddie’s newest article, ‘Insane Fiend Consulted in Solving Mass Murders.’ He is clearly pleased that his hero is helping to catch him.

Dolarhyde, needing film, approaches the archivist Reba McLane (Rutina Wesley, aka Tara from True Blood). Immediately, he softens around her. Reba is blind, and that seems to disarm Dolarhyde’s painful physical insecurities. He even asks her for a plum, before asking her for the type of film that he needs. She offers digital, but Francis is a film snob. Later, he spots Reba at a bus stop, and he offers her a ride home (he is driving a murder van, but she doesn’t seem to mind). She tells him she always takes the bus, that there is no need to worry. “I’m not worried,” says Francis, trying to emulate a sane and empathetic human, “Ride with me, for my pleasure.” Once at Reba’s home, she invites Francis inside.


Inside, Reba serves pie and tells Francis about herself. She is a sweet person, who has spent her life teaching speech and vision-impaired children. She tells Francis that she likes him because she feels no sympathy from him, when she feels inundated with pity from others. She asks to touch his face, and Dolarhyde flinches. “Trust me, I’m smiling,” he says.

Will calls his wife Molly and tells her he’s lonesome. “I’m feeling Randy,” says Molly. “Me too,” says Will. “Randy is the new dog,” says Molly. Will laughs. Just seeing Will laugh and smile is a new dimension for the character. The only laughter he’s ever let out is pained chuckles. Molly is a representation of everything that Will now has to lose. Before, he only was in danger of losing himself. Now he is in danger of losing a family.

Jack visits Hannibal, and Hannibal curses him for involving Will in this new case, “It’d be more honest to eat his brain right out of his skull,” says Hannibal.

“You’re nothing, if not honest,” replies Jack.

Hannibal believes that The Tooth Fairy has seen Will, and doesn’t seem to be overly thrilled about being involved in Jack’s case. “It takes one to catch one,” says Jack.

“It takes TWO to catch one,” says Hannibal.

Jack believes that Will was never a better investigator than when Hannibal was inside his head. Though Hannibal agrees, he refuses to be a pawn in Jack Crawford’s game. “You’ll either play, or you won’t,” says Jack.


Showing us what happened after Will placed that fateful call to Hannibal before the season two finale massacre, Hannibal tells Abigail they must wait for Will, hoping that when Will sees that she’s alive, he would go with them. Abigail is of course worried that they will be killed or captured, should they wait. “I’m on my honor to look after you, you have to look after me, too,” says Hannibal. Hannibal wanted a family as much as anyone, and the fact that his delusion was so painfully denied brings him more strife than his captivity.

Hannibal, back in the present, is told he has a call from his attorney. It’s from Francis Dolarhyde. He’s delighted that Hannibal has taken an interest in his case, because he knows that Hannibal alone can understand what he’s becoming. Hannibal asks what that is.

“THE GREAT. RED. DRAGON!”

Richard Armitage Continues To Impress With His ‘Red Dragon’ Portrayal In ‘Hannibal’

Richard Armitage continues to impress with his performance as serial killer Francis Dolarhyde, a.k.a. The Red Dragon in the NBC horror series, Hannibal.

Viewers met The Red Dragon last week, in the second part of the cancelled series and even though the British actor didn’t use his deep baritone voice at all, one could say he stole the show. His heartbreaking introduction left his fans in awe of his physical strength, displayed in the difficult movements his body was able to perform as part of his transformation.

For those who haven’t read the Thomas Harris novel, Red Dragon, Dolarhyde is as wicked as they come because of the circumstances in his youth. Born with a cleft palate, he was always inadequate due to the ensuing speech impediment and was bullied by his step-siblings and grandmother. His circumstances created a monster and now he wants the power.

Richard Armitage finally spoke on Saturday night’s episode called, “And The Woman Clothed With the Sun.” The lisp Harris describes in his novel was done perfectly and it was actually painful to watch him struggle with his words. That is one of the things Armitage said he wanted to do, make Dolarhyde an empathetic character, despite the horrible crimes he commits.

Along with Richard Armitage’s first words, we were also introduced to Reba McClane, played by True Blood star Rutina Wesley. Reba is interesting to Dolarhyde because she is blind and so she cannot see his disfigured face like everyone else does, she can’t judge him.

Dolarhyde is shy, but Reba doesn’t seem to mind his awkwardness and actually explains that he doesn’t have to be uncomfortable around her because she understands his words. However, he is reluctant when she asks to touch his face.

“I want to see if you’re smiling,” she asks to put him at ease.

“Trust me, I’m smiling.” Francis responds as he holds her arm at bay. Dolarhyde hasn’t been around many women, in fact, Reba is the first adult woman he has ever interacted with in his life and he is conflicted.

Earlier in the episode, we see Richard Armitage in the beginning of his “Becoming” into the “Red Dragon” as he watches he horror he inflicted upon the Leeds family on his video projector. But the question is how will his fascination with Reba affect his perfectly laid out plans to complete his transformation.

Richard Armitage is proving he is a force to be reckoned with when he’s on-screen and with all that was going on in Hannibal episode 309, it’s not an easy task. We also saw Will Graham (Hugh Dancy) and Dr. Lecter (Mads Mikkelsen) reunited, as the former is desperate for help in stopping the serial killer. Freddie Lounds is back, as was Abigail in a freaky flashback to season one.

We were left with the first interaction between Dolarhyde and Lecter, when the Doctor receives a call from who he is told is his attorney. The serial killer is a fan of Hannibal and tells him he is honored that he has taken an interest in his doings. Hannibal asks Dolarhyde what he is becoming and we hear Richard Armitage’s distinctive voice saying, “The Great Red Dragon.”


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Hannibal Recap: Trust Me, I'm Smiling

Hannbial - Season 3
HANNIBAL -- "...and the Woman Clothed with the Sun" Episode 309

Hannibal
And the Woman Clothed With the Sun
Season 3
Episode 9
EDITOR’S RATING: *****


“There are those whose own vulgar normality is so apparent and stultifying that they strive to escape it. They affect flamboyant behaviour and claim originality according to the fashionable eccentricities of their time. They claim brains or talent or indifference to mores in desperate attempts to deny their own mediocrity.” - Katherine Dunn, Geek Love

Will Graham knows exactly where to find Hannibal Lecter. Hannibal wanted it this way. Hannibal and Will have become two halves of one mentally unstable whole, each unable to exist without the other, not unlike Xander being split in two in the Buffy season five episode “The Replacement.” Will may have a happy life with his family while Hannibal spends his remaining days locked up in a bell jar-ish cell, but Will is living a lie. He’s only truly himself when he’s with Hannibal, and it’s that true self that he rejects. Hannibal's been denied his freedom, and by proxy has denied Will of his freedom. Yet, Hannibal's isn't a malicious denial – selfish, maybe, as he’s spreading his misery to thin it out, but he explicitly told Will not to step back into the darkness. That letter Will hid the trunk, it sounds like the warning of a caring friend, not a manipulative monster… though with Hannibal, that line has blurred beyond recognition.

Uttering the now famous line, "That's the same atrocious aftershave you wore in court," Hannibal greets Will. Riffing on Jonathan Demme's impeccable use of shot-reverse-shot in The Silence of the Lambs, director John Dahl casts Will's ghostly reflection on the glass when we're looking at Hannibal, and Hannibal’s when we're looking at Will. (The temptation to meld them ala Bergman must've been painfully tempting.)

The music undulates calmly, a placid sea on which Will and Hannibal drift toward each other.

"Did you read the note?" Hannibal asks. "Or did you just burn it?"

"I read it. And then I burned it."

Hannibal ascertains that Will has a child now, that distinctive scent of dogs and pine and oil giving him away. "I gave you a child, if you recall," Hannibal says.

The scene, though brief, is rife with tension as Hannibal, standing so still, so stoic, picks through Will's brain, looking for sore spots he can tap, old ghosts he can exhume. This is how Hannibal shows his love.

Will calls him Dr. Lecter, and Hannibal asks if they're no longer on a first-name basis. He seems hurt.

"I'm more comfortable the less personal we are," Will elucidates.

Dr. Lecter sees him, raises the bet:

"You came here to have a look at me, to get that old scent again. Why don't you just smell yourself?"

As Will turns to depart, Dr. Lecter says, "You're family." Despite everything – the attempted murders, the lies, the betrayals, the manipulation – Will is all Hannibal has.

Back at the Hobbs house, all those years ago, when Abigail finally realized what Hannibal is, and Hannibal apologized for not being able to protect her. We see how Hannibal treats family. Hannibal has to kill Abigail – a symbolic death, a blood ritual, so she can be reborn, as his daughter. He must take a pound of her flesh, but not her finger: He wants to teach her to play harpsichord one day.

“How would you have killed me?” she asks.

“I would have cut your throat. Like your father did.”

Abigail speaks in the hushed undertones of Bedelia. Hannibal has this effect on women, purging them of their inflection.

Hannibal sticks a needle and tube in Abigail’s neck. She has to bleed. A lot. Blood leaves the human neck in a geyser before slowing, so they have to do this carefully and quickly.

“Are you ready to die, Abigail?”

“Yes.”

A pause.

“Can I push the button?” Abigail asks.

“Yes.”

And a stream of blood rushes out of Abigail’s neck, Hannibal aiming her like a hose, spraying her essence all over the room. The blood washes down the walls in waves.

Back in the present, Will reunites with Alana. He looks well, but Alana doesn’t seem overly concerned with his wellness. Word of his collaboration with Dr. Lecter has Will’s old galère irate. Will isn’t the only one Dr. Lecter hurt, Alana reminds him, and she now has a baby, a Verger baby, whom she birthed. She has a lot to lose. Will likens the sensation of seeing Dr. Lecter again to having the doctor looking into the back of his skull, peering through a secret window.

“I felt like a fly flitting around in there.”

Will has, in a way, relapsed. He didn’t leave Dr. Lecter behind in his cell: He took Dr. Lecter with him. They’ve circled back to the beginning, their relationship reborn. The pivotal motif of the Red Dragon arc is the Sisyphean desperation of existence. Life is an Ouroboros, always sucking on its own tail.

“And the Woman Clothed With the Sun,” written by Jeff Vlaming, Helen Shang, Bryan Fueller, and Steve Lightfoot, has a low-key yet eloquent look, courtesy of director John Dahl. Dahl, whose dialogue-centric neo-noirs skulk in seedy underworlds, knows how to visualize the essence of dialogue while keeping twisty, turny plots in check. This episode finds sensuality in sinister acts, not unlike Dahl's sultry The Last Seduction. Here, he likes to end scenes by separating the characters from the backgrounds, dissolving the scenery into oblivion while the character lingers for a prolonged moment, an echo of life.

Hannibal Lecter is like the Babadook: You can’t let him in, or you’ll never get him out. He pries open Will’s skull and peruses at his leisure. The Tooth Fairy, he says, is a “Shy boy,” who, like Will, “needs a family to escape what’s inside him.”

As they saunter through the myriad rooms of his memory palace, Dr. Lecter opines that Will is using his family to feign a sense of normality. Will, like Hannibal, like the Tooth Fairy, is a freak. Having a stepson absolves him of any hereditary flaws.

“You know better than to breed, Will.”

Hannibal, we learn, was raising the new Abigail, training her, molding her. He props up her father’s corpse in his office, the same chair in which Will sits during their sessions. He instructs Abigail to cut his throat. She slides the knife through his flesh and formaldehyde flows out.

In a different kind of prison cell, a dinner table in a gangrene-colored room, Francis Dolarhyde watches home movies. Dolarhyde wears the show’s son et lumière aesthetic the way Blake’s woman wears the sun. His room looks like an unsettled id that’s exploded.

Later, in the darkroom of the photo lab where he works, Dolarhyde speaks for the first time:

“I’m Francis… Dolarhyde.”

The young girl working there, Reba (Rutina Wesley), is unperturbed by his presence.

“Do you think… I can have a plum?” he asks her. The words tumble out of his mouth. This is the first time we’ve seen him as anything but a monster. He’s… apprehensive? Nervous? He’d be pathetic if we didn’t know what he really is, what he’s becoming.

“Of course,” she tells him.

Francis needs help finding infrared film to record nocturnal animals. He doesn’t like the digital format. (Fueller et al really know how to make us suddenly feel sympathetic for the guy.) Reba offers to develop his footage for him, since even the slightest bit of light would destroy it. You need all-consuming darkness, which doesn’t affect her: She’s blind. “Privacy guaranteed," she quips.

Francis offers to give her a ride home. “For my pleasure,” he says, sucking on the word as if he’s never tasted it before.

Richard Armitage’s Dolarhyde displays none of the Wellesian ham of the character’s previous incarnations. Notice how he jitters, how he can’t sustain eye contact. He’s twitchy yet sensitive, menacing because we know what he can do, though nothing in his scenes with Reba convey malice. His face contorts, unsure how to express emotion. He eats as though he’s afraid someone might take away his food – the way a stray dog eats.

Reba likes Francis because he doesn’t pity her. He feels no sympathy for her. She puts her hand up to his face, to see if he’s smiling. He grabs her hand:

“Trust me, I’m smiling.”

The saddest part is he may actually think he is smiling.

Green, the color of arsenic, of gas chamber doors and decay and rot, saturates the whole episode: Francis’s askew walls; the light spilling in his windows; the hue of the home movies; the formaldehyde filling Garrett Jacob Hobbs; Francis’s shirt; Will’s sweater; the foliage enveloping the houses of the Tooth Fairy’s victims. The world of the Red Dragon is evergreen, perennially reborn. It lives, it dies, it lives again. The traits of characters are fluid, flowing from Hannibal to Will to Francis. They all have “complicated arrangements,” Will and Hannibal, Hannibal and Alana, Alana and Will, Abigail and Hannibal, Francis and Reba. These are people who can’t be with other people, but can’t live alone.

This season we’ve seen how Hannibal needs Will, but whether Will needs Hannibal has been ambiguous. But it was Will who called Hannibal, just like Hannibal called Garrett Jacobs Hobbs, and said, “They know.” Hannibal and Abigail were cutting up vegetables, waiting for Will to arrive that night, before the events of “Mizumono” transpired. They were going to eat together, have a family meal.

Now: Francis calls Hannibal. He tells Hannibal that he’s the only one who understand what Francis is becoming.

“What are you becoming?” Hannibal asks.

In a throaty roar, Francis says, “The Great. Red. Dragon.”

We’ve had ersatz Red Dragons before. Season two’s Randall Tier, a former patient of Dr. Lecter’s, expressed his inner animal by donning a mechanized suit he cobbled together out of a saber-toothed skeleton and metal rods. Hannibal manipulated Randall, sending him to Will’s house on a mission of murder. Will broke his neck.

"A true freak cannot be made,” Katherine Dunn says in her masterful novel Geek Love. “A true freak must be born.” Francis Dolarhyde is a true freak. He is being born again: Plagued by normalcy, engulfed by ordinariness, Francis is burning alive from the inside-out.

Review: 'Hannibal' - 'and the Woman Clothed with the Sun': We are family?

FRANCIS DOLARHYDE BEFRIENDS A COWORKER, AND HANNIBAL HAS MEMORIES OF ABIGAIL
By Alan Sepinwall @Sepinwall | SATURDAY, AUG 1, 2015 11:00 PM


A review of tonight's "Hannibal" coming up just as soon as I'm dressed up in moral dignity pants...

"It takes two to catch one." -Hannibal

We're now getting deep into this show's adaptation of the "Red Dragon" novel (with winks to the movies along the way, like Freddie Lounds mentioning "manhunters"), which has pros and cons.

Having a story that Fuller, Lightfoot and company want to adapt relatively faithfully imposes a structure on the show that hasn't always been there the last season and a half or so. And it's also fun to see particular moments, and hear particular lines, in this context.

At the same time, though, I came out of "and the Woman Clothed with the Sun" wondering if the Harris story necessarily lent itself to a more prolonged adaptation (with commercial breaks subtracted, these six episodes will run a little over four hours), and also whether this particular take on the characters and the world always matched up with the pieces being taken directly from the source material.

So Hannibal's complaints to Will about Will's aftershave, and about the parade of unqualified specialists who have come in to study him, are from the text (sometimes quoted directly, sometimes paraphrased), but they don't sound quite right coming out of the Mads Mikkelsen version of Hannibal, who's been painted as arrogant and dismissive of the rest of the world, but usually in a disappointed rather than bitchy way. Of course, this is a Hannibal who's spent three years in a cell being psychologically poked, prodded, and gawked at, so his feelings for the rest of humanity may have changed from benign condescension to a more curdled contempt. But based on the guy I've watched for two and a half seasons, something seemed slightly off compared to when, say, Brian Cox delivered those same insults way back in "Manhunter."

The flashbacks to Hannibal's secret mentorship of Abigail during the events of season 2, meanwhile, did fill in some blanks in the narrative. But they largely felt like a way to give us an active and free Hannibal at a time in the narrative when he's confined to the mental hospital and on the periphery of the hunt for the Red Dragon. And the Abigail scenes are an easy way to elongate the telling of the main story, which has previously done well being adapted for the screen in roughly half the time. I like Abigail, and Kacey Rohl continues to work well opposite Mikkelsen (as she did earlier this season with Hugh Dancy), but I found myself getting a little impatient to get back to the Red Dragon arc during her scenes.

And the scenes involving and/or about the Dragon remain terrific. This week, he gets a name (Francis Dolarhyde), a job (working at a photo processing lab) and a chance to actually speak, albeit with the speech impediment that goes with his cleft palate scar. Richard Armitage is fascinating to watch alone in Dolarhyde's chamber, but even more when he's trying to fit into the waking world. Rutina Wesley, finally freed of the thankless role of Tara on "True Blood," is terrific as Dolarhyde's co-worker Reba, displaying the warmth and directness that makes Reba as appealing to him as her blindness (and, thus, inability to see him for the freak he clearly views himself as) does.

It remains a pleasure to watch Will back in action, trying to get the Dragon's scent without getting too wrapped up in Hannibal's. And as with the return of Price and Zeller last week, Freddie's re-emergence adds yet another skeptical, human perspective to a show where many of the other characters are too caught up in the mythology of Hannibal to always be able to remark on it in more relatable terms(*).

(*) It's not a perfect analogy, but I think of how desperately the "Star Wars" prequels needed a Han Solo type who had no interest in the Force, midi-chlorians, trade agreements or any of the other things that the rest of the characters treated with such solemnity. Freddie and the lab guys each provide a bit of that other, often more humorous, perspective, and it's welcome.

That Dolarhyde has the ability to make an unmonitored phone call to Hannibal seems a bit of a stretch, but communication between the two is a part of the original story, and another way to make Hannibal seem vital even while he's behind ventilated glass.

Some other thoughts:

* It is never not creepy and funny whenever someone on this show says "Verger baby," as we discover that Alana carried and gave birth to her and Margot's very wealthy child. I also appreciate Alana's newfound penchant for wearing feminine versions of Hannibal's tailored suits.

* It was startling to see Will watching the home movies on an iPad. The show has never tried to be a period piece, but this story in particular is maintaining some of the more period-specific details from a book originally published in 1981, like Dolarhyde's place of employment. It's not that photo processing labs no longer exist, but that they're far more rare in this digital age. Similarly, to support Dolarhyde's love of saving his own clippings, we see that Freddie's TattleCrime website now has a glossy print spin-off magazine, which isn't generally the direction things travel in media these days.


Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watchi ... qJUPkD6.99

‘Hannibal’ Recap: Always Room for a Few More Scars

Season 3, Episode 9: “…And the Woman Clothed With the Sun”

There is an East Asian belief, with roots in both Chinese and Japanese legend, that there is a red string of fate that tethers together individuals who are destined (or doomed) to meet. Often, the people connected are thought to be soul mates, other times, just individuals whose interactions have been written in the stars. Time and again throughout this episdoe the characters point out how they’re all stuck together, whether they like it or not, with Jack going so far as to tell Hannibal, “We’re all in this stew together,” and Alana telling Will that she wasn’t merely worried for him, she worried for them all.


The characters in “Hannibal” are linked, all tarred by Lecter’s influence, and frantically left trying to rid themselves of the darkness that enveloped them in the first half of this season. In this show, it’s not so much a red string of fate, but a black chain of trauma that tightly binds the characters together, never affording them the chance for escape.

But as restrictive as that connective tissue can be, there are some benefits to that feeling of inevitability. Being in the presence of someone who truly understands you allows for physical barriers to dissipate, something evidenced throughout the episode. Will, emotionally wrung out from both his continuing investigation into the Tooth Fairy murders and his conversations with Hannibal, calls home and speaks with his wife, Molly, a process that seems to hearten and refocus him. The conversation is convivial and soothing and soon, the two share the conversation is taking place within the bed in Will’s hotel room, as though the laws of time and space are no match for the connection between Will and Molly.

It’s not unlike the relationship Will has with Hannibal, wherein their connection transforms their surroundings into something surreal. Hannibal and Will explore one of the Tooth Fairy crime scenes, puzzling out what drives the killer, while luring Will back into the darkness it took so long to extricate himself from. The more that Will gives himself over to the investigation of the Red Dragon, the more that Hannibal resumes control over his psyche.

The idea of inexplicable and immediate connections extends to Francis Dolarhyde as well, as he finds himself in contact with a young film developer named Reba, (portrayed beautifully by Rutina Wesley of “True Blood”) who happens to be blind. This connection is forged through both shared interests and mutual disadvantage, though it is cemented in the fact that neither treats the other with the kid gloves so many people use when interacting with individuals who are disabled. Reba believes she can see who Francis is, even without the benefit of sight. There is, obviously, a deeply damaged person within Francis, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t some level of goodness there, too.

This is, beyond all else, one of the show’s most significant accomplishments — that idea that as black as someone’s soul may be, that there may still be a glimmer of something else there, too. Hannibal may be the devil himself, but there is some level of genuine affection for Will. (And there was for Abigail.) It goes the other way, too, Will may be a brilliantly empathetic man, with a big heart, but there is a deep and abiding darkness in there. “Hannibal” crafts psychologically complex characters that aren’t easily categorized as good or evil, which is what makes it such effective horror. It’s frightening to believe that there is evil lurking in our world, like a wolf picking off wounded lambs, but it’s far more terrifying to think of that same wolf walking among us, disguised as just another sheep, and we none the wiser.

Fast Five

• Freddie Lounds makes her triumphant return, having been absent since the show’s Season 2 finale. Freddie is doing pretty well, having taken her services offline and, apparently, revitalizing print media with her pulpy smut. She’s also single-handedly drawn a road map from Hannibal to Will for Francis to follow, which will almost certainly end poorly for everyone involved.

• In the time Will has been gone, both he and Molly respectively have adopted a new dog. As lovely and empathetic as the couple are, at some point you cross over from humanitarian to animal hoarder.

• Abigail is back and is a surprisingly large part of the episode, given that she’s been dead for half a season. The show’s casting, with some few notable exceptions, is brilliant and it’s great when it finds new ways to incorporate old characters. (Death on “Hannibal” is sometimes an easy hurdle to overcome.)

• Alana and Will share a scene that allows them to feel each other out about their new lives. During this time, we find out that Alana is still with Margot and the pair have a son, the Verger heir, that Alana herself carried, which is as close to a happy ending as anyone on this show is likely to get.

Book Spoiler: As Jack and Hannibal debate who is manipulating Will more, Hannibal says that a face is all scars, if you know how to look, and that there’s always room for a few more. Given that Francis hunts Will and his family down in “Red Dragon,” I have to assume that this is a nod to his fate. This troubles me, because Hugh Dancy is a beautiful man with a very beautiful face.

Hannibal Review: 3.09 “…And the Woman Clothed with the Sun”

Written by Jeff Vlaming & Helen Shang and Bryan Fuller & Steve Lightfoot
Directed by John Dahl
Hannibal airs Thursdays Saturdays at 10 pm ET on NBC

Warning: Since these will serve as both reviews and recaps, beware of SPOILERS if you have yet to see the episode.


“Trust me, I’m smiling.” — Francis Dolarhyde.
H ad Hannibal‘s ratings been better, I believe show runner Bryan Fuller would’ve planned to close season three with Hannibal turning himself in, and then save the Red Dragon material for season four. But every species can smell its own extinction, and Fuller — who seems to specialize in wonderful shows that inevitably get cancelled — had to guess that his gorgeous, bloody creation wasn’t long for network TV. Thus, he’s had to truncate things a bit, surgically stitching together two vastly different stories into one season. So far, everything has been running smoothly. But the latest episode, “…And the Woman Clothed with the Sun”, takes a bit of a stumble.

This is a particularly cold episode. Hannibal has always been a dark, disturbing show, but it never lacked passion or emotion. Not the case here — everything feels a step or two out of pace. Things just aren’t clicking in this episode, and there’s an unfortunate feeling of going through the motions. The coldness is reflected in the characters as well, maybe even appropriately so. When Will (Hugh Dancy) and Hannibal (Mads Mikkelsen) are face to face again after three years, Hannibal is distinctly, well, bitchy towards Will. “You just came here to look at me,” Hannibal sniffs. Even when Dr. Lecter was attempting to saw the top of Will’s skull off, he exuded a warmth towards the man. Here, Hannibal is contemptuous to see Will back in the game. After all, he did warn Will not to help Jack Crawford.

Will is still on the hunt for The Tooth Fairy, aka Francis Dolarhyde (Richard Armitage), and he needs Hannibal’s help. Hannibal does so, once again envisioning himself in his own office instead of a cell. In previous incarnations of this material, Hannibal and Will are just two men in a cramped room having a conversation. Here, director John Dahl employs a nice “show, don’t tell” technique of having Will and Hannibal magically transport from location to location; from day to night. Hannibal keeps tossing out verbal clues–calling The Tooth Fairy both a “shy boy” and a “pilgrim”, but Will isn’t quite receptive to them. Instead, he seems distracted and troubled, and his trademark sweat-soaked nightmares return with a fury.

Hannibal may be helping Will for now, but Alana (Caroline Dhavernas) has her suspicions that he’s planning something else — something more nefarious. And she’s having none of it. “I know what you’re afraid of,” she practically seethes as she confronts him. “It’s not pain or solitude. It’s indignity.” Alana threatens to take away his books, drawings, and his toilet, leaving him with nothing but his indignity, and memories of the dead. It’s a great moment of acting for Dhavernas, as you can truly feel how fed-up she is with Hannibal’s twisted little games.

As for Dolarhyde, Hannibal once again makes great use of Armitage’s body-language — all twisted muscle and clenched fists. There’s a wonderful, Cronenberg-ian moment when we even see a big, fleshy tail snaking its way out of Dolarhyde’s back. But just as we seem him at his most monstrous, Hannibal also begins to humanize him a bit. There’s a little flashback to Dolarhyde as child, eating with his stern looking grandmother. And as an adult, Dolarhyde starts to have some human contact besides those unfortunate happy families he slaughters. He seeks the assistance of Reba (Rutina Wesley), a blind woman who works at the same photographic company he does. While their conversation is awkward, Reba seems interested in Dolarhyde, and he ends up giving her a ride home. She thinks he’s shy and closed-mouth because of the surgery he’s had to repair a cleft palate. Of course there’s more than meets the eye about the man she refers to as “Mr. D”, but she can’t exactly see him to know that.

The Dolarhyde material is compelling, but “…And the Woman Clothed with the Sun” finds itself spinning its wheels and once again going back to the dearly departed Abigail Hobbs (Kacey Rohl). Through flashbacks it’s revealed just how Hannibal faked Abigail’s death the first time to frame Will, and how he systematically broke her down and more or less brainwashed her to his cause. I know Abigail is a fan-favorite, and Rohl always delivers a strong performance as a young woman so irrevocably damaged, but please — enough. Enough with Abigail Hobbs. Let her rest in peace. When Will comes to visit Hannibal the first time, the later brings up the fact that Will has a child now–his step-son through Molly–and coldly spits: “I gave you a child,” referring to Abigail. This is great, cruel stuff, but to then bring Abigail back through flashbacks feels like beating a dead horse, especially since we all know how it’s going to end up. Abigail even asks Hannibal in a flashback that if he were going to kill her, how would he do it? “I’d cut your throat like your father did,” Hannibal says. Yes. We know. Move on.

This Abigail stuff feels so tacked-on and unnecessary that it completely derails the episode. Part of that has to do with the nature of this season — if the Red Dragon material were given its own entire season to spread out, it might come across as less wasteful to once again bring Abigail back into the mix. Here though, with only four episodes left in both season and series, there’s a distinct sense that the clock is ticking, and we shouldn’t be wasting a single moment on perfunctory matters.


After Dinner Conversation
— The NBC press site erroneously included several images from next week’s episode into the section for this week’s, and as a result I incorrectly believed Gillian Anderson would return this week, which she doesn’t. She’s definitely back next week though, I promise!

— Hannibal’s flashback scene “brainwashing” Abigail is taken mostly from the Hannibal novel, where Hannibal brainwashed Clarice Starling near the end of the book. There, Hannibal shows Clarice a pile of her father’s bones. Here, Hannibal shows Abigail the exhumed corpse of her father. I may not be a fan of more Abigail material, but I will confess this is a great scene, especially when Abigail cuts her dead father’s neck and yellowish embalming fluid comes pouring out, horrifying Abigail.

— Speaking of the source material, this might be the episode that is the most faithful to Thomas Harris yet. Whole scenes and chunks of dialog between Will and Hannibal are lifted verbatim from Red Dragon.

— Scott Thompson’s anger over the murdered pet cat of one of The Tooth Fairy’s victims is wonderful. When it’s remarked that he seems more upset about the dead cat than the dead children of the family, he responds: “I’m particularly fond of cats, I’m not particularly fond of children.”

— Lara Jean Chorostecki’s Freddie Lounds returns, and she and Will are no longer buddies, even though she agreed to fake her death to help Will last season. She smells something fishy about how the massacre at Muskrat Farm’s went down, and Will just wants her to stay away. He’s also pretty unhappy about how Freddie reported the story overall. “You called us MURDER HUSBANDS!” he angrily cries, referring to himself and Hannibal. “Well, you did run away to Europe together…” Freddie counters.

— Of course Will adopted the Leeds’ dog. Of course.

— Was the orderly who brought Hannibal the phone at the end of the episode supposed to be the show’s version of the famous Barney, from Thomas Harris’ books? Maybe! If so, they can’t use that name in any way, as it belongs with the rights to Silence of the Lambs, which this show does not have.

— Speaking of that phone call at the end, Armitage’s delivery of what he is becoming, “The Great. Red. DRAGON!” is wonderful in how monstrous it sounds.

— Am I being too harsh towards this episode? Did you like it? Please let me know in the comments, I’d love to hear from you. Just don’t be rude — you know what happens to the rude.

— Next week on Hannibal: The return of Bedelia Du Maurier.

Hannibal’s Wardrobe
— In a flashback, Hannibal wears a vest with some surgical gloves, which is a pretty good look. When he’s visualizing himself in his office instead of his cell, he has on one of his classic three-piece-suit combos, including that wide-knotted tie.

— It’s also worth noting Alana has picked up some fashion tips from Hannibal, as she sports a black-and-white Beetlejuice-like jacket very similar to one Hannibal wore earlier this season.


GRADE: C+

Spoiler Note: It is getting harder and harder to write about these new episodes of Hannibal without spoiling aspects from the source material. I am going to try my best to not give away anything that hasn't been seen on the show, and would ask that those that comment do the same. However, this is the disclaimer that some things may be spoiled in my article, as the show is following the previous two movies, and the book, closely as of this episode.

"...And the Woman Clothed in the Sun" was about as standard an episode of television we are going to get from Hannibal at this point, but it was still a great ride. We didn't get any huge revelations, or even a new crime scene, but we learned some important information, and watched the Red Dragon plot move forward.

The big plot point in this week's episode was, of course, Will (Hugh Dancy) returning to Hannibal (Mads Mikkelson) for help on the Tooth Fairy case. The most interesting thing about their interaction to me was the use of each character's respective memory palace, and how they seem to work together. While it was used, at first, simply to make their conversation feel more like the way the used to consult with each other, and we got to see Will knowingly step closer to Hannibal to review the evidence, by the end of the episode, Will's mind was in a much darker place, and his memory palace was corrupted. He was envisioning himself as the Tooth Fairy, as his new descent into madness is happening much faster than the last one. It was also made clear that Jack (Laurence Fishburne) has no qualms about what he is putting Will through, suggesting that Jack never learned from the previous events of the show. Between Jack and Hannibal, things are looking more dire for Will than ever before.

The other significant event from this week's episode was Francis (Richard Armitage) meeting Reba (Rutina Wesley). While the scenes played out identically compared to the source material, it's still interesting to see what, exactly, makes Francis comfortable enough to talk to someone. The significant note about Reba is her blindess, which allows Francis to communicate with her without her fixating on his deformity. This aligns with Hannibal's theory that he must be "extremely shy." Things took a little bit of a dire turn towards the end of the episode when it was revealed that Reba could still sense his speech impediment through hearing, and Francis' "Trust me, I'm smiling" was not at all reassuring as he looked ready to kill her right then and there.

It is also worth noting that Freddie Lounds (Lara Jean Chorostecki) has returned, and Tattle Crime might play a big role in this case. We've seen that Dolarhyde reads the magazine, and used it to see that Will is investigating him. We also saw him reach out to Hannibal at the end of the episode, and we know he is convinced that he is turning into the "Great Red Dragon." Basically, Dolarhyde is probably the most insane character to appear on the show so far, and often he is downright horrifying to watch.

"...And the Woman Clothed in the Sun" moved things along nicely for Hannibal, which is good, considering that there aren't many episodes left. I'm still concerned about how much like the films and books these episodes are so far, at least when it comes to the Tooth Fairy material. The deeper dive into Will and Hannibal's psyche is all new, though, giving me something fresh to watch at the same time. Check back here next week for the review of the next episode.

HANNIBAL: "AND THE WOMAN CLOTHED WITH THE SUN..." REVIEW

→ JULY 30, 2015 Note: While Hannibal has been moved to Saturdays in the US, it continues to air on Thursdays in Canada. That being the case, I’ll be running my reviews Thursday nights for IGN Canada readers and then re-promoting on Saturday night for the US.
Per usual, full spoilers for the episode follow, so beware if you haven’t seen yet!
While it was established last week, this episode was especially effective with how it used the idea of Hannibal’s memory palace and the environments he imagined he was in versus the cell he was actually in. This was never commented upon, which allowed us to ponder… was Will seeing this too? After all, he too had been building a memory palace, as Hannibal himself had noted, and they "share some rooms" – and we even saw Will use this skill later, when he imagined himself in bed with Molly, during their phone call. But the big conversation Hannibal and Will had as the episode began was especially terrific in this regard, moving from Hannibal’s office to the two of them outside, with a giant, looming moon behind them.
I’m very much enjoying how Alana is essentially sharing Chilton’s role in the books (and films), as it was she who got to threaten him with taking away his books and drawings and leave him with “nothing but indignity.” Going into Season 3, Bryan Fuller had said he really wanted to give Alana more to do and I think he’s delivered on that front. Here, Hannibal and Alana had a fun back and forth as she called him out for planning something, even as he managed to throw in some innuendo when replying to her, saying, “I love a good finger wagging” with, “Yes, you do. How is Margot?”


This episode also filled in many of the blanks regarding Abigail, as we saw some big moments of what occurred when she was with Hannibal from the end of Season 1 until the end of Season 2 – including the notable way they faked her death.
These were very compelling scenes, as we saw Abigail falling under Hannibal’s dark spell, including having her slice the throat of her father’s corpse. But even as Hannibal cultivated Abigail’s darkness, everything he told her about how “We have to protect each other” was tinged with an awful feeling, knowing that he would murder her – and even underlining that he killed her in the way her own father nearly had. What a tragic character.
As for the Red Dragon himself, we saw a different side of him here as he met Reba (True Blood’s Rutina Wesley), a blind coworker of his who he formed a rapport with. Wesley was very good, playing very well off of Richard Armitage, as we heard more of his speech impediment – and she made it clear she had no judgment about it. Of course we also got some glimpses of Francis’ childhood too and his grandmother… which I won’t say more about if you don’t know the Red Dragon story, but should be interesting to delve into.
But lest we think we’re getting too much of the nice side of Francis, Will’s investigations reminded us of the naked, blood-soaked monster he has become. Showing these different facets of the character, Armitage is expertly capturing the very complicated, damaged person Francis is, as we saw a vulnerable side with Reba, but always felt just how scary he is.
Lastly, it was great to have Freddie back at last. Hugh Dancy and Lara Jean Chorostecki were really fun throwing barbs back and forth at each other, as we learned Freddie called Hannibal and Will “murder husbands” in her coverage. Plus, she got to say the word “Manhunter,” in a nice nod to the very first Hannibal Lecter adaptation.

THE VERDICT

The second installment of the Red Dragon story began to really show the characters intermixing again, and there’s a lot of fascinating dynamics at work. Will’s interplay with everyone from Hannibal to Alana to Freddie was fueled by all that’s happened so far, while it still is an intriguing question trying to figure out if Hannibal really wishes Will wasn’t being brought back into this world or not. Clearly though, it is taking a toll on Will again, but has he put his life back together enough to keep the worst at bay?

But in the meantime… he took the dog! Aww

Review: 'Hannibal' Season 3, Episode 9, '...And the Woman Clothed With the Sun': Murder Husbands

Red Dragon continues, despite some needless flashbacks.

Appetizer

Last time, the "Red Dragon" adaptation started and all was right with the world.

Hannibal Behind Bars

We kick off with Will visiting Hannibal: Hannibal quickly parses that Will has a new family and immediately shifts into catty ex mode. In the book, this scene shows Hannibal's mocking superiority, but for show Hannibal it also conveys his emotional wounding at Will's betrayal. It's a nice twist on familiar source material, something this episode offers more than once.

It seems we're also sticking with Hannibal's conversations taking place in his memory palace, so the two of them appear in several different locations throughout the scene. It makes sense for a show as visually sumptuous as "Hannibal" to want to spice things up for scenes that could wind up just being talking heads. It's not like they were ever going to do the Jonathan Demme head-on close-up approach.

Hannibal's critique of Will's family leads him to tell Will, "I gave you a child, if you recall." This leads to a series of flashbacks of Hannibal taking Abigail Hobbs under his wing, back when the audience thought she was dead. There's nothing wrong with these scenes per se, and a bit where Hannibal and Abigail create a convincing blood spatter is pretty sweet by "Hannibal" standards, but Abigail has more than served her purpose as a character. These scenes really just hit the same thematic point about family over and over, and mostly seem there to pad out the running time.

Might as well also use this section to talk about Alana, who's dressing sharp as hell this episode. She seems to have largely taken over Chilton's role from the books as Hannibal's primary jailer, although she's much less sleazy. She's still with Margot, and apparently successfully brought a Verger baby to term, so she and Margot are now super rich. Way to get yours, Alana! She threatens to take away Hannibal's niceties (his books, his drawings, his toilet) -- not in the name of petty cruelty or naked ambition like Chilton, but in an effort to save Will. She knows what Hannibal is capable of and is willing to take more extreme steps to prevent it.

Willucinations

Oh, so many! To convey Will's declining mental state, he pictures himself as Dolarhyde a bunch, naked and covered in blood, which should be quite exciting for those of you who want a look inside Dancy's pantsies. Then he looks in the mirror and imagines his face breaking off piece by piece, reminiscent of both mirror shards and the old "Will as a cup" motif. He and Molly get a nice scene on the phone together, which gets across their easy chemistry. Will imagines himself not in his hotel room, but by Molly's side in bed. He's picked up a few tricks from Hannibal.

Turns out the show will be handling Dolarhyde's transformation into the Great Red Dragon quite literally, as he manages to sprout a swell tail this episode. The other big moment for Dolarhyde is the introduction of Reba McClane (Rutina Wesley, whose work I'm familiar with), a blind woman who works at his film development lab. There's an immediate chemistry, since he doesn't feel judged by his appearance and she doesn't feel judged for her lack of sight. Their scenes are well-played and taken straight from the book, because if something ain't broke, why fix it? I will say the "Open wide and say 'Aaaaah'" poster at Reba's bus stop is a nice bit of set dressing.

The episode concludes with Dolarhyde successfully contacting Hannibal by phone, by pretending to be his lawyer. One might think it would be a little tougher to get Hannibal on the phone like that when one has a notably speech impediment and growls and hisses like a dragon man, but then I don't run a psychiatric hospital, so what do I know?

Freddie Lounds Is Onto Something

Freddie's back, having apparently burned her bridges with Will by snapping a shot of his colostomy bag while he was unconscious. Freddie wins my admiration forever by apparently having referred to Will and Hannibal as "Murder Husbands" in print. It's great when this show has a sense of humor about itself. I'm extremely curious how Freddie's character will play out this season, since the show has already played the infamous "flaming wheelchair of death" scene. There's a tension there that the show could exploit.

Jack Attack

Jack visits Hannibal and it's revealed that Jack deliberately manipulated Will into meeting with Hannibal again. "Will has never been more effective than with you inside his head," Jack tells Hannibal. He's willing to sacrifice Will's sanity if it means more lives aren't lost. Like Alana, contact with Hannibal has hardened Jack.

A Quick Appreciation of Scott Thompson and Aaron Abrams

Thompson's character is more upset about Dolarhyde murdering a cat than the children he killed. Abrams is aghast. Even a little bit of these guys is gold.

Grade: B

Going into Hannibal’s “Red Dragon” arc, one of my main goals is to separate the text I love from the series I love. For one, despite the fact that every episode boasts the title “Based on Red Dragon by Thomas Harris,” the series has actively worked to deviate from many elements of the original text in terms of inter-character relations. As such, the show should stand as its own separate entity. What’s more, it just makes for a more satisfying viewing experience when I’m not frantically skimming through my well-worn Red Dragon copy in search of what’s been altered.

In the case of “And the Woman Clothed with the Sun…” this makes for somewhat of an interesting experience. As Hannibal, Mads Mikkelsen beautifully conveys a certain sense of condescension that the character has towards the rest of humanity. After all, the whole reason he justifies eating other people—besides the fact that it’s delicious—is that no one is his equal; therefore, it is not technically cannibalism. Both in the books and movies, Hannibal’s distaste for humanity manifests itself much more overtly. At times throughout Red Dragon, he’s downright combative and spiteful of Will and others. Perhaps in an attempt to stay true to the novel, some of these sharp edges emerge in his exchanges with Will, Alana and Jack, particularly when he complains about the long line of foolish experts who tried to analyze or study him. Granted, three years of being locked up in a cell (despite its unrealistic extravagance) could very well have turned Hannibal into a Grumpy Garrett, but it still feels a touch out of character here.

That being said, it’s what the show does to subtly subvert both the novel and previous adaptations therein that I find most intriguing. This mainly pertains to how it moves away from the iconic image of having Hannibal communicating with his visitors from behind a transparent cell wall in favor of re-imagining their conversations as taking place in a real-life location. Whenever Will and Hannibal discuss the details of the “Red Dragon” case, for instance, they are transported back into Season One Hannibal where the two would go over Will’s cases in Hannibal’s office. Hannibal is even shown wearing similar clothes to his Season One counterpart. Whether this comes from the characters’ own perspectives or merely from the wonky internal logic of the show, it does an effective job of highlighting the fact that, while he may be separated physically from the likes of Will and Alana, there’s very much still an undeniable connection that makes it feel as though the good doctor is right there with them.

This technique also applies to the other major person in Will’s life—his wife, Molly. During a telephone conversation, the show alternates between cutting between the two as they converse on the phone, and showing them continuing the conversation while laying next to each other in bed. In drawing up this parallel, the writers appear to be hinting at the fact that this half of the season will be a war between Molly and Hannibal’s influence on Will’s psyche.

Interestingly enough, the episode also continues the season’s employment of flashbacks. Whereas the flashbacks during the season’s first half served a specific purpose in helping to slowly doll out information, however, the flashbacks depicting Hannibal’s time with Abigail Hobbs don’t really seem to hold much significance in the context of this story. Sure, it’s nice to have Kacey Rohl back as Abigail, but what do we really gain by knowing how Hannibal arranged her “murder” scene, and that he told her to head upstairs before the events of the Red Dinner? One could say that knowing she was still a willing student of his and not a traumatized prisoner adds some shading to their dynamic, but the flashbacks nevertheless feels a bit like filler material. Then again, perhaps this will make sense later down the line. Of course, I also said the same thing about Chiyoh…

What remains undeniably fantastic is any scene involving Richard Armitage’s Francis Dolarhyde. Given that Hannibal can be so obsessively centered on its major characters, it’s clear that Bryan Fuller and his writers are having a ball exploring the new blood that is this character. This becomes apparent in their decision to really swing for the fence when it comes to embracing the crazier elements of the novel. This includes, in a scene depicting Dolarhyde’s “transformation” into his Red Dragon persona, actually having a dragon’s tail sliver into frame, and thus turning the character’s mental procedure into a literal one.

Most notably, of course, is that the episode marks Dolaryhyde’s first encounter with Reba, the blind woman who will become a pivotal figure in his life. It’s through this encounter, after an episode and a half of silence, that we finally hear the man speak—something he’s been reluctant to do given his insecurity about his voice. And while Reba maybe seems a bit too trusting in choosing to accept a ride home from Dolarhyde, even if he is a work colleague, their interaction in the kitchen goes a long way to setting a stage for a real emotional connection between the two. Both have had to deal with disabilities that set them apart from the mainstream—Reba with losing her sight and Dolarhyde with the mental scarring of his upbringing—and both flatly reject demonstrations of pity. When Reba asks to touch Dolarhyde’s face to see if he’s smiling, the way in which Armitage delivers the line “Trust me, I’m smiling…” manages to somehow be simultaneously eerie and heartbreaking.

Another welcome element of the episode is the return of Freddie Lounds, making her first appearance this season. Along with CSIs Price and Zeller from last week, Freddie is a character who often feels as though she resides in a different world from the rest of the characters, which is not at all a bad thing. For all its positive attributes, Hannibal can often feel like an overly insular show, with characters engaging in peculiar behavior and delivering off-the-wall dialogue that would have any real-world person scrunching their head in confusion. Characters like Freddie help to place the show’s craziness in a somewhat grounded context. The mere fact that she referred to Will and Hannibal as “murder husbands” in her article for the way they “ran off to Europe together” goes a long way towards establishing the fact that, yes, the duo’s relationship is just as weird in this world as it would be in ours.

After last week’s plot-heavy opener, “And the Woman Clothed with the Sun…” spends much of its time eschewing eye-popping set pieces in favor of slowly pushing forward character. In fact, other than Dolarhyde meeting Reba, not a whole lot of particular note really happens in this installment. And while this does make for some lapses in momentum, it also helps lay foundation for the craziness that is sure to follow.

Four episodes left people…

‘Hannibal’ Recap 3×9: Murder Husbands
By Maggie Serota | 08/03/15 11:30

As you’ll recall, season 1 ended with a jumpsuited Will encased in glass greeting Hannibal with a clipped “Hello, Dr. Lecter.” “And the Woman Clothed in the Sun” begins with Will greeting the good doctor the same way, except this time, it’s Hannibal that encaged.

When Michael Mann shot this scene, the camera switched back from Bill Petersen and Brian Cox, framing each man with the cell bars as if to suggest that either Will or Hannibal could be locked up. The TV retelling of the Red Dragon storyline borrows a page from the Jonathan Demme playbook and shows Will reflected in the glass while Hannibal is talking and vice versa, suggesting that the two men ultimately complete each other.

No one is more aware of how much they complete each other more than Hannibal. He’s hurt by the formality with which Will addresses him, calling him Dr. Lecter. Hannibal’s never been big on boundaries, and now he lives a life confined by nothing but boundaries.

Part of the thrill of this episode is getting to revisit some of the great dialogue from Manhunter. However, when Brian Cox took shots at the atrocious aftershave Bill Petersen was wearing, he didn’t have the bitterness of a jilted ex-lover. Hannibal sounds more like an ex-wife than a disgraced colleague as he uses his unsettling smell sense to glean that Will moved on to a domestic life including a child.

“I gave you a child, if you recall.” Hannibal sniffs.

Of course, the child in question was the teen Abigail Hobbs. We’re treated to a blood ritual scene that should have been soundtracked by George Michaels’ “Father Figure.” As touched upon by Chiyoh and Bedelia, the women in Hannibal’s life fall on a spectrum between participants and observer. In the scenes where Hannibal was nurturing Abigail under the guise of her death, Abigail was the most enthusiastic and active participant of them all, what with the whole slitting the throat of her father’s corpse as an exercise in self-love. It was illuminating to see what was going on while Abigail was hidden away all during the second season and it’s a shame she didn’t stick around long enough for Hannibal to teach her the harpsichord.

“Every family loves differently. Every family is unique,“ Hannibal said before lovingly presenting Abigail with her father’s cadaver.

Every family certainly is unique, just asked Alana. She ended up carrying the Verger heir and is raising her young son with Margot, who is still her partner even after the time jump. Despite the fact that she’s now flush with Verger cash, she’s still content to run the hospital for the criminally insane rather than retire and enjoy her cash and prizes. No one ever really gets Hannibal out of their system, and that certainly applies to the women who holds the keys that lock the cannibal away from the rest of the world. However, Alana isn’t just content to encase the doctor in glass like a tiger at the zoo. She’s not going to be content until she robs the ex-lover who broke her body by robbing him of his dignity. She’ll take away his toilet if that’s what it takes. Even though the romantic moment between Alana and Will has long since passed, that doesn’t stop her from shaming Hannibal in regards to his calculated efforts to get inside Will’s head.

Despite Hannibal’s hurt feelings, he manages to put them aside for a moment to take Will through a stroll in his memory palace and opine about the Tooth Fairy’s predilection for killing under the moonlight and selecting families with spacious backyards.

Of course, Freddie Lounds sees everyone’s relationship through a veneer of suspicion, what with Alana getting rich off of the Verger estate and then passing on a plush respite from the death penalty on to Hannibal. She is pretty spot on with her “murder husbands” summation of the Will/Hannibal dynamic as she recounts the pair’s sexy jaunt off to Europe. Still, as much as she needles Will on her involvement in the Tooth Fairy murders investigation, all her coverage is doing is creating a direct conduit from Francis Dolarhyde to his new, would be mentor, Hannibal Lecter.

Speaking of Dolarhyde, we get a brief flashback to his family life, including an unsettling meal at a table full of stern elderly folks before we’re shuttled into his present, where he’s writhing into his transformation into The Great Red Dragon, scaly tale and all. The one stumbling block to this transition is his meeting of blind co-worker and film processor Reba McClane. Reba is drawn to Francis because he doesn’t exude a sense of pity in regards to her blindness. Francis is drawn to Reba because she’s warm and sweet to him, facilitated by the fact that she can’t see his harelip and she can effortlessly navigate his speech impediment thanks to her speech pathology background. She even has a pet name for him, “Mr. D.” She must really like him, because she didn’t even flinch when he uttered “for my pleasure” when he asked her to climb into his murder van for a ride home.

Dolarhyde has found a certain solace in Reba just as Will did in Molly and the ready made family she provided, thus having prevented Will from passing along his damaged genes. We see a welcomed levity in Will as he playfully banters with Molly on the phone over their shared love of dog hoarding. Of course, delving back into the minds of killers has already cracked the psychological resolve he’s grown over the years off the job. When he dreams, he dreams of Molly splayed out like one of the victims in Dolarhyde’s slayed happy families. Like, Dolarhyde and Reba, Molly and her son can only hold him together for so long, before Hannibal’s influence bulldozes through his meticulously constructed stability.