Ron Does Stuff

Season 2! I’m finally going to watch the second season of this show…more than a decade since it was released. Better late than never, I guess?

During the season finale, we saw Will figure out that Hannibal was the one framing him but he can’t do anything about it right now because he’s the main suspect behind the copycat killings that stemmed from the Garrett Jacob Hobbs case. Aside from Will, nobody from the FBI has figured out that Hannibal is the copycat killer and the Chesapeake Ripper.

This first episode opens with Hannibal and Crawford fighting in the kitchen what the fuck? It’s a pretty full-on fight with knives and kitchen implements being used and ends with Crawford being stabbed in the neck? Again, what the fuck? And then we get transported back to 12 weeks earlier. So this definitely happened.

Twelve weeks earlier, Hannibal was feeding Crawford sashimi. Or what he says is sashimi because when he tells Crawford “He was a flounder” when Crawford asked about the fish the immediate thought in my head is he just fed Crawford a human. We also get acknowledgement of Hannibal Rising with the mention of Hannibal’s aunt Murasaki. As evidenced by my review of Hannibal Rising, I mostly focused on Gaspard Ulliel.

As they eat, they talk about the aftermath of Will being caught as the Chesapeake Killer copycat. Crawford feels some guilt while Hannibal puts up a veneer of grief, because we know he’s not grieving Will.

And what about Will? Will is in Chilton’s hospital being psychoanalyzed by Chilton. Or at least Chilton tries to psychoanalyze him. Will’s not interested because the only doctor he wants to talk to is Hannibal. That’s the way love goes, I guess!

Back at the FBI, Miranda Hobbes is questioning Crawford’s decisions when it comes to Will and tells him that there’s going to be an internal investigation happening because of the report that Alana Bloom made on his actions when it came to Will. Despite her best efforts, Miranda Hobbes is unable to convince Alana Bloom to recant her report, a frustrating development that she will probably be discussing with Carrie and the girls when she gets back to New York.

Hannibal, meanwhile, has gone to his girl friend Bedelia to ask for advice about meeting Will. Bedelia sees that these two murderous homos are down bad for each other and that they’ll careen towards each other whatever she says, so she just prods Hannibal to get him to say what it is he wants from Will.

When the two of them finally meet again after Hannibal essentially framed Will for all of his murders, Will tells Hannibal that the voice in his head now sounds like Hannibal, which I’m sure got Hannibal a little chubbed up. Will tells Hannibal that there’s going to be a reckoning once he figures out what Hannibal did to him and Hannibal has that smile on his face that just tells Will that he’s not expecting that to happen anytime soon.

And that might be because with Will in prison, Hannibal is now the new “Will Graham”, off to investigate a bunch of bodies that just floated out of the water somewhere in the United States. It excites him so much he even tells Bedelia about it. He also reminds Bedelia that as much as she thinks she knows him, she doesn’t really know what he’s capable of. Very much a threat.

Over at Chilton’s hospital, Alana is trying to help Will come up with a legal defense but unbeknownst to either of them, Chilton is listening in on their conversation. I like this callback to The Silence of the Lambs movie! Alana tries to help Will recover his memories but it proves to be too intense for Will. That said, the imagery? The music? Perfectly unsettling. Brave to the team.

Over at Hannibal’s home, Chilton is spilling what he’s heard to Hannibal, sounding just like Gretchen Weiners on the phone with Regina George. He thinks that Will is a psychopathic murderer so he misses it when Hannibal flat out tells him that he’s the psychopathic murderer.

However, Hannibal is a psychopathic murderer that the FBI isn’t concerned with right now. The team is having a hard time trying to connect the dots with this episode’s killer of the week, and Beverly Katz turns to Will Graham for help. Maybe I’m overthinking this but their interaction kinda mirrors that of Clarice and Hannibal in The Silence of the Lambs. Even if the filmmakers didn’t intend for it to be that way, that movie has had such an effect on culture and the media that came after it so it can’t help but seep through, especially in this show that is part of the franchise.

While Will’s incarcerated, Crawford pays a visit to his home, which is where Alana finds him. Alana still thinks that Will did all those killings, while Crawford seems open to being convinced otherwise. They still think that Will isn’t accepting responsibility because he doesn’t remember anything, not knowing that Will has got the clearest view of the situation.

And then we end with the latest victim of the latest “criminal of the week” — and wouldn’t you know it he’s making an eye just as I was talking about Will having the clearest view.