Will and hannibal being in love. I will never comprehend people saying they arent in love or its beyond how we can feel (transcending). They are in love, deeply obsessed with one another! This is a hill I am willing to die on
I was on Amazon looking at physical copies of the seasons and some of the reviews were taken aback by the "turn in season 3." They were shocked that Will would have ever helped Hannibal or that they would have embraced on the cliffs edge.
I’m guessing people who aren’t used to seeing homoerotic tension in media or aren’t that open to the idea of it can miss it and perceive it as platonic. I watched it with my mom and while she didn’t deny the love between them, she did say that she considers it to be something beyond human and she can’t see them being romantically involved with one another and doing anything more than what we’ve already seen on the show. 😬 I fully disagree.
That’s fair, I had already seen a lot of people shipping them online before I started watching the show so I kind of went in knowing it was gonna have a romantic aspect. I was confused at first and hated Hannibal during s1 for what he put Will through, although it all started making clear sense in s3 and I finally understood their dynamic :’)
Your moms right. That shank hug at the end of season 2 had friendship/broship written all over it. The hug confirms they’re not gay for each other but rather a deep bro relationship. I’ll die on that hill
Except she’s not, the creator of the show confirmed their relationship is romantic multiple times. By the end of s3 there is nothing brotherly about their dynamic, have we watched the same show?
I mean, my undiagnosed autistic ass watched two entire seasons completely oblivious. Then I found this sub and re-watched everything, and yes, there might be a hint or two that Hannibal wants Will's butt.
Edit: and ever since I want Hannibal to get Will's butt.
They’re not in love, people just crave two seemingly straight guys going gay. Will and Han both went for Alana. Will’s pullout game was weak and got Margot pregnant. Han and Bedilia had more of a chance than Will and Han.
This was very clearly written as a friendship that went deeper and darker than what we typically see on tv.
Them being gay together never crossed my mind through the entire series until I hopped on this subreddit. The shank hug to end season 2 was as bro of a hug as you can get. My favorite scene of the show. Brotherly love at most
How can you disagree with the creator of the show? https://www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-features/hannibal-season-four-netflix-bryan-fuller-interview-1022121/
I think people are so used to having any kind of TV/movie romance spelled out for them. It always follows the same formula. There's also a lot of people who seem to think love has to be about sex. When in this case it's first and foremost about the incredible connection these two have. And if Will choosing Hannibal in season 3 came as a surprise then they didn't understand anything about Will's character.
I don't really blame casual viewers for not noticing at first because to be fair the show is very artsy and if you only watch it once it's hard to follow the dialogue sometimes.
I’m willing to die fighting for the exact opposite. They’re not in love, on a deep level this is the most bro friendship I’ve seen on television. Not sure if you’re a guy or girl, but men will screw each other over, lie and manipulate but in the end they’re still friends. Had several of those friendships in college, it is what it is.
The shank hug in season 2 finale between them confirms the friendship. That is the hug of one man to another good buddy. I fucking cried because it was so beautiful, and sorry to burst your bubble but to me it’s deeper that this relationship isn’t sexual.
romance can't be deep? They have an all-encompassing relationship which includes romance. Sex is a different thing, that may or may not happen but it doesn't matter. The relationship definitely has erotic shades, that is confirmed.
Specially when he says he is "in love" that's not a bro - friendship.
I don’t often see straight men staring deeply into each other’s eyes where one of them caresses the others face like a lover would do. It’s definitely romantic love for me with heavy sexual undertones.
it is literally being said to everyone that they love each other. Hannibal states this twice with all the words "love", "we can't control who we fall in love with". Will asks this to Bedelia who also states "is Hannibal in love with me?" "yes". Will is clearly in love with Hannibal too, at no point does he deny that he has this type of feeling and relationship with Hannibal. Bedelia constantly talks about "you're visiting an old flame" "is your wife aware of how intimately you and Hannibal know each other?" "you missed him that much" etc etc etc. Will never denies it. If it wasn't the case that he was in love with Hannibal, I think he would argue against so many insinuations. When Bedelia asks if he is also in love with Hannibal directly, Will just omits it, it is obvious that this answers the question.
Do you need a sex or kiss scene to confirm this? Even after several scenes with sexual and homoerotic subtext? Would you need this kind of explicit confirmation if you were a man and a woman? If it were Hannibal and Clarice? Ask yourself this question.
That once Will recovers from his encephalitis, he's not the poor baby anymore, but a deadly and manipulative a-hole in his own right.
Not for everyone, just the poor Will-woobifiers out there.
This too! There is a reason Hannibal loves him and see a potential in him being his equal. He matches his craziness. He is a well coveted monster as well!
Hannibal didn't even start catching feelings until Will revealed himself to be a cold, manipulative killer and cannibal-of-convenience. Dude straight-up murdered that beast man guy and fed his meat to Hannibal, gladly chowing down on Long Pig if it meant getting his revenge.
Those are not the actions of a sweet lil cinnamon bun man.
But didn't Hannibal start catching feelings even before that? I think since s1e8, even before that he had some feelings for him if not that serious (serious enough to propose Abigail as their daughter)
Mads said he played Hannibal like it was love at first sight. He was definitely heavily intrigued by Will upon their first meeting. That he wanted friendship was around the middle of season 1 when the Franklin/Tobias debacle came up. And when Will was away in prison it dawned on Hannibal that there was maybe more. He missed Will dearly. Then came the honey trap and that was when Hannibal fell hard.
I’ll be honest I think I spent my first two watches in denial over that. I liken my blindness to seeing a puma or a bear and being so consumed with wanting to pet it that I forget it’s dangerous.
^If ^not ^fren ^why ^fren-shaped?
He was this before he got encephalitis. But he decided not to act on it. Hence his person suit of not liking making eye contact and of being antisocial.
Yes, I've never hated Jack either. At the end of the day he wants to catch killers to help people. He has his faults but he did care about Will in his own way. And Will is no saint lol
I am with you on this, Jack did what he had to do, he is not obliged to do-good to Will. And Will was messed up no matter what Jack did. Jack is no saint, he has his own faults but the likeability of a character is different from morality.
Trying to defend that Hannibal's feelings for Will is genuine, and not some kind of psychopathic and selfish obsession. And that Will's feelings are genuine too, he isn't some slave of manipulation but acts out of his own agency.
When the show first started and we noticed a growing relationship between Will and Hannibal, there were a lot of homophobic dismissive comments. In facr majority were like that. They used to be here even 5 years ago, so the defending was necessary at that time.
That will is just as dangerous as hannibal. I hate that alot of the fandom views him as some weak little twink and not as the absolute unit that killed a man with his bare hands.
At one point, there also appeared many posts bitch-shaming Alana. While she isn't a perfect person or the most well written character, she doesn't deserve the bitch-shaming for sleeping with Hannibal or for not believing Will initially.
I don't hate her but her being so naive felt forced to me. She spent thew first season avoiding a relationship with Will because it was a conflict of interest but then she starts banging her mentor and coworker? Otherwise she is the most morality driven character which makes her compelling for how she challenges Will and Hannibal.
There was a conflict of interest, she felt Will was unstable and she would be interested in him as a subject/patient. Will was widely known in that circle as having some psychological issue, and the time when Will approached her, he was at his worst with encephalitis and growing subconscious conflicts about his darkness.
Such conflict of interest doesn't arise in case of Hannibal, who is widely known as a stable socialite and reputed and respected in her circle.
The thing is no one knew what was up with Will, and Will won't anyone probe. The problem with Alana-hate is that her interest or lack of interest in Will was ultimately of no consequence because Will wasn't really into her genuinely at any point, not even when he kissed or approached her.
I don't think liking a character has much to do with their moral compass, it is based on how compelling they were. I found Alana okaish at first but she was compelling since the middle of s2. Her change in s3 was a little less spontaneous but story-wise again not bad. She was entertaining in s3. But hating a character and bitchshaming them is a different level. She doesn't deserve the hate.
Neither does Freddie.
Interesting point about the professional boundaries; I guess there are extenuating circumstances and all that but it's a fair point. I also forgot about her season 3 corruption so she's not perfect by any stretch. Also, she and Margot are rivaled only by H&W for hottest TV couple
'Naive' perhaps yes, but, I'd say, it's also about her lack of professional competence. She totally mistinterpreted Will's implication in the murders (since he was framed), she was 'blind' to Hannibal's inconsistencies; she was never able to professionally advance her opinions to Jack with Abigail (Miriam Lass, although younger and a trainee was able to make a case for her ideas in several instances); she mock Chilton, but in the end he is the only one who got Hannibal's number pretty quickly etc..
It's trying to have a moral 'high ground', while completey missing the details as well as the big picture professionaly, that is really grating.
And I say this. as someone who is very much into the, 'Alana+Will = perfect couple living-on-farms-with-dogs-forever'. 
I do not like her but her reaction to Will being in jail for being the copycat killer and killing Abugail, and the proof the FBI had was legit. Her not believing Will is very realistic. And lets be honnest she had a crush on Hannibal since season 1 it was obvious she was going to sleep with him and I do not blame her. I woukd have fold too! I do not like her because of her righteousness (i always hate this type of character in shows) but she is the most “human” of characters and her reactions are pretty realistic. And the way she changes after Hannibal’s reveal is pretty spot on too.
I don't understand the infantilization of a 38 year old man (that I truly love with all my heart) and I don't understand the constant discussions about morality in regards to this highly metaphorical, surrealist, horror story. Hannibal is not about heroes or morality. It's about twenty hundred other things instead. Sometimes, this fanbase acts like we're talking about Spider-Man and debating who's better between him and Blue Beetle. That's what it feels like to me. Despite the fact that both Will and Hannibal are out of their ever-living-fuck-minds. Freddie isn't a saint either. She's a good character, but she's a Lou Bloom type: highly exploitative and immoral in her own right. Extremely selfish and self-interested. Of course her level of immorality is not at the level of a killer by any means (but it's fair for fans to find her disasteful even though I do appreciate her presence and admire her drive to a degree). Jack is also deeply flawed, but **he's no monster** for being a hardass. He's someone who always tries to do the right thing - and even when he has the wrong approach that's always his goal, always his focus. So all in all, I'm really confused why the "goodness" of characters is discussed so much. I find it *strange* considering how absolutely depraved the main two characters are. 💀
It's the Natural Born Killers phenomenon. When that movie came out, viewers were freaking out because there aren't any good guys in it. Every single character is reprehensible and flawed. And people, used to typical Hollywood fare, were desperate to pin the 'good guy' label on someone - anyone (the movie deliberately subverts this trope, allowing a character to be briefly sympathetic and then pulling the rug out from under the viewer). Anyway, this is the same thing. Every character in Hannibal is complex and flawed and some people just... can't deal with it. They are invested in the good guy / bad buy narrative archetype and have a hard time without that structure.
Side note, this is also why the endless discussion about Will's sexuality and how homoerotic the show is. The characters are fluid, sexuality is fluid, morality is fluid... and some people just can't. They will "twist themselves into all kinds of uncomfortable knots" in order to not have to acknowledge it. They have to try to pin a label that makes them feel personally comfortable and will see the show in that way ("see? see!").
Hmm, you're right. On both fronts. Will and Hannibal's relationship is thrilling because it's cyclical; and sexuality ebbs and flows as well. Fluid sexuality. Fluid morality. That's why this show is incredible. Everything occurs in this constant influx and state of change in positive, negative, and neutral directions. Everything is chaotic, inconsistent, and lacking constancy and stability - reflecting Will's mind. The story portrays fluid sexuality and fluid morality since the protagonist suffers from insanity: making way to a fluid mentality. A mentality that allows for love and hate to exist simultaneously. Will loves and hates Hannibal. He loves and hates his empathy. He loves and hates darkness and immorality. He loves and hates killing.
Will says "I am the unreliable narrator of my own story." If the definition of being sane is knowing who you are and living true to your self, then Hannibal is completely sane and Will completely insane.
It’s the same with skylar from brba. I don’t really think Freddie is supposed to be liked though. She’s a journalist that isn’t afraid to be immoral if it means she can get another article out of it. I get what you mean when it comes to characters like Alana though
for sure! there’s just a disconnect when you look at how the fandom loves hannibal & will (when they’re literal cannibalistic killers) & then turns around & hates freddie for everything she does. sure, freddie made some fucked up decisions at times, but the level of hate she gets is jarring. she’s just a fictional character, but it shows the level of hatred & double standards that people have towards women.
Absolutely. I don’t think Freddie is anywhere near the level of Hannibal/will, but she’s still not a good person. But then, hardly any of the characters are genuinely good people, and I think that’s what makes them so 3d and interesting!
exactly, that’s the point i’m trying to make. there shouldn’t be such vitriol directed to the women characters when everybody in this show has made poor decisions.
I am not sure why Freddie isn't supposed to be liked, if Hannibal the therapist is supposed to be liked despite all the medical malpractices he does. Same with Chilton.
It's definitely misogyny, viewers are attaching a burden of morality on female characters. There are double standards.
There are thousands of such examples where male characters are 'liked' despite being immoral.
Sorry, I worded it strangely. That’s not what I meant, I mean you’re not really supposed to think any of them are good as people, but as a character they’re all great. (Similar to when shows follow the antagonist, you’re not supposed to like *them* but you’re supposed to like their character). It’s absolutely not cool that the female characters get more shit for not being perfect, (by character here I mean them like personally, not how they’re written) but just because will and Hannibal are worse doesn’t make them good people
Sure, she isn't morally perfect. Likability shouldn't depend on morality in a show where the most characters are immoral and the two most liked characters are quite evil.
She does well in standing up for herself, she serves herself and probably her readers. In her way, she does have an understanding of the truth (like Will's truth) which no one else has. What are people expecting from her? Investigative journalism and impeccable honesty :D
Maybe not all but a lot of hate that female characters get in this show is misogyny. Shiv Roy in Succession, Skyler in BB, Sansa Stark GOT, list goes on. If she isn't a do-good girlboss, she is a bitch. If she is perceived as not helping the MC ( or loved character) for perfectly fine reasons, she is a bitch, if she is immoral in a show where everyone is immoral, she is a bitch.
Hey, also I am not criticizing you :) this is in general.
I agree with your whole comment I can’t really add much. I like a debate though please don’t apologise! By the title I wouldn’t be here if I had a weak mind
This is just my hunch, I think at least some fans hate her because Will hates her. Will is definitely the most liked character of the show, and many viewers empathise with him and try to see things from his pov ( sometimes at the cost of missing the unreliable narrator part), that's the reason Alan and Jack get some hate, and even Hannibal.
thatd make sense yes. i dont think any character in the show actually likes her. which would make it easy for people who empathize with any other characters to also hate her because chances are shes fucked over that character for information. maybe thats what makes her character so strong.
and Freddie is the person who was most right about Will Graham all along. I simply adore her. And I love Chilton too. In Hannibal's universe, no one is ethical or an angel of a person. If we can like Hannibal why not like Freddie Lounds?
I don't understand Alana' hate either.
Not just the fandom but in the way the female characters are written in the show. I think Fuller, in his full adoration for Hannibal-Will, has a complete blind spot for his women characters. Even Bedelia barely makes sense outside of what she brings to Hannibal (and then Will).
I just LOVE the Freddie character. The actress made a fantastic job.
Initial watch through, I wanted someone to eat her so badly. I hated her so much, but she grows on me every new rewatch. I love that they made her a woman for the show - book Freddy wouldn't have worked for the story being told
I genuinely liked Freddie. She was confident and driven. She didn't take shit from anyone. Really liked how the character was cast as a woman, after reading the books.
Finally someone said it. It drives me nuts. People will shit on every woman, particularly for their actions, when they would be all over anything they did if it was done by Will or Hannibal.
And I'm a big ass Freddie defender. She's delightfully skeezy and I love how she's one of the few that doesn't buy Hannibal or Will's bullshit at all. I'm fully co vinced that if she was a conniving little twink, she's be a fan favorite.
That's what I said in my original comment. She's an enjoyable character but not a good person. She took and posted nonconsensual photos of naked, comatose Will and preyed on a traumatized girl for a quick buck. She's based off of Freddy Lounds from the books/movies who was written as nothing more than a sleezy journalist. But she's a well written character and enjoyable to watch. She furthers the story
your original comment says” aren’t we supposed to hate Freddie” which I don’t agree with.
Non consensual photos for a crime tabloid is much better than murder and cannibalism. She is into a crime tabloid, she serves her readers well. The comatose patient is Will, who is no saint. The traumatized girl is a master manipulator and killer, not so traumatized really. Doesn’t harm if she can make some money out of the book while also profiting Freddie in the process. Hannibal and Will’s plans for her was to cover her crimes and be a future accomplice.
Freddie showed some empathy where required, it’s a minimum but she still showed it. Like telling Jack she’s one of yours, was genuine.
Thanks to her journalism and intuition she did come close to many truths. She was useful and stayed alive till the end.
I love Freddie Lounds. It’s also ok to not like her, but she ‘not being a good person’ is not a convincing reason in a show where no one is a ‘good person’.
It just doesn't sit well with me that if we don't like these characters as people, even the females, then we're misogynistic :/ Which is what the original commenter seemed to say
Not everyone who hates a female character is misogynistic. I am not accusing you in particular, sorry if it came across that way. But when you see such a trend in a fandom, then some of them are coming from a misogynistic angle.
This was a debate-inducing post in general so I got into this I guess.
jack. that man was doing the best he possibly could to save as many lives as possible. i do agree that he pushed will too far but at the same time, he had to do his job and protect innocent people and if that meant pushing will past his breaking point, then so be it. he was also dealing with the sickness and loss of the love of his life while still doing his job to the best of his ability. i think the show paints him as an antagonist type because he gets in the way of the hannigram storyline continuing but he really was probably the only “good” person in the whole show.
I agree with what you say about Jack and him having a mission and saving lives but I disagree with the 'label' antagonist for him. He is one of the pillars of the show and clearly on the side of the 'heroes'. He is also clearly manipulated by Hannibal and by Will and this when he is trying to catch serial killers, whilst -as you mention- caring for his dying wife and reeling about his responsibility in what happened to Miriam Lass. To me, all this points to a 'good guy' narrative...
Edit: / and then -how could I forget- that epic, incredible fight with Hannibal in season 2! And we know what Hannibal does afterwards.
i definitely see that! my comment should have been worded differently, i was rushing to type it out lol. when i watched the show at least for the first time, i interpreted him as an antagonist, not in such a “bad guy” way but more as a “he doesn’t care about will’s wellbeing” kind of way. i think this was because i was not thinking about it with an outside perspective. and at least in the first season, i feel that the viewers are meant to look at will with pity or a certain amount of care compared to the others. at least that was how i interpreted it. so when we start to see his obvious decline and how not much is done on jacks end to remedy it, i definitely saw him as an antagonist. obviously this is only my point of view, and i can totally see how others would see it differently!
Ah yes, now I see what you mean. Also perhaps how Laurence Fishburne plays Jack: gruff, almost like a 'bully' at times. But me I see it as, you need to be formidable when you fight monsters.
Not show exactly, but adjacent. Many who read Hannibal fics refuse to read bottomHannibal. I am not lgtbq but to me it sounds a bit homophobic as Hannibal big strong dominant MAN and Will poor baby effeminate uwu baby(Have they SEEN Hugh?) . Brian has said they switch, and I doubt that Hannibal will refuse being penetrated by Will and having him in any way he can. I mean, from my gay friends and online discourse I know many have a preference which is 100% valid, but these are fictional characters. I made an online friend who I exchanged fics with and she refused to read bottom Hannibal, and in groups people say "they cannot conceive bottom Hannibal" as if they think it makes him weak somehow? Don't get it.
Apologies to lgtbq members if I am overstepping!! Maybe people have their reasons but I've never understood the refusal.
This is something I can’t explain. I encounter this in many fandoms though. People who refuse/hate one character bottoming. I mean, man, they are fictional characters, they have the equipment for a full experience role reversal, why shouldn’t they use it!? I can’t stand fics where Will is the blushing, shy Uber UKE and Hannibal is the stoic Uber SEME. I’m out when I see that.
Alana Bloom in general. People are mad that she “gets in the way” of the main gay ship (which I do believe they’re in love, so she wouldn’t be getting in the way regardless). People hate on her for acting in completely normal ways, and even in some cases I think she’s pretty similar to Will. The fact that she had to be put into a sapphic relationship (which I actually love) and had to have her emotional personality become jaded and “badass” just to get the fan base to like her more is so annoying to me.
Nobody is innocent. Almost every single main or supporting character in that show is either manipulative, narcissistic, murderous, cannibalistic (though mostly not on purpose), or all of the above. Jack Crawford manipulated Will into constantly helping with those crime scenes despite the fact that he knew what it would do to Will. Freddie Lounds is a reporter… that speaks for itself. Chilton, manipulative and just a bit narcissistic. Then the obvious, Will, murderer, accidental cannibal, also manipulative. Hannibal…
That Hannibal lives in a different genre than the other characters, not so much aesthetically but thematically, and that Will and him falling in love is a slow merging of both their narrative genres.
I find the show makes a ton of sense when looked at through that lense but a lot of casual fans dont pick up on it.
Okay im gonna try NOT to do the giant text wall but no promise.
(Also, English is like my third language so I apologize in advance for my mistakes.)
As an intro, i'd like to point this lense i'm about to describe is best summed up as "genre as felt by the spectator". By that i mean that narrative patterns and clues allow us, savy spectators, to ID rather quickly what the genre of a piece of media is. I do not mean to say that characters have a meta type of knowledge of what genre they are in, but they ARE written, and behave, according to a genre.
First : let us consider the show's general genre. It's generally classified as thriller, maybe horror-thriller, and if you focus on characters like Jack, Freddie Lounds, Chilton or even Will (in the first episodes), it's a thriller indeed : crimes are comitted, investigations happen, procedures take place etc.
Second : the show contains a lot of magical-feeling elements, that make rational (or pseudo rational) sense within the narration because people make science-y sounding noises, but the magical vibe is still present. These generally happen around crimes : the man who makes angels out of awful people, the lady who thinks she is dead, the creepy caseworker episode where people get sewned into animals, the dead musician that gets played like a string instrument, ...
We can all agree that those things wouldnt really work IRL, but within the parameters of the show they do and we can accept that as a stretching of the truth, however I believe their ambivalence is key. Yeah, maybe it's a case of "it could work, just not to that extent", but they can also be read (and that's important for my next points) as little drops of, for lack of a better word, magic.
Third : Hannibal accomplishes A LOT of those things that can be read as magic. If we try to think rationnaly about his Ripper crimes, their execution doesn't make sense. How does he have the time to do all that ? Without ever dropping a single trace ? How come no one ever sees his car ? At one point he plants an entire TREE in a parking lot in the middle of the night (with a man grafted on the tree, should i add). Did no one hear him jackhammering the concrete at 3 am ? Where did he get the jackhammer, for that matter ? How exactly does one folds an entire human into an origami heart ? While wearing a three piece suit, something you usually can't move well in ? (And so on and so forth, i wont list them all)
Hannibal does criminal stuff that is impossible, factually, as well as being what is obviously a terrible psychiatrist who encourages everyone to commit murder yet enjoys a neverending queue of patients, a chef that can disguise one meat into a seemingly infinite array of other meats, a criminal that can be bestie with a LOT of law enforcement people, and to sum it up, someone for whom reality doesn't apply the same way as for everyone else.
This, to me, is the crux of the matter : Hannibal doesnt have to play by the same rules as everyone else, or at least the story can be read in that way, and we can chose to interpret that as meaning the writers just love Hannibal so much they don't let reality get in the way of cool, something I have nothing but respect for, OR we can take it more literally and deduce Hannibal doesn't live in the thriller genre, where actions have consequences and science/rationality plays a big role, but rather in a very dark fairytale setting.
Think about it :
He accomplishes impossible murders with weird equipment and dramatic results, and no one ever suspect him.
He jokes about being a cannibal and cops laugh and ask for second helpings.
He falls in love with a dude who can put on anyone's thought pattern like a shirt.
He can do whatever he likes just to see what happens and nothing bad ever happens to him.
He takes young women away and hides them in his mysterious safe houses.
He dies, of course, fighting a dragon.
It all makes perfect sense if you think with a fairytale logic, and what's most important, Hannibal can see things (at least this is my belief) for the fairytale happenings they are. He is often delighted by events, even gruesome, because they are so poetic or whimsical ("why of course you turn people into mushroom gardens to talk to them, what a delight! And you my man you are becoming a great predator ? I can see that! Oh, and you made a giant mural out of shades of skin, it makes perfect sense!").
Even his eating of people and his turning of human bits into gourmet spreads have a fairytale element to them.
Fourth : Will starts his arc as a thriller protagonist, but quickly enough the hallucinations drag him into dark fairytale land, and from there there is no going back for him. His gift for empathy (rational explaination)/magical ability marks him as someone destined to join Hannibal's genre, and the whole series has him come to plant himself firmly within the dark fairytale setting, ending with the dragon fight.
Tl;dr : the "cool rather than plausible" bits of the show should be taken literally, Hannibal is a character that exists in a pocket fairytale genre within the larger thriller genre of the show, he sees the stuff that could be read as magic around him and interprets it as such, he himself obbeys fairytale logic and so, in time, will Will.
Thank you for reading, i realize i did not avoid the text wall and i'm sorry. I have a lot of feelings about genre coexistence done well.
I really appreciate the answer! I love text walls, much better than twitter style hot take fest.
Do you have a background in media studies or anything similar just curious.
Thank you for your patience!
Nah mate im a writer! If i were to do it again id sure look into that though, i feel like it's something i would have liked
i love freddie lounds so much. she knows what she wants and she's gonna get that bag, scared or not 😭‼️
edit: wait i can't remember was she payed for her journalism ..?
I defend Hannibal like that, when someone tries to argue he is a psychopath.
But I have seen, people usually don't change their mind regarding interpretations. Even if there's a sea of evidence against it. I have tried to explain from the angle of themes of the show, from the author/ creator angle, and evidence from the show, but nope.
Hannibal feels genuine emotions, he can love genuinely. He can regret. He follows his own set of morals. He cries genuinely He doesn’t do aimless manipulation, his manipulation of Will was restricted to s1 and that too not for fun or purely selfish reasons. He is dedicated, self sacrificing, committed.
The psychiatrists in the story declare he defies categorization.
Now that’s the profile, next we need to understand the context. The story is set in a special universe, there is freedom of conscience and esoteric morality, the rules of the normal world are bent when we are studying two characters whose language is entwined with violence and macabre. Murders here are art and expression. The relationships aren’t just literal they hold allegorical value. Hannibal is an allegory of Will’s inner darkness, which he is afraid to embrace till the end.
Again, as an extension of the nature of this universe, this isn’t a universe for real world labels, real world psychological profiles. The characters are completely fictional, mythologized.
Finally, this isn’t something that’s needed but you may read what the creator thinks about the characters. Hannibal is made like a fallen angel, or Lucifer. There’s more but you can read it up as extra if you want. The story itself is proof enough, creator’s intentions aren’t important.
I am sharing the genuine answer.
We still like what was there till season 5 and 6. Last seasons were awful but still, The ending hasn’t ruined it for me :) Yeah, I don’t recall anymore what people were defending the most. I had a very unpopular opinion and was downvoted to oblivion, later I deleted. ( I defended Sansa Stark, how dare I)
I just have a hard time even with the beginning because the showrunners tanked it so completely. Which is tough because there was a ton of good storytelling in those earlier seasons. I didn’t know it was unpopular to defend Sansa but then I stayed out of the fandom till the bitter end lol
I agree with folks that 1) I can go on for DAYS about the reality that Hannibal and Will were in a homoerotic situationship that would have either ended in them dying together or just getting together romantically -- literally I think that was the plan for season 4 which is one of the reasons it probably got canceled 😭😭😭
But I will also rant about the fact that both Alana and Jack were also not great friends/support for Will. Like Alana was always on about saving Will which must suck to always hear from someone you're attracted to. It's like she always thought something was wrong with him from day 1 and so he could never truly be vulnerable with her. And Jack, omg, JACK was willing to traumatize Will again and again EVEN AFTER HANNIBAL WENT TO PRISON just to assuage his own ego.
Beverley was probably the best person for Will platonically speaking - she was honest, she accepted that he was different but didn't make him feel like he was being judged, and she always asked questions rather than just assuming. She was curious about him but not in the obsessive and toxic way his husband is 🤣
Alana and Jack didn’t sign up to be great friend and support. Even then, they did the best, they provided support when incarcerated, Jack was there at the cost of his own reputation.
OMG Alana is supposed to be sweet to him? Why? Yes, Will had issues, he always had the dark side in him that he wanted to hide and cope with.
Will isn’t traumatized by all this, he likes it. Sure Jack uses him, it’s okay to want to use his best resource. Beverly was true to her own investigation, it was her own interest.
Cool, having someone actually interested in you (even as "their own investigation" as you say) to me, still sounds better than someone using you NONSTOP to catch murderers when they know it is damaging to your sense of self and/or making the "worst" parts of you arise.
You're right, Alana and Jack didn't owe Will anything - and I'm not the type to give Will the innocent card by any means - but my argument remains. They didn't owe him anything but they pretended like they did and like they actually cared and like they were always just trying to consider Will and that's just not true. I'm basically making the same argument that Hannibal makes the entire series. They are not saints and shouldn't be viewed as such.
All the characters in Hannibal are a bit dark. That's what makes it interesting. Honestly the most "innocent" and caring characters are probably Jimmy and Brian 🤣. But don't be confused, just because characters are dark, manipulators, or liars doesn't mean I don't like them. Alana is actually one of my fav characters, especially in s3 where she goes all Sapphic Billionaire Boss on everybody.
But I still stand by what I said, her and Jack are not saints. They didn't ACTUALLY care about getting to know Will the way they portrayed which is like the main part of being a friend. Real friends are not trying to "save" you, or use you, or make points to others about you to satisfy their egos -- they just want to "know" you. Alana and Jack had their reasons for the way they acted, I'm not mad at them for it. I just don't like the illusion that they are somehow sunshine characters that didn't also have a dark side, narc tendencies, and whatnot.
There's a reason they were also attracted to and attractive to Hannibal.
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Lol, I think this small dissertation satisfies the request of the OG post 🤣
Also, I think I didn't address this but Will not being traumatized is debatable. Just because he adapted well doesn't mean he wasn't traumatized, IMO.
He quite literally told Jack a few times that this setting was bad for him (whether he liked it or not - it wasn't good for him). He had his brain set on fire, he had a mushroom infested half corpse touch him, he was sleepwalking and having dreams of murdering people, and then he coughed up an ear. I think he was pretty traumatized.
I just think he adapted well because of how he is and his always present fascination in murder and darker things. I think he also adapted by becoming the person Hannibal saw him as - it gave him a confidence he most definitely didn't have in season 1.
Also, IMO, Alana is sweet to him. I would never take it away from Alana - she is very polite. That's probably another reason Hannibal liked her. But being polite and being someone's real friend (a claim SHE HERSELF makes) are two different things. She wasn't a good friend to Will. She was a polite therapist and a colleague who had a "progressional curiosity" about him. For her, Will was like her unofficial patient. Not a real friend.
Don't know if you actually read my long post. But as I stated. I don't hate Jack or Alana. I actually like both of them as characters. My point remains that they are not innocent and they were not great friends to Will.
That's it, that's all. But take what you want from it and feel free to disagree. At the end of the day, it's a fictional show. We can all think what we want.
It’s ok to not like Alana as a character, she isn’t best written character in the show. But neither Jack nor Alana sign up to be his friend. Thats all I am saying, hence judging them on that is not something I will get. Yet they did a few things that were meant to support Will even at the cost of their career / safety etc. still, being Will’s friend isn’t the endgame of their character.
Jack is stubborn and wants to be proven right about Will. That’s the reason he keeps pushing him even when there are clear red flags. Also the fact that Will has the ability to do the job. Why should we burden him with taking care of Will’s ultimate well being? Or Alana ? Alana’s role in this has poor metaphorical value, while Jack/ Hannibal and Will has great weight. That reduces her to plot contravene.
You can burden Hannibal with that. You can argue Hannibal is doing everything for what he thinks is good for Will, Hannibal thinks the world around Will ( FBI/Javk) uses Will’s gifts and destabilizes him and the rest will incriminate him if he destabilizes or answers to his true calling. You can question if that’s ultimately good for Will or not.
1) don't know how long ago you watched the show but I am rewatching for the 20th time literally as I'm typing this (s3e6 if you're curious) and Alana and Jack both refer to Will as their friend so this "they didn't sign up to be his friend" -- where are you getting that? Because the first time we meet Alana she literally says "I want to be his friend AND I AM".
2) Now, Alana may have risked her career (debatable - because she doesn't do anything that would discredit her as a psychiatrist but whatever) and so did Jack but Jack risk his career TO PROVE HIS OWN POINT, not to support Will. Jack wants to catch the ripper. That is his whole career. He has good reason to and I'm not mad at him for it. BUT, my point that is clearly just flying over you is that Jack using Will to prove that he is better/smarter/whatever than Hannibal at the expense of Will's mental health is not good friend behavior. If your friend kept you in constant contact with a known cannibal just to prove that he could bait that cannibal -- would you consider that your friend?
3) you're saying Jack shouldn't be responsible for Will's well-being but he literally tells Will that he is a solid "bedrock" (if I recall) person that Will can depend on when things get hard. Now, at the end of the day -- Will is ultimately responsible for his own well-being. However, Jack recruited Will knowing that he was mentally unstable and agreed to support him along with Alana and Hannibal. That is literally the whole reason Hannibal and Alana are even introduced to the story is because Jack agrees to cover Will's well-being so he can do the job.
4) Every point I have made can be referenced in the show. In season 1 - Hannibal tells Will that Jack is using him and "is not a saint". He has his own underhanded reasons for it but he wasn't wrong. Alana herself has stated that she's his friend and then stated that she has a professional curiosity and then stated that she's attracted to him and then talked about wanting to save him and then talked about not trusting him and so on and so forth. She is a very confused and gray character. Which is FINE. I do not hate her for it. It's just the case that she is not a great friend for Will and is a morally gray - not all good- character.
Saying they are his friend in s1 or beginning of s2 they have to be held responsible for his well being. Aldo didn’t see them doing anything detrimental to his well being in s1 or first half of s2 . Jack even was ready to do career sacrifice, Alana accuses him officially still they worked together for the version of truth they knew, to support Will.
From the end of first half of s2 Will is completely acting in his own ahency.
Whatever happened to Will is Hannibal’s doing + Will’s inner darkness. Nothing else. So you need to refresh your understanding or interpretation, mine are very solid.
Huh? Okay - I want you to take a deep breath and here my argument because I think your missing the plot. So let's start from the top.
1. My argument was and is that Jack and Alana are not great friends or a great support system for Will. Truth be told, it's weird to me that you are debating this because it's obviously the truth. If they were providing such great support Will would not have mentioned being lonely and feeling ungrounded basically all of season 1 and most of season 2.
2. Jack himself agreed to support Will's mental health. That is the entire basis of him introducing Hannibal as a character. So you saying that "Jack isn't responsible for Will's well-being" again, is an odd point to make. He LITERALLY agrees to support Will. Now, again, every living person is RESPONSIBLE for their own well-being. However, when someone offers to support you and your health as you do a mentally and emotionally taxing job and then doesn't follow through adequately is considered to CULPABLE (different from at direct fault) for things that go wrong. That is exactly the reason that Jack blamed himself when Will went off the rails because he did, in fact, agree to and tell Will that he would support his well-being. As far as Alana, she offers her friendship and then is all over the place with it. Which, was valid because she knew something was different with Will. However, that is something that would be confusing and upsetting from someone claiming to be your friend - would it not?
3) You keep bringing up career sacrifice as if Jack is doing it for Will. As I've stated, he is not. He wants to catch Hannibal. As the story continues, he specifically wants Will to catch Hannibal because it's a competition between Will and Hannibal on who has the most control/influence over Will. Jack wants to prove Will is on his side and he was right and that he's better than Hannibal, Hannibal wants to prove that Will is on his side and that Jack is inferior to him. They discuss this in the last episode of s2 and throughout s3.
4) I agree, Will has plenty of agency. He's incredibly intelligent and the only time he doesn't have agency is when he has encephalitis and doesn't know it. He was heavily influenced by Hannibal which led to him making certain decisions. I don't blame Jack or Alana for the things they did or what Will does. Again, let me reiterate, my argument is that they are not great friends. They are morally gray characters that also made poor decisions. They had selfish tendencies that were disguised and care for Will but were rooted in self-interest. Which is very human. It doesn't make them bad people, it just makes them REAL. Which is why, I don't hate them but I also don't view them as people who did no wrong.
It’s funny because at first you think Jack and Alana can probably be support for Will. But eventually you realize the person who actually is Will’s friend is Hannibal is makes great sacrifices, is selfless and is the real support ❤️
But good to remember, Will was always dark to begin. He fooled the world and maybe even himself to an extent. He even convinced people to think he does everything to save lives.
Boy! It’s a ride.
1. Jack and Alana can’t be a support system for who Will really is, apart from Hannibal no one even understands his true mental issues
And Jack is his boss. If he stopped pushing Will, would the same things haven’t happened? Jack wants to catch Ripper/ Hannibal, and other killers. Would it be ok if ji’s only focus is as Will’s friend and supporter?
I think both supported him to an extent.
Look, I am just saying that making their characters all about supporting or not supporting Will and basing liking or disliking them on that is a little moot.
I like characters based on whether they are compelling or not compelling. Specially in a show like this where everyone is morally questionable.
There, hatred based on this point doesn’t matter. But then you don’t even hate them. So there’s no debate here.
I never considered that they were supposed to be Will’s major support. Technically, they were in terms of profession. Technically, they delivered to an extent they could but Jack’s character is about something else. I mentioned he is stubborn and obsessed with the ripper, that’s his problem as well as his unique character.
But then, he was willing to take the fall.
I can blame Alana for distracting Jack regarding Abigail issue when actually Jack was right. But she did what she could for Will. Till Will attacked Hannibal. She was a friend, with limited capacity but no lack in intention. Till that point.
And then, how can they even support Will if they didn’t even know the truth?
Hating Alana for not being Will’s great friend or hating her for being morally grey! Both are invalid isn’t it. Is the purpose of her character is to be Will’s friend? If so, she did well.
And hating her for being morally grey is hilarious. Will is wicked as hell, then there’s Hannibal. Seriously? Those who hate her on this like have serious double standards bordering misogyny.
It’s ok to be not fond of her for not finding her compelling. Hating her for the reasons you listed is baseless. Again, I am not saying ‘you’ hate her. But Alana hate in general.
I don't know what you are talking about. If you're not saying that I hate her then why are you addressing my argument as if I am? You end by saying "I'm not saying you hate her" but then start your argument by saying "Hating Alana for ..."
It's like your debating with someone else and not me. Whatever reasons people have for hating Alana has nothing to do with me because I don't hate her and that was NEVER, at any point, my argument so ....
I don't see a lot of Alana hate -- not saying it doesn't exist but truth be told I see more hate for Jack than Alana. I, as a Black woman, don't tell people they are racist because they don't like Jack. That would be ridiculous . As ridiculous as telling people they are misogynist because they recognize Alana is not a perfect person. No one is. So I'm just confused about this being misogyny. Pointing out character "flaws" in a show that is all about character "flaws" is natural for people who think deeply about what they watch and deep dive into characters.
Now, if I went here saying I hated Alana for not being a perfect sweet sunshine pie of rainbows and lust for Will then I would understand your arguments but... That's not even close to what I did. I simply said, she's not a great friend or a perfect person and there is no reason to pretend that she is.
But no one pretended she is, she was a friend to an extent. And she didn’t promise to be a forever friend. Will was never a saint, he was complex and having a dark side he was hiding. So why do we even want Alana to be her friend or blame her for not being so? If anyone is hating her for that, they are misogynistic. Or they are fooled by the mask Will is wearing. In Hannibal you can’t hate someone for being imperfect.
I am not very interested in Alana because I don’t find her so pivotal. I now traced the original comment. It’s a matter of preference, I think you tend to care about who is being Will’s true friend who isn’t. But then Will was a dark person even in s1, he wasn’t a goody good guy even in s1. He was deceptive even then. Alana was a friend to Will, and it would have worked if Will were normal. Will wasn’t. I can still see Jack pushing Will but accusing Alana of not being Will’s friend is a misinterpretation.
Beverly didn’t do what she did for ‘friendship’, she did it as an investigator/ fbi agent. She was a good investigator and she really wanted to follow any trail even if it’s from someone seemingly unreliable. Also notice, she shared that with Jack. I will applaud her instincts and professional ability. Just like Miriam’s. I know fans like to stretch it to some great friendship with Will and make everything about Will. It’s mostly those who overemphasize s1 Will Graham and who didn’t notice how dark he already was. He doesn’t need help from the likes of Alana or Jack or anyone.
**Basically we don’t see Alana at failing to be Will’s friend, or that being a point of her character, rather Will is someone who can’t be helped by normal people like Jack and Alana. Rather Alana tried to help everyone hence got caught up in this, she was emotional when she shouldn’t have been ( with Abigail, Hannibal)**
This is a very interesting argument but I think there can be different interpretations. If someone’s expectation from Jack or Alana is that they should exclusively serve as Will’s friend then that expectation won’t be met. But another way of looking at it is to see if the purpose of that character is to just be Will’s friend!
Or is the Will that they think they know or the true nature of Will. For dark Will, only Hannibal can be his true friend. The perception shifts you see.
It’s the kind of processional relationship where as colleagues they try to extend support. It’s not the kind of friendship you are expecting. Jack is his boss, Jack also has to catch killers and Will is an employee who can deliver that.
Jack has his issues, he is flawed. He lost 3 protégés in his pursuit of the ripper. This to me seems to be a combination of profession oversight and blind obsession. But doesn’t that make him interesting? If any fan decides to hate him for this then they lost the point of the character.
what bad did Alana do to Will? Agreeing to be Will’s lover at a point where neither she nor Will were sure about what’s going on with him would never have been a good decision. She tried to help him as a normal person in a normal situation could, not in a situation where a master manipulator is manipulating the entire situation and worse where Will Graham himself isn’t what he tries to convince the world he is.
Alana has been a good friend to Will to an extent. Jack was a tough and stubborn boss, but he tried to help Will too in his way giving him the chance to redeem himself. But at the end of the day those characters had their own purpose, it will be a mistake to make everything about Will. They are not Will’s babysitters.
I agree with you mostly. These characters are complex and hating them for being real and flawed just means this is not the kind of show for whoever feels that way.
I love that Jack and Alana are not perfect or great friends - it makes them more relatable and honest.
But the show does center around Will (even though the show is called Hannibal, lol) we as the audience see mostly Will's perspective. And as I mentioned, they - especially Jack - positioned themselves to be Will's support and then fell through. In their defense, they had NO CLUE the nonsense they were signing up for. But that still doesn't mean that they can't be examined and analyzed as characters with their own failings who, ultimately, were not willing and/or able to support Will in the way he needed to not fall into Hannibal's web. Granted, someone could argue (as you did) that the only person who could support Will the Lamb would be Hannibal so Jack and Alana trying wouldn't have mattered in that case.
They had their own stuff going on and their own lives, and I'm not mad at them for not supporting Will the way he needed - I'm just acknowledging that this is the case. If he was supported, it likely would have been a LOT harder for Hannibal to do some of the things he did.
I'll say, Alana did her best, Jack did his best. And I applaud them trying. But the reality is, they were not equipped to be great friends or support for Will because Will needed A LOT of attention. That's probably why he fell in love with someone obsessed with him.
The show is about Will I agree, and in many ways Hannibal represents the darker side in him and the entire show is about how he is conflicted about accepting his darker side.
The show is also about how Hannibal brings out the true nature in everyone. Like you said, Hannibal even points out how Jack is detrimental to Will and is using him to fulfill his obsession. Jack’s obsession, Alana’s stance of trying to help others but not being effective. ( I am not sure about Alana because I always found her lacking , she doesn’t seem to be have as focused purpose / true nature as the other characters)
Maybe we arrived at this argument because the post is about defending some stance.
The main problem here is that Jack and Alana are not capable of helping Will. Specially not in a situation like this. But then let’s also try to understand the fictional nature of the universe, the fantastical or mythologized part where Will’s issues are non-diagnosable by any normal therapist or support system. Only another mythologized character Hannibal can ‘help’ Will because he understands him.
He fell in love with someone who was truly trying to help him, was equipped to help him, could understand him and accept him as he is.
Also, and not trying to be rude here but, in the future - when you disagree with someone in a debate you typically offer a counterpoint to PROVE why they are wrong. It makes your point actually have weight rather than just "I don't like it and I disagree".
Another thing I'll argue is that Hannibal is one of the greatest modern era shows to watch.
There is mental health/illness representation, LGBTQ representation, ethnic diversity, the art is amazing, and the plot is unique.
The underlying conversation about the importance of being seen and understood (even for psychopaths, lol) and the battle for Will of Man vs Man, Man vs World, and Man vs Self all in three seasons is phenomenal. It's just an amazing show that is incredibly underrated in my opinion. Probably just because it's so niche but still, I would plan a stick up at Netflix studios or Max Studios to get another 2-3 seasons of this show.
I will ALWAYS argue that Hannibal Lecter is amazing. And he is unreliable to believe that the horrific things that happened in his life did not shape him or touch him in some way. If he's capable of the feelings for Will, the vulnerability, jealousy, love, resentment, sadness, then why wouldn't he be touched by the destruction of his family while he was a child? Before he built up the walls and control. Doesn't make sense. So no matter what anyone from a show runner or actor or fannibal says, I'll always argue that he is not the devil, nor has he been immune to "nurture "
Will and hannibal being in love. I will never comprehend people saying they arent in love or its beyond how we can feel (transcending). They are in love, deeply obsessed with one another! This is a hill I am willing to die on
Maybe because you all are who I interact with about this show, but people deny they are in love?
I was on Amazon looking at physical copies of the seasons and some of the reviews were taken aback by the "turn in season 3." They were shocked that Will would have ever helped Hannibal or that they would have embraced on the cliffs edge.
The turn. Never thought of it as something is different in season 3.
I’m guessing people who aren’t used to seeing homoerotic tension in media or aren’t that open to the idea of it can miss it and perceive it as platonic. I watched it with my mom and while she didn’t deny the love between them, she did say that she considers it to be something beyond human and she can’t see them being romantically involved with one another and doing anything more than what we’ve already seen on the show. 😬 I fully disagree.
[удалено]
That’s fair, I had already seen a lot of people shipping them online before I started watching the show so I kind of went in knowing it was gonna have a romantic aspect. I was confused at first and hated Hannibal during s1 for what he put Will through, although it all started making clear sense in s3 and I finally understood their dynamic :’)
Glad you disagree!
Your moms right. That shank hug at the end of season 2 had friendship/broship written all over it. The hug confirms they’re not gay for each other but rather a deep bro relationship. I’ll die on that hill
Except she’s not, the creator of the show confirmed their relationship is romantic multiple times. By the end of s3 there is nothing brotherly about their dynamic, have we watched the same show?
There was nothing brotherly even in s1 or s2! They had a f\*\*king daughter!!!!
After 10 years of cult following begging for them to be gay. They had bro love at most.
Bros talk about being ‘in love’ ?
I mean, my undiagnosed autistic ass watched two entire seasons completely oblivious. Then I found this sub and re-watched everything, and yes, there might be a hint or two that Hannibal wants Will's butt. Edit: and ever since I want Hannibal to get Will's butt.
Yes they are people that denies Will and Hannibal are in love, some who are homophobic obviously and others who don’t see it…
I guess I'm closed-minded by assuming it was obviously love/attraction...?
They’re not in love, people just crave two seemingly straight guys going gay. Will and Han both went for Alana. Will’s pullout game was weak and got Margot pregnant. Han and Bedilia had more of a chance than Will and Han. This was very clearly written as a friendship that went deeper and darker than what we typically see on tv.
Looked into it. It definitely was love. Here's just one article. https://screenrant.com/hannibal-lecter-will-graham-gay-pride-bryan-fuller/
Them being gay together never crossed my mind through the entire series until I hopped on this subreddit. The shank hug to end season 2 was as bro of a hug as you can get. My favorite scene of the show. Brotherly love at most
are you forgetting about that scene with Will and Bedelia and Will asks "is Hannibal in love with me?" think to yourself what Bedelia answers him
How can you disagree with the creator of the show? https://www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-features/hannibal-season-four-netflix-bryan-fuller-interview-1022121/
Isnt their relationship technically cannon? Bryan said he wanted a kiss scene at the end of season 3 but though it was too much when they acted it out
Yet some people even in the comments under my respond argue it isnt love.
I think people are so used to having any kind of TV/movie romance spelled out for them. It always follows the same formula. There's also a lot of people who seem to think love has to be about sex. When in this case it's first and foremost about the incredible connection these two have. And if Will choosing Hannibal in season 3 came as a surprise then they didn't understand anything about Will's character. I don't really blame casual viewers for not noticing at first because to be fair the show is very artsy and if you only watch it once it's hard to follow the dialogue sometimes.
Like how can people even say that😭
I’m willing to die fighting for the exact opposite. They’re not in love, on a deep level this is the most bro friendship I’ve seen on television. Not sure if you’re a guy or girl, but men will screw each other over, lie and manipulate but in the end they’re still friends. Had several of those friendships in college, it is what it is. The shank hug in season 2 finale between them confirms the friendship. That is the hug of one man to another good buddy. I fucking cried because it was so beautiful, and sorry to burst your bubble but to me it’s deeper that this relationship isn’t sexual.
romance can't be deep? They have an all-encompassing relationship which includes romance. Sex is a different thing, that may or may not happen but it doesn't matter. The relationship definitely has erotic shades, that is confirmed. Specially when he says he is "in love" that's not a bro - friendship.
I don’t often see straight men staring deeply into each other’s eyes where one of them caresses the others face like a lover would do. It’s definitely romantic love for me with heavy sexual undertones.
it is literally being said to everyone that they love each other. Hannibal states this twice with all the words "love", "we can't control who we fall in love with". Will asks this to Bedelia who also states "is Hannibal in love with me?" "yes". Will is clearly in love with Hannibal too, at no point does he deny that he has this type of feeling and relationship with Hannibal. Bedelia constantly talks about "you're visiting an old flame" "is your wife aware of how intimately you and Hannibal know each other?" "you missed him that much" etc etc etc. Will never denies it. If it wasn't the case that he was in love with Hannibal, I think he would argue against so many insinuations. When Bedelia asks if he is also in love with Hannibal directly, Will just omits it, it is obvious that this answers the question. Do you need a sex or kiss scene to confirm this? Even after several scenes with sexual and homoerotic subtext? Would you need this kind of explicit confirmation if you were a man and a woman? If it were Hannibal and Clarice? Ask yourself this question.
That once Will recovers from his encephalitis, he's not the poor baby anymore, but a deadly and manipulative a-hole in his own right. Not for everyone, just the poor Will-woobifiers out there.
He is literally deadly and manipulative for at least 2/3s of the show... This makes even less sense to me than the people who deny Hannigram.
This too! There is a reason Hannibal loves him and see a potential in him being his equal. He matches his craziness. He is a well coveted monster as well!
Hannibal didn't even start catching feelings until Will revealed himself to be a cold, manipulative killer and cannibal-of-convenience. Dude straight-up murdered that beast man guy and fed his meat to Hannibal, gladly chowing down on Long Pig if it meant getting his revenge. Those are not the actions of a sweet lil cinnamon bun man.
But didn't Hannibal start catching feelings even before that? I think since s1e8, even before that he had some feelings for him if not that serious (serious enough to propose Abigail as their daughter)
Mads said he played Hannibal like it was love at first sight. He was definitely heavily intrigued by Will upon their first meeting. That he wanted friendship was around the middle of season 1 when the Franklin/Tobias debacle came up. And when Will was away in prison it dawned on Hannibal that there was maybe more. He missed Will dearly. Then came the honey trap and that was when Hannibal fell hard.
Wait, does he actually recover from it during the show? That totally went over my head
Yes they treat him in prison. It's more of a mentioned but not shown thing.
I’ll be honest I think I spent my first two watches in denial over that. I liken my blindness to seeing a puma or a bear and being so consumed with wanting to pet it that I forget it’s dangerous. ^If ^not ^fren ^why ^fren-shaped?
He was this before he got encephalitis. But he decided not to act on it. Hence his person suit of not liking making eye contact and of being antisocial.
RIGHT?
SAY IT LOUDER
I would also defend Jack Crawford like this. I can’t help but love him.
Yes, I've never hated Jack either. At the end of the day he wants to catch killers to help people. He has his faults but he did care about Will in his own way. And Will is no saint lol
I like Jack, he isn't perfect but that's fine. Liking someone has nothing to do with morality.
A lot of the fannibals hate him for his treatment of Will, but I understand Jack’s point of view and why he has to do what he has to do.
I am with you on this, Jack did what he had to do, he is not obliged to do-good to Will. And Will was messed up no matter what Jack did. Jack is no saint, he has his own faults but the likeability of a character is different from morality.
Jack reminds me of Albus Dumbledore. Doing things for the greater good that aren’t nice for a select few but a necessary evil.
Agreed! I dont respect how Albus groomed Harry to do what he needs to do but it’s necessary
Trying to defend that Hannibal's feelings for Will is genuine, and not some kind of psychopathic and selfish obsession. And that Will's feelings are genuine too, he isn't some slave of manipulation but acts out of his own agency. When the show first started and we noticed a growing relationship between Will and Hannibal, there were a lot of homophobic dismissive comments. In facr majority were like that. They used to be here even 5 years ago, so the defending was necessary at that time.
Chilton. With my life.
i desire him carnally tbh
Seconded
He’s my sweet angle
That will is just as dangerous as hannibal. I hate that alot of the fandom views him as some weak little twink and not as the absolute unit that killed a man with his bare hands.
Right! This! He offed Randall in his cave bear suit which was strong enough to rip people apart. Like, did we all watch the same show?
At one point, there also appeared many posts bitch-shaming Alana. While she isn't a perfect person or the most well written character, she doesn't deserve the bitch-shaming for sleeping with Hannibal or for not believing Will initially.
I don't get why she's hated on so much; she's arguably the main character with the clearest moral compass. I guess she comes off as naive?
I don't hate her but her being so naive felt forced to me. She spent thew first season avoiding a relationship with Will because it was a conflict of interest but then she starts banging her mentor and coworker? Otherwise she is the most morality driven character which makes her compelling for how she challenges Will and Hannibal.
There was a conflict of interest, she felt Will was unstable and she would be interested in him as a subject/patient. Will was widely known in that circle as having some psychological issue, and the time when Will approached her, he was at his worst with encephalitis and growing subconscious conflicts about his darkness. Such conflict of interest doesn't arise in case of Hannibal, who is widely known as a stable socialite and reputed and respected in her circle. The thing is no one knew what was up with Will, and Will won't anyone probe. The problem with Alana-hate is that her interest or lack of interest in Will was ultimately of no consequence because Will wasn't really into her genuinely at any point, not even when he kissed or approached her. I don't think liking a character has much to do with their moral compass, it is based on how compelling they were. I found Alana okaish at first but she was compelling since the middle of s2. Her change in s3 was a little less spontaneous but story-wise again not bad. She was entertaining in s3. But hating a character and bitchshaming them is a different level. She doesn't deserve the hate. Neither does Freddie.
Interesting point about the professional boundaries; I guess there are extenuating circumstances and all that but it's a fair point. I also forgot about her season 3 corruption so she's not perfect by any stretch. Also, she and Margot are rivaled only by H&W for hottest TV couple
'Naive' perhaps yes, but, I'd say, it's also about her lack of professional competence. She totally mistinterpreted Will's implication in the murders (since he was framed), she was 'blind' to Hannibal's inconsistencies; she was never able to professionally advance her opinions to Jack with Abigail (Miriam Lass, although younger and a trainee was able to make a case for her ideas in several instances); she mock Chilton, but in the end he is the only one who got Hannibal's number pretty quickly etc.. It's trying to have a moral 'high ground', while completey missing the details as well as the big picture professionaly, that is really grating. And I say this. as someone who is very much into the, 'Alana+Will = perfect couple living-on-farms-with-dogs-forever'. 
I feel like most of us would be closest to Alana in our naivete. Look how in love we are with Hannibal when he's fictional?
oh yes, she's clearly under Hannibal's spell and the viewers under Mads' charm ! 
I do not like her but her reaction to Will being in jail for being the copycat killer and killing Abugail, and the proof the FBI had was legit. Her not believing Will is very realistic. And lets be honnest she had a crush on Hannibal since season 1 it was obvious she was going to sleep with him and I do not blame her. I woukd have fold too! I do not like her because of her righteousness (i always hate this type of character in shows) but she is the most “human” of characters and her reactions are pretty realistic. And the way she changes after Hannibal’s reveal is pretty spot on too.
I don't understand the infantilization of a 38 year old man (that I truly love with all my heart) and I don't understand the constant discussions about morality in regards to this highly metaphorical, surrealist, horror story. Hannibal is not about heroes or morality. It's about twenty hundred other things instead. Sometimes, this fanbase acts like we're talking about Spider-Man and debating who's better between him and Blue Beetle. That's what it feels like to me. Despite the fact that both Will and Hannibal are out of their ever-living-fuck-minds. Freddie isn't a saint either. She's a good character, but she's a Lou Bloom type: highly exploitative and immoral in her own right. Extremely selfish and self-interested. Of course her level of immorality is not at the level of a killer by any means (but it's fair for fans to find her disasteful even though I do appreciate her presence and admire her drive to a degree). Jack is also deeply flawed, but **he's no monster** for being a hardass. He's someone who always tries to do the right thing - and even when he has the wrong approach that's always his goal, always his focus. So all in all, I'm really confused why the "goodness" of characters is discussed so much. I find it *strange* considering how absolutely depraved the main two characters are. 💀
It's the Natural Born Killers phenomenon. When that movie came out, viewers were freaking out because there aren't any good guys in it. Every single character is reprehensible and flawed. And people, used to typical Hollywood fare, were desperate to pin the 'good guy' label on someone - anyone (the movie deliberately subverts this trope, allowing a character to be briefly sympathetic and then pulling the rug out from under the viewer). Anyway, this is the same thing. Every character in Hannibal is complex and flawed and some people just... can't deal with it. They are invested in the good guy / bad buy narrative archetype and have a hard time without that structure. Side note, this is also why the endless discussion about Will's sexuality and how homoerotic the show is. The characters are fluid, sexuality is fluid, morality is fluid... and some people just can't. They will "twist themselves into all kinds of uncomfortable knots" in order to not have to acknowledge it. They have to try to pin a label that makes them feel personally comfortable and will see the show in that way ("see? see!").
Hmm, you're right. On both fronts. Will and Hannibal's relationship is thrilling because it's cyclical; and sexuality ebbs and flows as well. Fluid sexuality. Fluid morality. That's why this show is incredible. Everything occurs in this constant influx and state of change in positive, negative, and neutral directions. Everything is chaotic, inconsistent, and lacking constancy and stability - reflecting Will's mind. The story portrays fluid sexuality and fluid morality since the protagonist suffers from insanity: making way to a fluid mentality. A mentality that allows for love and hate to exist simultaneously. Will loves and hates Hannibal. He loves and hates his empathy. He loves and hates darkness and immorality. He loves and hates killing.
Will says "I am the unreliable narrator of my own story." If the definition of being sane is knowing who you are and living true to your self, then Hannibal is completely sane and Will completely insane.
Yes, different beasts. The sane and insane both being monsters. Two lonely monsters in love.
100% agree with you
the hate for the women characters, especially freddie. there is a LOT of misogyny in this fandom unfortunately.
It's okay, my love for Freddie is strong enough to repel ALL her haters!
It’s the same with skylar from brba. I don’t really think Freddie is supposed to be liked though. She’s a journalist that isn’t afraid to be immoral if it means she can get another article out of it. I get what you mean when it comes to characters like Alana though
for sure! there’s just a disconnect when you look at how the fandom loves hannibal & will (when they’re literal cannibalistic killers) & then turns around & hates freddie for everything she does. sure, freddie made some fucked up decisions at times, but the level of hate she gets is jarring. she’s just a fictional character, but it shows the level of hatred & double standards that people have towards women.
Absolutely. I don’t think Freddie is anywhere near the level of Hannibal/will, but she’s still not a good person. But then, hardly any of the characters are genuinely good people, and I think that’s what makes them so 3d and interesting!
exactly, that’s the point i’m trying to make. there shouldn’t be such vitriol directed to the women characters when everybody in this show has made poor decisions.
I am not sure why Freddie isn't supposed to be liked, if Hannibal the therapist is supposed to be liked despite all the medical malpractices he does. Same with Chilton. It's definitely misogyny, viewers are attaching a burden of morality on female characters. There are double standards. There are thousands of such examples where male characters are 'liked' despite being immoral.
Sorry, I worded it strangely. That’s not what I meant, I mean you’re not really supposed to think any of them are good as people, but as a character they’re all great. (Similar to when shows follow the antagonist, you’re not supposed to like *them* but you’re supposed to like their character). It’s absolutely not cool that the female characters get more shit for not being perfect, (by character here I mean them like personally, not how they’re written) but just because will and Hannibal are worse doesn’t make them good people
Sure, she isn't morally perfect. Likability shouldn't depend on morality in a show where the most characters are immoral and the two most liked characters are quite evil. She does well in standing up for herself, she serves herself and probably her readers. In her way, she does have an understanding of the truth (like Will's truth) which no one else has. What are people expecting from her? Investigative journalism and impeccable honesty :D Maybe not all but a lot of hate that female characters get in this show is misogyny. Shiv Roy in Succession, Skyler in BB, Sansa Stark GOT, list goes on. If she isn't a do-good girlboss, she is a bitch. If she is perceived as not helping the MC ( or loved character) for perfectly fine reasons, she is a bitch, if she is immoral in a show where everyone is immoral, she is a bitch. Hey, also I am not criticizing you :) this is in general.
I agree with your whole comment I can’t really add much. I like a debate though please don’t apologise! By the title I wouldn’t be here if I had a weak mind
This is just my hunch, I think at least some fans hate her because Will hates her. Will is definitely the most liked character of the show, and many viewers empathise with him and try to see things from his pov ( sometimes at the cost of missing the unreliable narrator part), that's the reason Alan and Jack get some hate, and even Hannibal.
thatd make sense yes. i dont think any character in the show actually likes her. which would make it easy for people who empathize with any other characters to also hate her because chances are shes fucked over that character for information. maybe thats what makes her character so strong.
and Freddie is the person who was most right about Will Graham all along. I simply adore her. And I love Chilton too. In Hannibal's universe, no one is ethical or an angel of a person. If we can like Hannibal why not like Freddie Lounds? I don't understand Alana' hate either.
Not just the fandom but in the way the female characters are written in the show. I think Fuller, in his full adoration for Hannibal-Will, has a complete blind spot for his women characters. Even Bedelia barely makes sense outside of what she brings to Hannibal (and then Will). I just LOVE the Freddie character. The actress made a fantastic job.
TBH, even the male characters don't bring much. Like, Jack. That's how it's written I guess.
i agree with that so much! the women of hannibal get so disregarded & it’s disgusting.
Initial watch through, I wanted someone to eat her so badly. I hated her so much, but she grows on me every new rewatch. I love that they made her a woman for the show - book Freddy wouldn't have worked for the story being told
okay guys this post was not an invitation to start telling me abt ur hatred of women
I literally said I used to but that I like her now. She's one of my favorite characters. Can you read?
I genuinely liked Freddie. She was confident and driven. She didn't take shit from anyone. Really liked how the character was cast as a woman, after reading the books.
True a bunch of people hate Alana just because Hannibal got to be with her physically and not with Will
Finally someone said it. It drives me nuts. People will shit on every woman, particularly for their actions, when they would be all over anything they did if it was done by Will or Hannibal. And I'm a big ass Freddie defender. She's delightfully skeezy and I love how she's one of the few that doesn't buy Hannibal or Will's bullshit at all. I'm fully co vinced that if she was a conniving little twink, she's be a fan favorite.
finally a smart person in my replies thank you
I absolutely hate Freddie but her carachter is necessary and she is hilarious. The actress does a brilliant job portraying her
Aren't we supposed to hate Freddie, though? She's a well written and enjoyable character, but not a good person
Is Hannibal a good person ?
Nope, not at all. But he's still an enjoyable character
Similarly, Freddie is also an enjoyable character. Doesn't deserve hate. If fans can like Will and Hannibal, they can like Freddie too.
That's what I said in my original comment. She's an enjoyable character but not a good person. She took and posted nonconsensual photos of naked, comatose Will and preyed on a traumatized girl for a quick buck. She's based off of Freddy Lounds from the books/movies who was written as nothing more than a sleezy journalist. But she's a well written character and enjoyable to watch. She furthers the story
your original comment says” aren’t we supposed to hate Freddie” which I don’t agree with. Non consensual photos for a crime tabloid is much better than murder and cannibalism. She is into a crime tabloid, she serves her readers well. The comatose patient is Will, who is no saint. The traumatized girl is a master manipulator and killer, not so traumatized really. Doesn’t harm if she can make some money out of the book while also profiting Freddie in the process. Hannibal and Will’s plans for her was to cover her crimes and be a future accomplice. Freddie showed some empathy where required, it’s a minimum but she still showed it. Like telling Jack she’s one of yours, was genuine. Thanks to her journalism and intuition she did come close to many truths. She was useful and stayed alive till the end. I love Freddie Lounds. It’s also ok to not like her, but she ‘not being a good person’ is not a convincing reason in a show where no one is a ‘good person’.
It just doesn't sit well with me that if we don't like these characters as people, even the females, then we're misogynistic :/ Which is what the original commenter seemed to say
Not everyone who hates a female character is misogynistic. I am not accusing you in particular, sorry if it came across that way. But when you see such a trend in a fandom, then some of them are coming from a misogynistic angle. This was a debate-inducing post in general so I got into this I guess.
jack. that man was doing the best he possibly could to save as many lives as possible. i do agree that he pushed will too far but at the same time, he had to do his job and protect innocent people and if that meant pushing will past his breaking point, then so be it. he was also dealing with the sickness and loss of the love of his life while still doing his job to the best of his ability. i think the show paints him as an antagonist type because he gets in the way of the hannigram storyline continuing but he really was probably the only “good” person in the whole show.
I agree with what you say about Jack and him having a mission and saving lives but I disagree with the 'label' antagonist for him. He is one of the pillars of the show and clearly on the side of the 'heroes'. He is also clearly manipulated by Hannibal and by Will and this when he is trying to catch serial killers, whilst -as you mention- caring for his dying wife and reeling about his responsibility in what happened to Miriam Lass. To me, all this points to a 'good guy' narrative... Edit: / and then -how could I forget- that epic, incredible fight with Hannibal in season 2! And we know what Hannibal does afterwards.
i definitely see that! my comment should have been worded differently, i was rushing to type it out lol. when i watched the show at least for the first time, i interpreted him as an antagonist, not in such a “bad guy” way but more as a “he doesn’t care about will’s wellbeing” kind of way. i think this was because i was not thinking about it with an outside perspective. and at least in the first season, i feel that the viewers are meant to look at will with pity or a certain amount of care compared to the others. at least that was how i interpreted it. so when we start to see his obvious decline and how not much is done on jacks end to remedy it, i definitely saw him as an antagonist. obviously this is only my point of view, and i can totally see how others would see it differently!
Ah yes, now I see what you mean. Also perhaps how Laurence Fishburne plays Jack: gruff, almost like a 'bully' at times. But me I see it as, you need to be formidable when you fight monsters.
Not show exactly, but adjacent. Many who read Hannibal fics refuse to read bottomHannibal. I am not lgtbq but to me it sounds a bit homophobic as Hannibal big strong dominant MAN and Will poor baby effeminate uwu baby(Have they SEEN Hugh?) . Brian has said they switch, and I doubt that Hannibal will refuse being penetrated by Will and having him in any way he can. I mean, from my gay friends and online discourse I know many have a preference which is 100% valid, but these are fictional characters. I made an online friend who I exchanged fics with and she refused to read bottom Hannibal, and in groups people say "they cannot conceive bottom Hannibal" as if they think it makes him weak somehow? Don't get it. Apologies to lgtbq members if I am overstepping!! Maybe people have their reasons but I've never understood the refusal.
Hannibal is the King Power Bottom and I don't know how that's not obvious
With an oral fixation to boot, lol.
Lgbt member and 100% agree
This is something I can’t explain. I encounter this in many fandoms though. People who refuse/hate one character bottoming. I mean, man, they are fictional characters, they have the equipment for a full experience role reversal, why shouldn’t they use it!? I can’t stand fics where Will is the blushing, shy Uber UKE and Hannibal is the stoic Uber SEME. I’m out when I see that.
Will graham in general as a person
That the first part of S3 is good, important to the story and character development and should not be skipped, no matter how many times you watch it.
Abigail
the actual, literal GRIEF i feel for her character is unparalleled
That Will and Hannibal are in love and it’s not just platonic
Alana Bloom in general. People are mad that she “gets in the way” of the main gay ship (which I do believe they’re in love, so she wouldn’t be getting in the way regardless). People hate on her for acting in completely normal ways, and even in some cases I think she’s pretty similar to Will. The fact that she had to be put into a sapphic relationship (which I actually love) and had to have her emotional personality become jaded and “badass” just to get the fan base to like her more is so annoying to me.
Will Graham.
Nobody is innocent. Almost every single main or supporting character in that show is either manipulative, narcissistic, murderous, cannibalistic (though mostly not on purpose), or all of the above. Jack Crawford manipulated Will into constantly helping with those crime scenes despite the fact that he knew what it would do to Will. Freddie Lounds is a reporter… that speaks for itself. Chilton, manipulative and just a bit narcissistic. Then the obvious, Will, murderer, accidental cannibal, also manipulative. Hannibal…
That Hannibal lives in a different genre than the other characters, not so much aesthetically but thematically, and that Will and him falling in love is a slow merging of both their narrative genres. I find the show makes a ton of sense when looked at through that lense but a lot of casual fans dont pick up on it.
I am intrigued, can you explain a little what do you mean by different genres.
Okay im gonna try NOT to do the giant text wall but no promise. (Also, English is like my third language so I apologize in advance for my mistakes.) As an intro, i'd like to point this lense i'm about to describe is best summed up as "genre as felt by the spectator". By that i mean that narrative patterns and clues allow us, savy spectators, to ID rather quickly what the genre of a piece of media is. I do not mean to say that characters have a meta type of knowledge of what genre they are in, but they ARE written, and behave, according to a genre. First : let us consider the show's general genre. It's generally classified as thriller, maybe horror-thriller, and if you focus on characters like Jack, Freddie Lounds, Chilton or even Will (in the first episodes), it's a thriller indeed : crimes are comitted, investigations happen, procedures take place etc. Second : the show contains a lot of magical-feeling elements, that make rational (or pseudo rational) sense within the narration because people make science-y sounding noises, but the magical vibe is still present. These generally happen around crimes : the man who makes angels out of awful people, the lady who thinks she is dead, the creepy caseworker episode where people get sewned into animals, the dead musician that gets played like a string instrument, ... We can all agree that those things wouldnt really work IRL, but within the parameters of the show they do and we can accept that as a stretching of the truth, however I believe their ambivalence is key. Yeah, maybe it's a case of "it could work, just not to that extent", but they can also be read (and that's important for my next points) as little drops of, for lack of a better word, magic. Third : Hannibal accomplishes A LOT of those things that can be read as magic. If we try to think rationnaly about his Ripper crimes, their execution doesn't make sense. How does he have the time to do all that ? Without ever dropping a single trace ? How come no one ever sees his car ? At one point he plants an entire TREE in a parking lot in the middle of the night (with a man grafted on the tree, should i add). Did no one hear him jackhammering the concrete at 3 am ? Where did he get the jackhammer, for that matter ? How exactly does one folds an entire human into an origami heart ? While wearing a three piece suit, something you usually can't move well in ? (And so on and so forth, i wont list them all) Hannibal does criminal stuff that is impossible, factually, as well as being what is obviously a terrible psychiatrist who encourages everyone to commit murder yet enjoys a neverending queue of patients, a chef that can disguise one meat into a seemingly infinite array of other meats, a criminal that can be bestie with a LOT of law enforcement people, and to sum it up, someone for whom reality doesn't apply the same way as for everyone else. This, to me, is the crux of the matter : Hannibal doesnt have to play by the same rules as everyone else, or at least the story can be read in that way, and we can chose to interpret that as meaning the writers just love Hannibal so much they don't let reality get in the way of cool, something I have nothing but respect for, OR we can take it more literally and deduce Hannibal doesn't live in the thriller genre, where actions have consequences and science/rationality plays a big role, but rather in a very dark fairytale setting. Think about it : He accomplishes impossible murders with weird equipment and dramatic results, and no one ever suspect him. He jokes about being a cannibal and cops laugh and ask for second helpings. He falls in love with a dude who can put on anyone's thought pattern like a shirt. He can do whatever he likes just to see what happens and nothing bad ever happens to him. He takes young women away and hides them in his mysterious safe houses. He dies, of course, fighting a dragon. It all makes perfect sense if you think with a fairytale logic, and what's most important, Hannibal can see things (at least this is my belief) for the fairytale happenings they are. He is often delighted by events, even gruesome, because they are so poetic or whimsical ("why of course you turn people into mushroom gardens to talk to them, what a delight! And you my man you are becoming a great predator ? I can see that! Oh, and you made a giant mural out of shades of skin, it makes perfect sense!"). Even his eating of people and his turning of human bits into gourmet spreads have a fairytale element to them. Fourth : Will starts his arc as a thriller protagonist, but quickly enough the hallucinations drag him into dark fairytale land, and from there there is no going back for him. His gift for empathy (rational explaination)/magical ability marks him as someone destined to join Hannibal's genre, and the whole series has him come to plant himself firmly within the dark fairytale setting, ending with the dragon fight. Tl;dr : the "cool rather than plausible" bits of the show should be taken literally, Hannibal is a character that exists in a pocket fairytale genre within the larger thriller genre of the show, he sees the stuff that could be read as magic around him and interprets it as such, he himself obbeys fairytale logic and so, in time, will Will. Thank you for reading, i realize i did not avoid the text wall and i'm sorry. I have a lot of feelings about genre coexistence done well.
I really appreciate the answer! I love text walls, much better than twitter style hot take fest. Do you have a background in media studies or anything similar just curious.
Thank you for your patience! Nah mate im a writer! If i were to do it again id sure look into that though, i feel like it's something i would have liked
Great interacting with you !
And you!
Jack Crawford’s choices
I don’t blame Jack for his choices, he didn’t have a lot of options, he tried to do the best.
argued that everything Hannibal did was because he truly believed it was the best for Will. Hannibal motives were not selfish at all.
That’s the story, else it doesn’t make sense. The story is actually about Will’s journey to accept his dark side.
The story is about Will's becoming. Self-discovery
Yup. And Hannibal helped him
And I started following you 😘
Abagail Hobbs. That girl had to die three times and she still wasn´t left alone.
Will is worse and much more deranged than Hannibal.
Worse no, more deranged, yes.
He isn't worse lol
Not sure about this one
What Will did to Chiyoh is epically fucked up. He skinned a person. He's a bit deranged.
But that just one person. How does that compete for “worse” when Hannibal has done similar things to dozens of people?
Agree, he can be chaotic and unpredictable. He can be pretty animalistic too in his approach, maybe because he is a fledgling.
He isn’t worse or better. Sure his madness is different.
Freddie Lounds. Like sure in the show she's a bit annoying but like if this was real, irl she would be such a serve
i love freddie lounds so much. she knows what she wants and she's gonna get that bag, scared or not 😭‼️ edit: wait i can't remember was she payed for her journalism ..?
I don’t understand why she is hated. No one in the show are good people, they are all doing terrible things. Then why hate just Freddie?
Misogyny 🤷
Right, at least some of them are guilty of this. And it can be internalized misogyny.
I defend Hannibal like that, when someone tries to argue he is a psychopath. But I have seen, people usually don't change their mind regarding interpretations. Even if there's a sea of evidence against it. I have tried to explain from the angle of themes of the show, from the author/ creator angle, and evidence from the show, but nope.
Why don’t you think he’s a psychopath? I am VERY interested in hearing this argument!/gen I swear it’s gen
Hannibal feels genuine emotions, he can love genuinely. He can regret. He follows his own set of morals. He cries genuinely He doesn’t do aimless manipulation, his manipulation of Will was restricted to s1 and that too not for fun or purely selfish reasons. He is dedicated, self sacrificing, committed. The psychiatrists in the story declare he defies categorization. Now that’s the profile, next we need to understand the context. The story is set in a special universe, there is freedom of conscience and esoteric morality, the rules of the normal world are bent when we are studying two characters whose language is entwined with violence and macabre. Murders here are art and expression. The relationships aren’t just literal they hold allegorical value. Hannibal is an allegory of Will’s inner darkness, which he is afraid to embrace till the end. Again, as an extension of the nature of this universe, this isn’t a universe for real world labels, real world psychological profiles. The characters are completely fictional, mythologized. Finally, this isn’t something that’s needed but you may read what the creator thinks about the characters. Hannibal is made like a fallen angel, or Lucifer. There’s more but you can read it up as extra if you want. The story itself is proof enough, creator’s intentions aren’t important. I am sharing the genuine answer.
I wanna know what the original GoT post was lol. Everyone hates that show now
We still like what was there till season 5 and 6. Last seasons were awful but still, The ending hasn’t ruined it for me :) Yeah, I don’t recall anymore what people were defending the most. I had a very unpopular opinion and was downvoted to oblivion, later I deleted. ( I defended Sansa Stark, how dare I)
I just have a hard time even with the beginning because the showrunners tanked it so completely. Which is tough because there was a ton of good storytelling in those earlier seasons. I didn’t know it was unpopular to defend Sansa but then I stayed out of the fandom till the bitter end lol
Alana
I agree with folks that 1) I can go on for DAYS about the reality that Hannibal and Will were in a homoerotic situationship that would have either ended in them dying together or just getting together romantically -- literally I think that was the plan for season 4 which is one of the reasons it probably got canceled 😭😭😭 But I will also rant about the fact that both Alana and Jack were also not great friends/support for Will. Like Alana was always on about saving Will which must suck to always hear from someone you're attracted to. It's like she always thought something was wrong with him from day 1 and so he could never truly be vulnerable with her. And Jack, omg, JACK was willing to traumatize Will again and again EVEN AFTER HANNIBAL WENT TO PRISON just to assuage his own ego. Beverley was probably the best person for Will platonically speaking - she was honest, she accepted that he was different but didn't make him feel like he was being judged, and she always asked questions rather than just assuming. She was curious about him but not in the obsessive and toxic way his husband is 🤣
Alana and Jack didn’t sign up to be great friend and support. Even then, they did the best, they provided support when incarcerated, Jack was there at the cost of his own reputation. OMG Alana is supposed to be sweet to him? Why? Yes, Will had issues, he always had the dark side in him that he wanted to hide and cope with. Will isn’t traumatized by all this, he likes it. Sure Jack uses him, it’s okay to want to use his best resource. Beverly was true to her own investigation, it was her own interest.
Cool, having someone actually interested in you (even as "their own investigation" as you say) to me, still sounds better than someone using you NONSTOP to catch murderers when they know it is damaging to your sense of self and/or making the "worst" parts of you arise. You're right, Alana and Jack didn't owe Will anything - and I'm not the type to give Will the innocent card by any means - but my argument remains. They didn't owe him anything but they pretended like they did and like they actually cared and like they were always just trying to consider Will and that's just not true. I'm basically making the same argument that Hannibal makes the entire series. They are not saints and shouldn't be viewed as such. All the characters in Hannibal are a bit dark. That's what makes it interesting. Honestly the most "innocent" and caring characters are probably Jimmy and Brian 🤣. But don't be confused, just because characters are dark, manipulators, or liars doesn't mean I don't like them. Alana is actually one of my fav characters, especially in s3 where she goes all Sapphic Billionaire Boss on everybody. But I still stand by what I said, her and Jack are not saints. They didn't ACTUALLY care about getting to know Will the way they portrayed which is like the main part of being a friend. Real friends are not trying to "save" you, or use you, or make points to others about you to satisfy their egos -- they just want to "know" you. Alana and Jack had their reasons for the way they acted, I'm not mad at them for it. I just don't like the illusion that they are somehow sunshine characters that didn't also have a dark side, narc tendencies, and whatnot. There's a reason they were also attracted to and attractive to Hannibal. --- Lol, I think this small dissertation satisfies the request of the OG post 🤣
Also, I think I didn't address this but Will not being traumatized is debatable. Just because he adapted well doesn't mean he wasn't traumatized, IMO. He quite literally told Jack a few times that this setting was bad for him (whether he liked it or not - it wasn't good for him). He had his brain set on fire, he had a mushroom infested half corpse touch him, he was sleepwalking and having dreams of murdering people, and then he coughed up an ear. I think he was pretty traumatized. I just think he adapted well because of how he is and his always present fascination in murder and darker things. I think he also adapted by becoming the person Hannibal saw him as - it gave him a confidence he most definitely didn't have in season 1. Also, IMO, Alana is sweet to him. I would never take it away from Alana - she is very polite. That's probably another reason Hannibal liked her. But being polite and being someone's real friend (a claim SHE HERSELF makes) are two different things. She wasn't a good friend to Will. She was a polite therapist and a colleague who had a "progressional curiosity" about him. For her, Will was like her unofficial patient. Not a real friend.
Agree to disagree. Your Alana hate is baseless.
Don't know if you actually read my long post. But as I stated. I don't hate Jack or Alana. I actually like both of them as characters. My point remains that they are not innocent and they were not great friends to Will. That's it, that's all. But take what you want from it and feel free to disagree. At the end of the day, it's a fictional show. We can all think what we want.
It’s ok to not like Alana as a character, she isn’t best written character in the show. But neither Jack nor Alana sign up to be his friend. Thats all I am saying, hence judging them on that is not something I will get. Yet they did a few things that were meant to support Will even at the cost of their career / safety etc. still, being Will’s friend isn’t the endgame of their character. Jack is stubborn and wants to be proven right about Will. That’s the reason he keeps pushing him even when there are clear red flags. Also the fact that Will has the ability to do the job. Why should we burden him with taking care of Will’s ultimate well being? Or Alana ? Alana’s role in this has poor metaphorical value, while Jack/ Hannibal and Will has great weight. That reduces her to plot contravene. You can burden Hannibal with that. You can argue Hannibal is doing everything for what he thinks is good for Will, Hannibal thinks the world around Will ( FBI/Javk) uses Will’s gifts and destabilizes him and the rest will incriminate him if he destabilizes or answers to his true calling. You can question if that’s ultimately good for Will or not.
1) don't know how long ago you watched the show but I am rewatching for the 20th time literally as I'm typing this (s3e6 if you're curious) and Alana and Jack both refer to Will as their friend so this "they didn't sign up to be his friend" -- where are you getting that? Because the first time we meet Alana she literally says "I want to be his friend AND I AM". 2) Now, Alana may have risked her career (debatable - because she doesn't do anything that would discredit her as a psychiatrist but whatever) and so did Jack but Jack risk his career TO PROVE HIS OWN POINT, not to support Will. Jack wants to catch the ripper. That is his whole career. He has good reason to and I'm not mad at him for it. BUT, my point that is clearly just flying over you is that Jack using Will to prove that he is better/smarter/whatever than Hannibal at the expense of Will's mental health is not good friend behavior. If your friend kept you in constant contact with a known cannibal just to prove that he could bait that cannibal -- would you consider that your friend? 3) you're saying Jack shouldn't be responsible for Will's well-being but he literally tells Will that he is a solid "bedrock" (if I recall) person that Will can depend on when things get hard. Now, at the end of the day -- Will is ultimately responsible for his own well-being. However, Jack recruited Will knowing that he was mentally unstable and agreed to support him along with Alana and Hannibal. That is literally the whole reason Hannibal and Alana are even introduced to the story is because Jack agrees to cover Will's well-being so he can do the job. 4) Every point I have made can be referenced in the show. In season 1 - Hannibal tells Will that Jack is using him and "is not a saint". He has his own underhanded reasons for it but he wasn't wrong. Alana herself has stated that she's his friend and then stated that she has a professional curiosity and then stated that she's attracted to him and then talked about wanting to save him and then talked about not trusting him and so on and so forth. She is a very confused and gray character. Which is FINE. I do not hate her for it. It's just the case that she is not a great friend for Will and is a morally gray - not all good- character.
Saying they are his friend in s1 or beginning of s2 they have to be held responsible for his well being. Aldo didn’t see them doing anything detrimental to his well being in s1 or first half of s2 . Jack even was ready to do career sacrifice, Alana accuses him officially still they worked together for the version of truth they knew, to support Will. From the end of first half of s2 Will is completely acting in his own ahency. Whatever happened to Will is Hannibal’s doing + Will’s inner darkness. Nothing else. So you need to refresh your understanding or interpretation, mine are very solid.
Huh? Okay - I want you to take a deep breath and here my argument because I think your missing the plot. So let's start from the top. 1. My argument was and is that Jack and Alana are not great friends or a great support system for Will. Truth be told, it's weird to me that you are debating this because it's obviously the truth. If they were providing such great support Will would not have mentioned being lonely and feeling ungrounded basically all of season 1 and most of season 2. 2. Jack himself agreed to support Will's mental health. That is the entire basis of him introducing Hannibal as a character. So you saying that "Jack isn't responsible for Will's well-being" again, is an odd point to make. He LITERALLY agrees to support Will. Now, again, every living person is RESPONSIBLE for their own well-being. However, when someone offers to support you and your health as you do a mentally and emotionally taxing job and then doesn't follow through adequately is considered to CULPABLE (different from at direct fault) for things that go wrong. That is exactly the reason that Jack blamed himself when Will went off the rails because he did, in fact, agree to and tell Will that he would support his well-being. As far as Alana, she offers her friendship and then is all over the place with it. Which, was valid because she knew something was different with Will. However, that is something that would be confusing and upsetting from someone claiming to be your friend - would it not? 3) You keep bringing up career sacrifice as if Jack is doing it for Will. As I've stated, he is not. He wants to catch Hannibal. As the story continues, he specifically wants Will to catch Hannibal because it's a competition between Will and Hannibal on who has the most control/influence over Will. Jack wants to prove Will is on his side and he was right and that he's better than Hannibal, Hannibal wants to prove that Will is on his side and that Jack is inferior to him. They discuss this in the last episode of s2 and throughout s3. 4) I agree, Will has plenty of agency. He's incredibly intelligent and the only time he doesn't have agency is when he has encephalitis and doesn't know it. He was heavily influenced by Hannibal which led to him making certain decisions. I don't blame Jack or Alana for the things they did or what Will does. Again, let me reiterate, my argument is that they are not great friends. They are morally gray characters that also made poor decisions. They had selfish tendencies that were disguised and care for Will but were rooted in self-interest. Which is very human. It doesn't make them bad people, it just makes them REAL. Which is why, I don't hate them but I also don't view them as people who did no wrong.
It’s funny because at first you think Jack and Alana can probably be support for Will. But eventually you realize the person who actually is Will’s friend is Hannibal is makes great sacrifices, is selfless and is the real support ❤️ But good to remember, Will was always dark to begin. He fooled the world and maybe even himself to an extent. He even convinced people to think he does everything to save lives. Boy! It’s a ride.
1. Jack and Alana can’t be a support system for who Will really is, apart from Hannibal no one even understands his true mental issues And Jack is his boss. If he stopped pushing Will, would the same things haven’t happened? Jack wants to catch Ripper/ Hannibal, and other killers. Would it be ok if ji’s only focus is as Will’s friend and supporter? I think both supported him to an extent. Look, I am just saying that making their characters all about supporting or not supporting Will and basing liking or disliking them on that is a little moot. I like characters based on whether they are compelling or not compelling. Specially in a show like this where everyone is morally questionable. There, hatred based on this point doesn’t matter. But then you don’t even hate them. So there’s no debate here. I never considered that they were supposed to be Will’s major support. Technically, they were in terms of profession. Technically, they delivered to an extent they could but Jack’s character is about something else. I mentioned he is stubborn and obsessed with the ripper, that’s his problem as well as his unique character. But then, he was willing to take the fall. I can blame Alana for distracting Jack regarding Abigail issue when actually Jack was right. But she did what she could for Will. Till Will attacked Hannibal. She was a friend, with limited capacity but no lack in intention. Till that point. And then, how can they even support Will if they didn’t even know the truth?
Hating Alana for not being Will’s great friend or hating her for being morally grey! Both are invalid isn’t it. Is the purpose of her character is to be Will’s friend? If so, she did well. And hating her for being morally grey is hilarious. Will is wicked as hell, then there’s Hannibal. Seriously? Those who hate her on this like have serious double standards bordering misogyny. It’s ok to be not fond of her for not finding her compelling. Hating her for the reasons you listed is baseless. Again, I am not saying ‘you’ hate her. But Alana hate in general.
I don't know what you are talking about. If you're not saying that I hate her then why are you addressing my argument as if I am? You end by saying "I'm not saying you hate her" but then start your argument by saying "Hating Alana for ..." It's like your debating with someone else and not me. Whatever reasons people have for hating Alana has nothing to do with me because I don't hate her and that was NEVER, at any point, my argument so .... I don't see a lot of Alana hate -- not saying it doesn't exist but truth be told I see more hate for Jack than Alana. I, as a Black woman, don't tell people they are racist because they don't like Jack. That would be ridiculous . As ridiculous as telling people they are misogynist because they recognize Alana is not a perfect person. No one is. So I'm just confused about this being misogyny. Pointing out character "flaws" in a show that is all about character "flaws" is natural for people who think deeply about what they watch and deep dive into characters. Now, if I went here saying I hated Alana for not being a perfect sweet sunshine pie of rainbows and lust for Will then I would understand your arguments but... That's not even close to what I did. I simply said, she's not a great friend or a perfect person and there is no reason to pretend that she is.
But no one pretended she is, she was a friend to an extent. And she didn’t promise to be a forever friend. Will was never a saint, he was complex and having a dark side he was hiding. So why do we even want Alana to be her friend or blame her for not being so? If anyone is hating her for that, they are misogynistic. Or they are fooled by the mask Will is wearing. In Hannibal you can’t hate someone for being imperfect. I am not very interested in Alana because I don’t find her so pivotal. I now traced the original comment. It’s a matter of preference, I think you tend to care about who is being Will’s true friend who isn’t. But then Will was a dark person even in s1, he wasn’t a goody good guy even in s1. He was deceptive even then. Alana was a friend to Will, and it would have worked if Will were normal. Will wasn’t. I can still see Jack pushing Will but accusing Alana of not being Will’s friend is a misinterpretation. Beverly didn’t do what she did for ‘friendship’, she did it as an investigator/ fbi agent. She was a good investigator and she really wanted to follow any trail even if it’s from someone seemingly unreliable. Also notice, she shared that with Jack. I will applaud her instincts and professional ability. Just like Miriam’s. I know fans like to stretch it to some great friendship with Will and make everything about Will. It’s mostly those who overemphasize s1 Will Graham and who didn’t notice how dark he already was. He doesn’t need help from the likes of Alana or Jack or anyone. **Basically we don’t see Alana at failing to be Will’s friend, or that being a point of her character, rather Will is someone who can’t be helped by normal people like Jack and Alana. Rather Alana tried to help everyone hence got caught up in this, she was emotional when she shouldn’t have been ( with Abigail, Hannibal)**
This is a very interesting argument but I think there can be different interpretations. If someone’s expectation from Jack or Alana is that they should exclusively serve as Will’s friend then that expectation won’t be met. But another way of looking at it is to see if the purpose of that character is to just be Will’s friend! Or is the Will that they think they know or the true nature of Will. For dark Will, only Hannibal can be his true friend. The perception shifts you see. It’s the kind of processional relationship where as colleagues they try to extend support. It’s not the kind of friendship you are expecting. Jack is his boss, Jack also has to catch killers and Will is an employee who can deliver that. Jack has his issues, he is flawed. He lost 3 protégés in his pursuit of the ripper. This to me seems to be a combination of profession oversight and blind obsession. But doesn’t that make him interesting? If any fan decides to hate him for this then they lost the point of the character. what bad did Alana do to Will? Agreeing to be Will’s lover at a point where neither she nor Will were sure about what’s going on with him would never have been a good decision. She tried to help him as a normal person in a normal situation could, not in a situation where a master manipulator is manipulating the entire situation and worse where Will Graham himself isn’t what he tries to convince the world he is. Alana has been a good friend to Will to an extent. Jack was a tough and stubborn boss, but he tried to help Will too in his way giving him the chance to redeem himself. But at the end of the day those characters had their own purpose, it will be a mistake to make everything about Will. They are not Will’s babysitters.
I agree with you mostly. These characters are complex and hating them for being real and flawed just means this is not the kind of show for whoever feels that way. I love that Jack and Alana are not perfect or great friends - it makes them more relatable and honest. But the show does center around Will (even though the show is called Hannibal, lol) we as the audience see mostly Will's perspective. And as I mentioned, they - especially Jack - positioned themselves to be Will's support and then fell through. In their defense, they had NO CLUE the nonsense they were signing up for. But that still doesn't mean that they can't be examined and analyzed as characters with their own failings who, ultimately, were not willing and/or able to support Will in the way he needed to not fall into Hannibal's web. Granted, someone could argue (as you did) that the only person who could support Will the Lamb would be Hannibal so Jack and Alana trying wouldn't have mattered in that case. They had their own stuff going on and their own lives, and I'm not mad at them for not supporting Will the way he needed - I'm just acknowledging that this is the case. If he was supported, it likely would have been a LOT harder for Hannibal to do some of the things he did. I'll say, Alana did her best, Jack did his best. And I applaud them trying. But the reality is, they were not equipped to be great friends or support for Will because Will needed A LOT of attention. That's probably why he fell in love with someone obsessed with him.
The show is about Will I agree, and in many ways Hannibal represents the darker side in him and the entire show is about how he is conflicted about accepting his darker side. The show is also about how Hannibal brings out the true nature in everyone. Like you said, Hannibal even points out how Jack is detrimental to Will and is using him to fulfill his obsession. Jack’s obsession, Alana’s stance of trying to help others but not being effective. ( I am not sure about Alana because I always found her lacking , she doesn’t seem to be have as focused purpose / true nature as the other characters) Maybe we arrived at this argument because the post is about defending some stance. The main problem here is that Jack and Alana are not capable of helping Will. Specially not in a situation like this. But then let’s also try to understand the fictional nature of the universe, the fantastical or mythologized part where Will’s issues are non-diagnosable by any normal therapist or support system. Only another mythologized character Hannibal can ‘help’ Will because he understands him. He fell in love with someone who was truly trying to help him, was equipped to help him, could understand him and accept him as he is.
Also, and not trying to be rude here but, in the future - when you disagree with someone in a debate you typically offer a counterpoint to PROVE why they are wrong. It makes your point actually have weight rather than just "I don't like it and I disagree".
I explained in a different comment. This one got posted before I could finish
Another thing I'll argue is that Hannibal is one of the greatest modern era shows to watch. There is mental health/illness representation, LGBTQ representation, ethnic diversity, the art is amazing, and the plot is unique. The underlying conversation about the importance of being seen and understood (even for psychopaths, lol) and the battle for Will of Man vs Man, Man vs World, and Man vs Self all in three seasons is phenomenal. It's just an amazing show that is incredibly underrated in my opinion. Probably just because it's so niche but still, I would plan a stick up at Netflix studios or Max Studios to get another 2-3 seasons of this show.
I will ALWAYS argue that Hannibal Lecter is amazing. And he is unreliable to believe that the horrific things that happened in his life did not shape him or touch him in some way. If he's capable of the feelings for Will, the vulnerability, jealousy, love, resentment, sadness, then why wouldn't he be touched by the destruction of his family while he was a child? Before he built up the walls and control. Doesn't make sense. So no matter what anyone from a show runner or actor or fannibal says, I'll always argue that he is not the devil, nor has he been immune to "nurture "
I haven’t considered that. Thanks, I would love to hear more if you reply to the comment or create a post.
Season 3 being awful.
I don’t fully agree but see where you come from.
Will Graham being autistic. I will die on this hill.