Hannibal: Savoureux Recap [Season Finale]

All I have to say is that Bryan Fuller is goddamn lucky there is going to be a second season because if he had left things like that I would have found him, shanked him, and baked him into… I don’t know. Bread or something. Because that ending was extremely rude, Mister Fuller.

The Fannibals would not have taken very kindly to it at all.

Okay, it was kind of an awesome season finale but it would have been beyond frustrating as a series finale. I mean, we can live with this ending because we know there is a second season. That is really the only reason you are safe, sir. We need you. We can’t go about eating you. Yet. But I’m getting way too ahead of myself. Because this is an episode that needs a step by step #feels break down. Are you ready for the emotions, sadness, frustration, and feels that come from this episode. No. You’re not. I mean, if the trailer was as bad as it was how do you think the episode was going to turn out? Prepare for an onslaught of symbolism and throwbacks.

You’ve been warned.

Sometime between the last time we saw Will arriving back at the Dulles airport and the beginning of this episode Will somehow managed to make it home and get in bed without anyone realizing. Considering Hannibal had basically told Jack that Will was the copycat you’d think they’d at least have a cruiser at his house watching for him to sneak back in or something. Everyone knows Will wouldn’t abandon his dogs for long. But no. Will manages to get home, get to sleep, and have one trippy ass dream about hunting the raven feathered stag, shooting it, and having it turn out to be some human/wendigo nightmare creature.

When he wakes up the fever is back, he’s freaking out, and he vomits up his meds in the sink. Where he finds an ear. Yeah. It kind of looks like he vomits up the ear and maybe he thought that for a split second but no. That didn’t happen. That said. There is still an ear in his sink. And we all know whose ear it’s going to be.

Cue a sad, emotionally wrecked Will Graham on his porch covered in dirt waiting for an always daper Hannibal to come help him figure things out. Which is basically Will telling Hannibal about going to Minnesota and Abigail being missing and, you know, the ear in his sink. If we didn’t know that Hannibal was setting Will up then his reaction would be pretty reasonable. There is an ear in the sink. Will is crazy. Abigail is gone and that she had run off because she was afraid of him. Yeah. He tells Will to get dressed and calls Jack Crawford.

A+ acting once again, Mads. You bastard.

Jack shows up with the team because apparently no one cares about a conflict of interest or anything like that. I feel like just basic law enforcement protocol says that you don’t investigate your own. I mean, Jack just acts like an asshole to Will and Beverly is the only one who can even look at him when they go in. Clearly they are too close to this investigation. Not that Jack cares when his people get too close to investigations but still. I feel like the only reason his own team doesn’t arrest him is because they don’t actually do that. And, god, one of the most depressing scenes is watching all the dogs brought out and then hearing Winston whimpering from outside the car after the agents put Will in their SUV to drive him to prison. Winston. Baby. Don’t cry.

Back at the bureau the lab team is back again processing Will’s things, taking pictures of the dirt and scratches all over him, and basically doing things they probably just… shouldn’t be doing. And of course no one except Beverly even cares. Because Jimmy and Brian are kind of douches. Let’s be honest. Except even Beverly doesn’t so much as give Will any sort of benefit of the doubt but instead makes him accept the reality of what is going on, the evidence they are finding, and the fact that it looks like he killed Abigail.

Alana isn’t necessarily ready to accept that fact. Well, maybe she’s ready to accept it but that doesn’t mean she’s happy about it. Jack keeps saying “blah blah blah this isn’t my fault” and “Hannibal said Will was fine.” To which she’s just frustrated and infuriated. And I would be, too. Goddamn it, Jack. From the very beginning she had said not to put him in the field and yet here you are running around and ruining people’s lives.  Alana is the only one that seems to still believe that something else is wrong with Will – though she also had no problem doubting that he’s also crazy and killed Abigail.

She goes to see him in prison and it’s like one of the most heartbreaking scenes ever. They had both wanted to be together and now they can’t be together and she’s going to go get his dogs and take care of them for him… I just had so many Alana/Will #feels. Tears. They poured down my face. Of course, then she has to do some psychopathology tests on Will because Jack is an asshole and doesn’t get that you don’t ask people’s friends to do this sort of thing. Like seriously. And apparently he didn’t pick up on the fact that they totally had a thing for one another because the first he heard of it was behind a two way mirror. Jack, seriously. How the hell are you the head of the BAU? Do you not pick up on anything?

CAROLINE DHAVERNAS MADE ME CRY IN THE EDITING ROOM #HANNIBAL #EMMYALDENTE

— Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) June 21, 2013

At least Alana is smart enough to pick up on something. When Will mockingly mentions the clocks Hannibal had him draw she sort of seems to get wise to something or another. Like she’s starting to doubt Hannibal’s abilities or at least she’s doubting something about Hannibal. I want to root for Alana to figure out everything but at the same time… I don’t want her to die. And I don’t think Hannibal really wants to have to kill her, either. He’s running out of friends.

Which, by the way, holy shit emotion from Hannibal. While all this is going on he’s meeting with Bedelia de Maurier (Gillian Anderson) and crying. And, like… it’s legit crying? I think? I mean, it sure as hell seems like it. Grieving for Abigail and the loss of whatever potential that relationship had. And also probably grieving for Will Graham. Who Bedelia really wants Hannibal to cut himself off from for whatever reason. You know, I just don’t know what to think about her. She says some things and I’m just like, ‘Gurl, what do you know?‘ Because she knows some stuff just… does she know everything? I’m just so confused.

#HANNIBAL‘S FEELINGS FOR ABIGAIL HOBBS ARE REFLECTIVE OF HIS ATTACHMENT TO HIS SISTER MISCHA AND HER LOSS #EMMYALDENTE

— Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) June 21, 2013

Probably not as confused as Will, though. The lab techs found remains wrapped up in his fishing lures (remember that scene from Ouef? Cuef? Whatever the hell Bryan Fuller wants to call it…) where Hannibal is taking are of Will’s dogs and sees all the fly fishing lures he makes? Yeah. Hannibal took remains from four different murders – the first copy cat murder, Abigail’s friend, Dr. Sutcliffe, and Georgia Madchen – and wrapped them up in lures. Once again perfectly framing Will. And Jack – because he’s an asshole – won’t listen to Will’s ramblings that someone is trying to frame him. He didn’t listen last episode so he’s clearly not going to listen this episode. Alana doubts it entirely, though. Good on you, Alana. Have faith. It will be rewarded. Someday. If Will ever proves he’s not the copycat killer.

Which he’s not really doing a good job of right now with all the hallucinating and shit. I mean, you can’t blame him too much. He’s still sick. He’s being faced with murder charges for five murders now and Jack won’t listen to a thing he has to say. It’s become very clear to Will that someone is setting him up but he just can’t do anything about it. It’s frustrating. For him and for us. And then Jack goes and starts questioning whether or not he’s even crazy and maybe he’s just faking all of it and faked the clock test. I just… I can’t with Jack. I really can’t any more. And then he goes with Alana to talk to Hannibal and Hannibal gets yet another chance to screw Will over and make everyone think he’s gone crazy and become a killer.

And of course when Will escapes from custody (the exact same way that Dr. Gideon escaped custody) the first thing he does is go to Hannibal because even though he’s starting to see what’s going on he hasn’t put two and two together.

At this point in the episode I was a bit furious because we had passed the halfway point so my theories from last week’s post on how this season was going to end were basically confirmed.

One of the most heartbreaking moments of probably this entire episode comes after Jack and Alana have left and Will is sitting in Hannibal’s upstairs library. Will admits that if it had just been Abigail that they said he killed he would have believed them. The evidence is there. He’s broken and very damaged. He would have believed that he just got too far into Hobbs’s head and just couldn’t shake him. But the fact that they are trying to pin the other murders on him is what pushes him too hard. But he’s not a killer. He knows that. Or he thinks he knows that. “I know who I am.” “No, all sense of who you are has been distorted by your illness. You know who you are in this moment. That’s not always the case, Will.”

Goddamn it, Hannibal.

Will is adamant that he didn’t kill anyone and that someone is trying to make sure no one else believes that. Hannibal pretends to help him by walking him through how he could have killed all these people “in order to prove that he did not.” Yeah. Sure. He just gives Will all these ideas at how he could have done it. Then when Will asks to go to Minnesota and see where Abigail died Hannibal drives him. I feel like Will should be wondering why Hannibal is so willing to stick his neck out like this but hey. Jack and Alana realize that Hannibal is missing and go to check with Bedelia to see if Hannibal has been around which he hasn’t. And to make it look like Will has kidnapped him he doesn’t call in to cancel his appointment which is something he would have otherwise considered rude.

Bedalia then says, “If anyone could have helped [Will] Graham it would have been Hannibal. In fact, he may still be drying.” Because the show is mocking us and our cries for help on Will’s behalf. Bryan Fuller, I swear to God.

In Minnesota, Will and Hannibal go back to Abigail’s house where she was killed. No body was found – Will thinks it’s because if he did kill her then he would have ‘honored every part of her’ as Garrett Jacob Hobbs would have. But we all know it’s because Hannibal wanted to eat her. Instead there is a ton of blood. As they walk through the house, Will starts to think and remember. He remembers the phone call that was made that tipped off Hobbs. He remembers when Abigail suggested re-enacting the crime with him as her father, Alana as her mother, and Hannibal as the man on the phone. Will knows that’s a clue but isn’t sure why.

Seeing where Abigail didn’t exactly help. Nor does Hannibal’s psychoanalysis hypothesizing that this was always Will’s plan and that he had come to Minnesota not to prove the existence of the copycat but to kill Abigail. To “find himself.” To find the killer within him. But that was never how Will worked. Yes, he got inside of the minds of killers and yes he sometimes let them inside his own mind. But he was never a killer. I mean, look at how Garrett Jacob Hobbs’s death affected him. Jack mentions back in the second episode that a large part of why Will didn’t make it as a cop was because he couldn’t pull the trigger. Presumably even when he should have pulled it. So while Hannibal continues trying to make him think it really was him that’s when it finally clicks for Will. It’s a fantastic scene. Hannibal trying to spin things one way and Will just realizing exactly what it was that Hannibal was doing. Maybe if Hannibal hadn’t called Will’s potential urges to kill – which I truthfully believe he does not have nor has ever actually had except when profiling – “inspirations” then Will wouldn’t have quite figure it out.

It was a poor choice of words that gave Hannibal away. Immediately after Will turned around and pulled a gun on Hannibal. Who asked him if killing him would make Will feel good. And it wouldn’t have. It really wouldn’t have. I think that you can see that. As much as he’s been toyed with and as angry as he is I don’t think it would have made him feel any better. And Will does get pretty upset. He basically has everything figured out. When Hannibal asks Will what reason he would have to be a killer that’s when it really all comes together. An intelligent psychopath with no discernible motive. He gets really emotional when he realizes that everything Hannibal has done was just to see what he would do. That all Hannibal did with people was, “Wind ’em up and watch ’em go.”

Unforunately, Jack hears very little of this. He comes in at the end and, honestly, anything that Hannibal would have said in response would never betray what he had actually done. Probably because he smelled Jack or something. Either way Will is standing there with a gun in his hand and Jack can’t just let him shoot Hannibal. For a minute it looks like Will might even put the gun down but he raises again to kill Hannibal and Jack shoots him.

Yeah. Jack shoots Will in the kitchen where Will shot Garrett Jacob Hobbs. He falls in the exact same place and before he looses consciousness says, “See?” And then sees Hannibal turn into the human/wendigo hybrid bastard creature.

At least he doesn’t die, I guess. The doctors figure out the encephalitis thing – which Alana has figured out earlier in the episode – and treat him. Hannibal and Jack both pat each other on the back and tell each other neither is to blame for what happened to Will when both of these bastards are to blame.

You know what, though?

At least the doctors helped Will Graham?

Hannibal goes over to Bedelia’s for dinner after he cooks some veal dish for her. Veal. Really, Hannibal? That is so not subtle at all and I swear to God Bedelia knows she’s eating Abigail. Just… I don’t know what she knows. The things she says and the way she says them is so ambiguous and vague. She could know everything or nothing. She also says something about worrying that Will would have been the patient to finally cost Hannibal his life. And she just didn’t seem to mean it in the sort of way that would have meant Will would have killed him. I just… she knows something. She also tells him that he shouldn’t be involved with Will any more and that he shouldn’t be involved in Will’s rehabilitation. To which he seems to agree.

He does, however, go to visit him and say good bye. For those of you who watch the show you may recognize the very dramatic- and very loud, I don’t know why it was so loud – opera score that’s playing as Hannibal walks through the corridors of the Baltimore Hospital for the Criminally Insane. It’s from Ridley Scott’s film Hannibal.

VIDE COR MEUM FROM Hannibal (2001) – Opera Scene ‘Vide Cor Meum’: http://t.co/RsFHefiCgy via @youtube #HANNIBAL #EMMYALDENTE

— Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) June 21, 2013

And if you thought this moment couldn’t get any more homage-y you’re wrong.

Because the last one of the episode?

So, here’s where we leave Will Graham. I mean, I guess people sort of helped him in the sense that at least he’s not going crazy because of the encephalitis. Except now he’s a sane man in an insane asylum and no one will ever believe anything he says again. Granted, those dead eyes could be either a defeated man grappling with the fact that he apparently murdered five people while sick (meaning the damage done may mean he doesn’t remember everything that happened in this episode and that Hannibal is the killer) or they could be the eyes of a man whose hardened by the fact that he remembers everything. I’m not sure which to believe though I’m inclined to go with the latter but I actually think it may be more of the former.

The problem with the latter is that it will pose a lot of problems since Bryan Fuller wants to keep the show going and adapt Red Dragon for season four. Which means that Will Graham actually has to get out of prison at some point in order to have his final show down with Hannibal and put Hannibal behind bars where Will is now.

I have a lot of theories for what will happen, how all of that will happen, and what will happen in season two. And I’ll probably type those up in a day or two. And we’ll let you all know what we find out in a few weeks at San Diego Comic Con. Because you best as hell bet that me and Kylee (and maybe Jane) will be camping out for that panel.

But for now, Fannibals and friends, take a moment. Breathe. Relax. And settle in for a long, year long hiatus. We will be here for you through it all.