NBC's Hannibal

[Roose Seal]

That trailer was gorgeous. Loved the "Stand By Me" cover.

I've wanted to get into this series for a while, not only because I've heard many good things, but also because it just looks so stylish and beautiful from promos and such (the atmosphere, the lighting, the set design, the cinematography, the food porn, etc. etc.). The problem is that I've heard the murders and the show in general are very disturbing. I watched The X-Files for the entirety of its run, so I'd like to think I have a strong stomach, but I'm not sure I can handle it. That trailer, though...ugh, so beautiful.

The murder scenes can be .. quite gruesome

the mushroom murders were certainly some of the weirdest and grossest shit I've seen on network TV.. or that woman whose skin just peeled off ....

but to me it's so stylized and over the top that it loops back to either ridiculous or beautiful.

Imo, in terms of actual scariness, the show doesn't come close to X-Files episodes like Roadrunners or Home....

Also, about the spoiler in the trailer, I'm guessing that if they put it in there then it can't be that much of a spoiler and it's probably a huge red herring (a red tuna?).

[Shryke]

People complain about too ambiguous, or not enough. Never enough to please all parties.

This could set itself up for a great series three where Hannibal is the one in prison and it deals with his consulting from the inside. To be honest, they could do the movies after this with Clarice if they wanted to. I wouldn't mind having Jodie Foster burned from my brain.

That's S4 (ie - Red Dragon).

S2 we're likely to see Will as the serial killer consultant and the whole thing ending with his exoneration and freedom.

S3 is the discovery of/hunt for Hannibal and ends with Hannibal behind bars.

S4 opens some time later as Will reunites with Hannibal to reenact Red Dragon in some capacity.

[Shryke]

The murder scenes can be .. quite gruesome

the mushroom murders were certainly some of the weirdest and grossest shit I've seen on network TV.. or that woman whose skin just peeled off ....

but to me it's so stylized and over the top that it loops back to either ridiculous or beautiful.
Imo, in terms of actual scariness, the show doesn't come close to X-Files episodes like Roadrunners or Home....

Also, about the spoiler in the trailer, I'm guessing that if they put it in there then it can't be that much of a spoiler and it's probably a huge red herring (a red tuna?).

It more seems disturbing and beautiful at the same time. It's horrifying more then it's gruesome of Boo-jump-scary.

[Shryke]

Anyway, just discovered this show a few weeks and ago and finished it tonight. Great first season. Really well written, fantastic leads and easily the most beautiful show filmed ... maybe ever. Just stunning direction all over.

Will be very interesting to see this new season. I was expecting it to end with Will gone crazy but I was not expecting him to catch on to Hannibal till next season. Should be interesting to see where they take their relationship.

[red snow]

...

Also, about the spoiler in the trailer, I'm guessing that if they put it in there then it can't be that much of a spoiler and it's probably a huge red herring (a red tuna?).

I hope so. I think it may have happened in the past as there were times with hallucinations by Will of him doing things he hadn't done. Maybe the spoilery scene is just a nightmare of Will's.

Anyway, just discovered this show a few weeks and ago and finished it tonight. Great first season. Really well written, fantastic leads and easily the most beautiful show filmed ... maybe ever. Just stunning direction all over.

I agree it's extremely gothic in the sense the gruesome is almost artistic which then makes it even more disturbing (but at the same time better than just outright shock). It's weird to see the same stylings that was evident in "pushing daisies" but inverted.

Not sure if you are watching "true detective" but if you are loving the visuals in this show it's a must.

[Datepalm]

It more seems disturbing and beautiful at the same time. It's horrifying more then it's gruesome of Boo-jump-scary.

I found it too pretty - It is gorgeous - to take seriously. Nothing that beautiful can be in any way disturbing, because nothing that beautiful can be real. That thing with the mushroom had me laughing hysterically, and at that point I decided the whole thing had to be parody and have been enjoying it as a comedy ever since. All the lovely compositions of dead bodies, the perfectly framed, perfectly shot sequences of Will - beautiful, beautiful Will, with his perfectly touselled hair and perfectly haunted eyes - going mad, Hannibals gorgeous office and suits, the lovely - but incredibly ridiculous - brutalism and concrete of the academy - all of it makes me giggle, every single time. It must be satire of the sexualization and glamourization of violence that's everywhere else on tv in a deniable, cruder form, right? Right?

ETA - Apropos, just saw this piece on a Marxist take of Hannibal. I think it's a little messy, but interesting - draws attention to Hannibal as a consumer and the role art plays in the show.

[Shryke]

I don't get how it can be too pretty to take seriously. The combination of beauty with incredibly disturbing imagery is what makes the show. It's a deliberate stylistic choice that's a reflection both of Hannibal himself, as the ultimate tasteful gentleman connoisseur, and the baroque source material. (It's also apparently an attempt to make it not feel like a generic serial killer procedural of which there are a million these days)

It's not trying to be shocking like a cheap horror movie, it's trying to be disturbing by in many ways deliberately avoiding gore. Every crime scene is meant not to be gruesome and disgusting, but haunting and horrifying and disturbing. Not bloody and stomach-churning so you want to look away, but beautiful so you can't look away and yet ridiculously unbelievably fucked up. One of the most disturbing moments in the show isn't any of the murder scenes but the part in Ep3 where Abigail is sitting on a chair at her home, clutching a pillow in fright only for the realisation to slowly dawn on her that her serial killer father made the thing and she tears it open to realise it's full of human hair from the girls he murdered. That's the feeling the show is going for.

Like Hannibal himself, the show is all about a beautiful elegant surface disguising and almost making palatable a truly terrifying and horrific underbelly. Every scene of him eating is like an incredibly contrast between the clean, organized, sane elegance of his environment overlain by the knowledge that he's eating people.

This whole style is based on the source material's style, which is the point. And it is somewhat a comment on the crass thrills of most of the other TV procedurals that are more like scholcky horror movies in that their violence is almost pornographic. "Here's your blood and guts, are you not entertained?!"

I can't understand what's funny about it at all. I don't think it's ridiculous, which is the only way I can see someone getting that reaction.

PS - Also, what's ridiculous about the brutalist architecture of the academy? It's pretty bog standard for university and public buildings from the 60s/70s. My first university had buildings that looked exactly like that. Fuck, it's filmed in Toronto so it could be in or based on classrooms there.

[Shryke]

Apropos, just saw this piece on a Marxist take of Hannibal. I think it's a little messy, but interesting - draws attention to Hannibal as a consumer and the role art plays in the show.

I liked this piece alot even if it is, as you say, a bit jumbled. I never thought of the differences between Hannibal and Will, the elegant detachment vs the messy human attachment in a consumerist context. And his comments about the FBI and their building and the way they work is insightful.

Hannibal as a man all about surfaces is really well covered by it though. He is a man all about appearance. Hence his hatred of rudeness but not of, say, murder.

Although interestingly this show's Hannibal is himself desperately seeking a deeper human connection which is why he's so obsessed with Will.

[Datepalm]

This whole style is based on the source material's style, which is the point. And it is somewhat a comment on the crass thrills of most of the other TV procedurals that are more like scholcky horror movies in that their violence is almost pornographic. "Here's your blood and guts, are you not entertained?!"

I can't understand what's funny about it at all. I don't think it's ridiculous, which is the only way I can see someone getting that reaction.

That's it exactly - It slips over from mere commentary and into actual, full on satire for me, and an effective and funny one at that.

It's not just the violence that is pornographic...it's all a little pornographic. It's so aestheticized - consciously, obviously, meticulously - that it all looks like a parody of that kind of fetishization, rather than just the fetishization itself. Food porn, clothes porn - those have become turns of phrase: here they are. The naked and contorted dead female body is fetishized by the camera into being attractive on another show - on this one it's fetishized by the killer itself.

But the characters, particularly Will and Hannibal are also...well...they're...I mean...to quote this ancient Harry Potter on why Draco is sexy:

Finally, the text often seems to me to actively encourage the reader—or at the very least its adolescent female readership—to not only sympathize with Draco but also to find him slightly erotically appealing, by the mere virtue of showing him getting physically hurt so very often.

Oh, come on now! Don't look at me like that. You all know what I'm saying here. It's the old "Hurt-Comfort" phenomenon, is what this is, and we all know about it, even if we like to pretend that we don't.

What "Hurt-Comfort" comes down to is the fact that women are just plain Bent, and adolescent girls even more so. They like to see male characters suffer, so long as they do so with some degree of manly dignity, because it turns them on. Male vulnerability garners their sympathy, and it also kind of excites them. They like it. No one ever wants to 'fess up to this, but it's true. Just look at the characters most often fixated upon as drool-worthy by JKR's adult female readers, will you? Lupin. Sirius. Snape.

We all know what's really going on there, don't we? Are we all grown-up enough to admit it? All three of those characters have erotic appeal primarily because they all suffer so much. Lupin's kindness wouldn't alone be sufficient to make him so sexy; it's all of that exhaustion and illness and emotional damage that really nets in the fans. Sirius without all those years spent in Azkaban wouldn't have nearly the following that he has. And Snape...well, it's all that angst that does it, right?

Maybe i've just spent too much time reading fanfic, and more time reading analysis of fanfic, but "Will Graham," as a construct, is, well, it's an eroticized dynamic. Whenever he wanders off alone to his lonely log cabin alone but for stray dogs alone to be tortured and gaslighted by Hannibal and generally stand around looking so, so pretty and so, so broken...look, it's basically also porn. Porn porn. Person porn, if you will. Hannibal - with his suits and wit and the fact we know he's going to lose - is likewise almost a parody of the charismatic villain.

The thing is, it's just all so obvious, so on the surface - it's not something that needs to be teased and analyzed out of it, it's just what it's doing, frankly and unapologetically, and that's just...funny to me.

[red snow]

you could argue that Hannibal is aware of this "hurt-comfort" theory and he's the one getting a bit of a kick out of it? He does seem to be conflicted with wanting to be Will's friend yet at the same time totally screwing him over.

[Datepalm]

you could argue that Hannibal is aware of this "hurt-comfort" theory and he's the one getting a bit of a kick out of it? He does seem to be conflicted with wanting to be Will's friend yet at the same time totally screwing him over.

In that Will is appealing to Hannibal precisely because he's so messed up, and Hannibal is keeping him that way so he stays cute?

[red snow]

In that Will is appealing to Hannibal precisely because he's so messed up, and Hannibal is keeping him that way so he stays cute?

Pretty much. I wouldn't go so far as to call it homo-erotic but Hannibal has a messed up way of expressing friendship towards him. I think he likes to see how Will copes with these things although I guess he's disappointed with him at the moment.

[Datepalm]

Pretty much. I wouldn't go so far as to call it homo-erotic but Hannibal has a messed up way of expressing friendship towards him. I think he likes to see how Will copes with these things although I guess he's disappointed with him at the moment.

Ooh, I like that take. That he doesn't just like seeing broken-battered-Will, but also broken-battered-but-bravely-struggling-and-coping-Will. I don't know that I wouldn't call it homoerotic either. Not in an overt, slashy sense maybe, but the way a lot of his 'artwork' gifts to Will are sexualized and the sensuality of all the food and stuff, there's some kind of current of sexuality running through the relationship, at least in the way it's portrayed to the viewer.

[Shryke]

That's it exactly - It slips over from mere commentary and into actual, full on satire for me, and an effective and funny one at that.

It's not just the violence that is pornographic...it's all a little pornographic. It's so aestheticized - consciously, obviously, meticulously - that it all looks like a parody of that kind of fetishization, rather than just the fetishization itself. Food porn, clothes porn - those have become turns of phrase: here they are. The naked and contorted dead female body is fetishized by the camera into being attractive on another show - on this one it's fetishized by the killer itself.

But the characters, particularly Will and Hannibal are also...well...they're...I mean...to quote this ancient Harry Potter on why Draco is sexy:

Maybe i've just spent too much time reading fanfic, and more time reading analysis of fanfic, but "Will Graham," as a construct, is, well, it's an eroticized dynamic. Whenever he wanders off alone to his lonely log cabin alone but for stray dogs alone to be tortured and gaslighted by Hannibal and generally stand around looking so, so pretty and so, so broken...look, it's basically also porn. Porn porn. Person porn, if you will. Hannibal - with his suits and wit and the fact we know he's going to lose - is likewise almost a parody of the charismatic villain.

The thing is, it's just all so obvious, so on the surface - it's not something that needs to be teased and analyzed out of it, it's just what it's doing, frankly and unapologetically, and that's just...funny to me.

I don't see it. Will is not meant to be eroticized and I don't believe he is. I mean, yes, he's an attractive man, but he's not supposed to be pretty and broken, he's shown an someone we can empathize with. The very deliberately has virtually all of the on-screen violence committed by Will and then shows how it fucks him up because he's our gateway into the violence being non-pornographic. The aftermath is almost artistic but the act itself is horrifying in both it's presentation and the way we see it effect our protagonist. They are creating an emotional connection between the viewer and Will not for the purpose of erotic suffering but in order to connect the viewer to the horror and violence of what's going on.

The same issue with your view of Will crops up with your view of Hannibal's obsession with him. It's not sexual or sensual at all. He's not cute to Hannibal, this isn't about "hurt-comfort" or anything. He is interesting to Hannibal (which he comes right out and says). And even more then that, he's someone who Hannibal thinks can be his friend. There's nothing remotely sexual or close to it going on there. He doesn't wanna fuck him he wants to be his friend and hang out with him and kill people with him maybe. (we see some of the same kind of thing with Hannibal and Abigail)

Maybe it is what you say, the whole fanfiction thing since so much of this strikes me as a shipping or slashfic type reading of the material. Like the thing you quote talking about Draco which is just completely out there.

But maybe that's the mindset you need for that. The kind of person who reads Harry Potter and thinks Draco is sexy maybe watches this show and sees comedy. I don't know. I just don't personally find it a very ... I guess accurate way of approaching the material in either situation.

[Jace, Extat]

Poking my head in to make some observations.

Thank you to the people on the first page or so who's glowing praise convinced me to watch this show. I'm only half way through the first episode, but this is... compelling.

I shouldn't be doing it in the dark, it's creepy as hell.

The guy who's the consultant is brilliant. It's also brilliant to show him deconstructing the scenes before he recommits the act himself, that gives the actor sooo much cool stuff to work with. He also really sells the anxiety/antisocial bit very well.

Lawrence Fishburn? Yes, please.

I literally just saw the intro for Dr. Lector, flawless. Both the delivery of the line 'he's eating them' and then the good Dr. eating his meal. That's where I'm at, and from here I go!

[Datepalm]

But maybe that's the mindset you need for that. The kind of person who reads Harry Potter and thinks Draco is sexy maybe watches this show and sees comedy. I don't know. I just don't personally find it a very ... I guess accurate way of approaching the material in either situation.

Funny is not the accurate surface reading, no, but finding Will hot is a surface reading. (As is the homoerotic subtext between him and Hannibal. Hannibal doesn't want to fuck him, but the show calls out and stages the relationship in various ways that have a sexualized/romantic edge. It's not text - it's subtext. It's why it's called the subtext.) Empathizing with Will and finding him all broken and pretty and damaged - because he feels so much! And it fucks him up so much! Won't someone help him!? - is totally, totally uncontradictory in any way. You (or me, for that matter - he does nothing for me) might not be the target audience, but Will is sexy. You probably don't find Twilight hot either!

[Shryke]

Funny is not the accurate surface reading, no, but finding Will hot is a surface reading. (As is the homoerotic subtext between him and Hannibal. Hannibal doesn't want to fuck him, but the show calls out and stages the relationship in various ways that have a sexualized/romantic edge. It's not text - it's subtext. It's why it's called the subtext.)

I don't see that subtext in any of their interactions. I don't believe it's there. Nothing about how their relationship is shown was a romantic edge to it.

Empathizing with Will and finding him all broken and pretty and damaged - because he feels so much! And it fucks him up so much! Won't someone help him!? - is totally, totally uncontradictory in any way. You (or me, for that matter - he does nothing for me) might not be the target audience, but Will is sexy. You probably don't find Twilight hot either!

I don't think Twilight is hot for various reasons, but it's really obvious that what it's going for. It's not like it's subtle. There's a difference between "it's not working on me" and "that's not even what they are going for".

[Arthmail]

I see no romantic inclination, on any level, between Will and Hannibal. To Hannibal, Will is, like himself, an anomaly. A point to be studied. It is partly a way to find a friend, but that reflects Hannibal's fucked up inability to connect with people, which is understandable considering he eats them.

And Will is not pretty. He's a mess, and he's presented as nothing else. His clothing, his interactions, they are not pretty. He's terrible at them. Hannibal is presented as the charm in the show, the stylized version of what people admire in others. Successful, well dressed, well spoken, cooks a mean human.

[Datepalm]

You guys are nuts. Will is hot. Seriously. This isn't my weird thing - the clothes, the rumpledness, the fragility, the whole thing - smoking hot. Check Tumblr (which is impossible to link to, apparently) if you don't believe me.

[Sci-2]

You guys are nuts. Will is hot. Seriously. This isn't my weird thing - the clothes, the rumpledness, the fragility, the whole thing - smoking hot. Check Tumblr (which is impossible to link to, apparently) if you don't believe me.

+1. I want him to reconstruct the crime in my pants.

(yes I know that makes no sense at all)

eta: Oh, Arthmail has terrible taste in men anyway. He doesn't think China Mieville is hot.