Hannibal: Yakimono Recap

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Hannibal: Yakimono (2×07)

Synopsis: Miriam Lass is back but her memories clearly cannot be trusted. Meanwhile Will Graham is back in the world and Jack still won’t see the  evidence pointing right at Hannibal. And Chilton is having the worst day ever. Poor, Chilton.

Rating: ★★★★☆

So many things happened this episode and all I can think is: “Oh, Frederick…”

Poor Chilton.

My poor, poor Chilton. It’s a good thing that Katie posted her Chilton appreciation post the other day because after this episode I don’t know if we’re going to ever have a chance to really appreciate his sass and pimp cane again. Chilton – like everyone – had a part to play in Hannibal’s grand plan and he may have sadly played it through this episode.

Miriam Lass has always had a part to play in Hannibal’s grand plan, too. I had suspected she was still alive from the moment the had found her arm. I just couldn’t imagine that after two years of being frozen an arm would de-thaw looking that fresh. I just didn’t see it working ou t that way. I also figured that she was what Beverley had seen in the basement and I was spot on. Surprisingly Miriam Lass is actually pretty functional. She’s in no way okay but I guess the brainwashing Hannibal did to her  – which Bryan Fuller explained on Twitter was inspired by Starling’s brainwashing in the Hannibal film – didn’t make her that much less of a person but definitely made her an unreliable witness.

She tells Jack that she doesn’t really remember much – just lights. And dreaming about drowning. Being drugged. She remembers not even being afraid or angry when the Ripper told her he was going to take her arm and give it to Jack. But Jack still brings in Hannibal and let’s her get a look at him. Despite hearing the Ripper’s voice but never seeing him she doesn’t recognize Hannibal so it’s pretty clear from that point that someone else is about to get set up.

Not Will, of course. Miriam pre-dates Will’s involvement.

And he likely has his own part to play in the end. Exonerated by the Ripper finally claiming responsibility for the crimes he had allegedly committed, Chilton and Will get to have one last moment. Both of them know way too much but unlike with Will, Hannibal doesn’t have any fascination or desire to be Chilton’s “friend.” Gideon went first, Chiton was next. That was how Will saw it and he told Chilton the only way to get ahead of it all and stay alive was to confess to his own manipulation of patients and tell Jack everything.

I mean, we know Chilton’s not going to do that but you got to hope that the guy would have. Not that it was going to help him in the long run. Hannibal had been stacking things against Chilton for years. He fit the Ripper profile just as well as Hannibal did. Perhaps even better than Hannibal because it’s hard to believe that someone as renown, sociable, and together would be the Ripper but Chilton? He’s got an obvious need for power and prestige. He’s already known to have manipulated Gideon and he’s used mind altering drugs on other patients, too – including Will. Which then puts Will’s testimony into question as well. He’s manipulative and vindictive. I mean, Chilton most assuredly had Gideon beaten after he embarrassed (and sort of implicated) him in front of Jack.

Is anyone really surprised that Hannibal is setting Chilton up?

Will warned Jack something like this was going to happen, too. Because Jack lacks any amount of judgement at all the first thing he did when he picked up Will – after sort of apologizing and then admitting he still has doubts about Hannibal – is take him to crime scene. I mean, what else do you do with a guy who just got release for a psychiatric hospital? Take him to a crime scene! Great idea, Jack. A+. No, really. So Will goes around looking at the evidence and just knows it’s too perfect. Everything is too well put together, too well placed. There was going to be some amount of evidence that would be used to point them in the absolute wrong direction. And Hannibal of course was still one step ahead of them.

Instead of planting someone else’s finger print – like, say, Chilton’s – he planted his own. Which is pretty clever because if was Chilton’s finger print it would be obvious he was being set up but all the little things add up against Chilton. Meanwhile Hannibal has Alanna in his corner and she’s not backing down. She refuses to forgive Will. She refuses to go along with all these accusations against him. But Chilton? Yeah, she’ll bite.

I mean, Chilton doesn’t really help his case. He tries to get back on the Ripper case instead of confessing like Will told him he should. He tries to get Jack to let him ‘treat’ Miriam and help her recover her memories just like he did with Will. Which just further implicates him and makes Jack not want to trust Will’s judgement since it just seems like Will’s memories were implanted and altered the same as Gideon’s had been.

Will gets to talk to Miriam, though. She’s fitted with a prosthesis and she’s trying to sort of figure out what’s going on. These two have a fair amount to bond over. Miriam knows she wasn’t spared by the Ripper – she was being saved for last. She was being saved to play a part in his grand plan. And they both know he’s done anything but set them free. They both know he’s still out there and he’s probably not done with either of them. That bothers Will so he goes and confronts Hannibal at home but of course Hannibal knows the right things to say to get Will to back off. At least for now.

And then Jack – because he’s a fucking idiot and apparently doesn’t understand what a conflict of interest is – takes Miriam to see Hannibal for memory recovery. All she remembers is the wound man.

ART RENDITION – MIRIAM’S VISION OF JACK CRAWFORD AS WOUND MAN! #FreeWill #Hannibal @NBCHannibal pic.twitter.com/EugsOE7IBw — Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) April 12, 2014

Which – when added up with everything else  – pretty much makes everyone think Chilton is the ripper.

Honestly, how they expect that this guy whose missing part of his guts and walks with a cane managed to string up that security guard and spirit Gideon away I have no idea. But whatever. They send some FBI guys to go pick up both Chilton and Hannibal but it turns out Hannibal got to Chilton first. Chilton comes home to his super swanky house and hears this beeping noise in his basement. He goes down into what I guess is a wine cellar or something and finds Gideon sans limbs dying on a gurney down there. All around him are all of Hannibal’s meat working tools. When Chilton tries to make a run for it Hannibal catches up with him, drugs him, and then massacres the FBI agents, leaving a mess of blood all over the place and the murder weapons in Chilton’s hands. One of the agents is done up like the wound man (and later books with the wound man drawing are found in Chilton’s home library).

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I mean, poor Chilton. His face the whole time.

He’s pretty understandably freaked out.

He’s panicking.

So he grabs a bag that Hannibal had set out (he really did make it look like Chilton was running for it) and goes to Will. Both of them know that Chilton is being set up and while Frederick wants to make a run for it Will instead calls Jack. I’m sure Will thought that Chilton would be better off in custody. After all, the Ripper eventually freed him and the evidence exonerated Will. But Chilton isn’t as patient or trusting in the system. He also probably knows if he went to the Baltimore Hospital for the Criminally Insane his days would be very much numbered before some sort of ‘accident’ or another happened. And of course when Jack shows up he comes alone, gun drawn because Jack doesn’t follow any goddamn procedures of any kind. In his desperation Chilton tries to pull a gun on Will but Will knows he’s no killer.

In the end, while Will is talking to Jack, Chilton tries to make a run for it but let’s be real. His pussy ass wasn’t going to get very far.

And he doesn’t.

Chilton surrenders pretty easily and gets taken into custody for processing. He asks to speak with Will but no one lets him. No one listens to him at all. Then they take him into an interrogation with Alanna while Jack and Miriam stand behind the glass. And, ugh. He’s so sad. Chilton. You make me so sad. Alanna is obviously pissed. Chilton is depressed. Miriam is crazy and freaking out telling Jack it’s Chilton who was brainwashing him but we all know it’s just part of Hannibal’s long con.

And then – because Jack is still a fucking moron – he goes and let’s Miriam jack his gun and shoot Chilton through the one-way glass.

Poor Chilton.

He’s probably dead.

I mean, the Chilton and Hannibal Tumblr tags are FULL of theories on how he could survive this.

And it’s not like he hasn’t survived worse.

Besides, the bullet went through the cheek and seems to have angled down which means it probably exited out of the back or side of the neck. Assuming it didn’t nick his spinal cord or brain stem and assuming Alanna got up and got to applying pressure fast enough he probably could have survived.

Bryan Fuller isn’t helping with all this speculation either.

— Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) April 12, 2014

@Arsh13 @NBCHannibal It is possible to survive a gunshot to the face. — Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) April 12, 2014

@_heisey Don’t be sad, but don’t expect a confirmation of his death either. — Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) April 12, 2014

@dhikaeternalita HERE’S MY SHOULDER. And don’t rule out Chilton’s resilience. The man survived disembowelment. — Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) April 12, 2014

@leannethehobbit That Chilton survived being disemboweled. Who knows what that cat can survive! — Bryan Fuller (@BryanFuller) April 12, 2014

He was even less helpful when it came to the AV Club interview he did.

But we all also felt the same about Beverley and tried our hardest to come up with some sort of way she could still be alive. People still do the same with Abigail. So I suspect next episode we’re going to definitively know whether or not Chilton is dead or alive. Jack’s not smart enough to have bought Chilton’s story and to put him into protection if you ask me. Plus he was super pissed at Chilton at the end of the episode. So. I doubt that theory is going to pan out.

I’m really not liking poor Frederick’s chances.

I’m also not liking Will’s new haircut.

We get a nice look at it when he comes to Hannibal’s place. No gun this time. It’s just Will’s standing appointment time which Hannibal has apparently kept open for him even despite everything. I’m not really sure how Hannibal is going along with Will wanting to come back and do therapy and confront his feelings about everything. Because they both know Hannibal is the Ripper and they both aren’t hiding it. So I’m not exactly sure how this is going to work.

Oh, also, another point against Chilton being alive? Will and Hannibal both talk about him as if he’s dead. Will says, “It had to be Miriam, didn’t it? She was compelled to take his life so she could take her own back.” And not long before that Hannibal was talking about grieving and mourning what had been lost. Not that I suspect Will necessarily needs to mourn Chilton – they weren’t really friends. But Chilton is as much a part of it as anything else.

I do kind of wonder if at the end of this season, though, Miriam isn’t going to come back and help Hannibal in taking out the others.

And this trailer for next week just makes me wonder where the hell we’re going with anything.

Will and Jack are having dinner with Hannibal.

Ugh. Bryan Fuller. Just stop toying with me like this.

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