i think this is my absolute favorite sequence of events in all of hannibal. will watches dolarhyde nearly choke hannibal out. you can hear hannibal gasping for air and you can see while dolarhyde has him, it does not look like he is able to fight back at all. hannibal looks beat.
if will just stayed put and let this happen, dolarhyde could've killed hannibal, and then will could've (at least tried) to kill dolarhyde. he could've run to get his gun and shot him, and hannibal and dolarhyde would both be dead, just like he originally planned with alana and jack. though obviously he wasn't actually planning it himself, still this eliminates any doubt.
but no, he pulls the knife out of his own shoulder and saves hannibal with it. he saved hannibal. he saved hannibal's life! this is such a "if i can't kill you, nobody can" moment. this is will choosing hannibal and everything that comes with him
and this is the exact moment 'love crime' starts playing. because hannibal saved will by jumping on dolarhyde's shoulders first just before will got his spine broken, and then will saved hannibal directly after. they are finally, after all this time, working in harmony.
Okay, so I thought of this the moment I laid eyes on Hannibal's Sheldon Isley flower tree tableau for the first time, and I honestly thought the connection to Hanahaki disease was so obvious that I expected it to be mentioned in the episode, but it never was. I've tried to find if other people have posted about this to no avail (though I severely doubt I am the only one who thought this), so I thought I would make a post about it myself!
Warning: my media literacy & analysis skills are severely underdeveloped, so forgive me if I say anything dumb, wrong, obvious, or if this is just completely incoherent, lol.
WHAT IS HANAHAKI DISEASE?
If you don't know what Hanahaki disease is, it is a fictional disease popularized by a 2009 Japanese manga "Hanahaki Otome" in which a character who is suffering unrequited love coughs up flowers growing from their lungs until it progresses far enough and they die, or their unrequited love turns requited and they are cured.
THE TIMING:
The Sheldon Isley flower tree tableau comes at the beginning of Futamono, almost directly after Hannibal is nearly killed by Matthew Brown (and Will, by proxy) at the end of Mukozuke.
Now, it is made clear in Futamono that Hannibal had been working on Isley's tableau for a while. He was growing specific flowers, it took time to sew him into the tree, he was placed in water with the tree 48 to 72 hours before he died, probably to feed the tree. This made me doubt the Hanahaki connection, as Hannibal had been working on this for probable weeks before Will tried to kill him.
However, at the beginning of the episode, Hannibal is shown in his kitchen talking to Alana while chopping up & skewering a heart (and says "My heart certainly feels skewered"). During this, he states: "Stravinsky said a true composer thinks about his unfinished work the whole time. He's not always conscious of this, but he's aware of it when he suddenly knows what to do."
Will's betrayal (I am hesitant to use this word, but I'll come back to it later) inspired Hannibal to finish and display his unfinished work: Sheldon Isley.
WHY HANAHAKI? PHYSICAL ASPECTS:
Sheldon Isley's body was not only hung on a cherry blossom tree, but the roots and branches were sewn throughout his entire body. Through his heels and out his fingertips. He is bound to his fate, much like Hannibal and Will have become so intertwined in each others' lives and minds, their fates are bound together as well. The fact that the tree is a cherry blossom tree is also significant, as this is a tree that flourishes in Japan, is heavily associated with Japan, and also because many depictions of Hanahaki disease use cherry blossoms as the flowers the victim coughs up.
Sheldon Isley was also drowned, which is another connection to Hanahaki disease. Although he didn't actually die from choking on flowers that were growing in his lungs, he did die from choking on the water that was likely growing the same tree he would be bound to, and the flowers that would replace his organs in Hannibal's tableau.
Additionally, Hannibal took every one of Isley's organs except for his lungs, yet another connection to Hanahaki disease's respiratory nature. Also, kind of ironic, since Isley died from drowning, and his lungs that betrayed him were the only organ he got to keep.
So, from the cherry blossom tree, the flowers replacing all of his organs but his lungs, the fact that he was drowned, and because Hannibal displayed him directly after Will tried to kill him, I feel the possibility that Sheldon Isley's tableau was a reference to Hanahaki disease is quite clear.
But why? The whole foundation of Hanahaki disease is unrequited love. Does Hannibal feel that Will's attempted murder of him is so heartbreaking? Or is there more? I definitely think so. Hannibal follows many different trains of thought at once, after all. I don't think it's plausible that Hannibal was only feeling rejection from Will because of his attempted murder of Hannibal. It's more than that.
WHY HANAHAKI? EMOTIONAL ASPECTS:
I have heavy doubts about how much Hannibal considers Will's "betrayal" (attempting to have Hannibal killed) a betrayal. We know how Hannibal acts when he has been betrayed. He killed Abigail in Mizumono after Will lied to him about his motivations in season 2b. He tried to cut Will's skull open and eat his brain in Dolce after Will pulled a knife on him in the Uffizi gallery (and also because Bedelia convinced him he had to eat Will, but I digress), for gods sake. This.. isn't that. The worst he does in retaliation to Will's attempted murder by proxy is send Randall Tier to kill him in Shiizakana, and I feel like that was barely malicious by Hannibal's standards; it was just another situation to put Will in to drag him even closer to his Becoming. For this reason, I don't think Hannibal was truly feeling heartbreak or rejection just because Will tried to have him killed.
I also have doubts about what he says in regard to Will's actions. I'm still not entirely sure, though, because it's still hard to tell when he's spouting half-truths or just outright lies, lol. He outwardly maintains an air of heartbreak and.. almost grief? afterwards. He tells Jack "I can't help Will. I can't trust him." And after Jack says "He's in a dark place where the shadows move and it's not safe to stand with him anymore," Hannibal replies, "I feel the same way." Hannibal's tone while saying this was sad, probably to manipulate Jack, but on the inside, I think Hannibal could be proud that he can't trust or help will anymore, at least not the same way as before. He's advanced to the next stage of his Becoming. He is happy that Will is in the dark place with the shadows. Will has finally become his equal.. or something close to it, as Hannibal says later, when he visits Will in the BSHCI, "I think you're more in control than you have ever been." He also tells him that "If I was Beverly's murderer, I'd applaud your effort." So, does Hannibal see Will trying to kill him as a betrayal, or a triumph because Will is one step closer to his Becoming? Again, I suspect he is likely following both of those trains of thought at once.
Again, I mention this because the entire foundation of Hanahaki disease is unrequited love. If Hannibal fully considers Will's attempted murder a betrayal, that would lead to Hannibal realizing that Will does not love him, and therefore Sheldon Isley's tableau being a reference to Hanahaki disease fits perfectly. However, as we know, Hannibal is much more complicated than that, and on whatever level he is hurt by what Will did, he is probably equally, if not more, proud of Will for cultivating his urges that he suppressed for so long as the inspirations they are and acting on them.
This leads me to my.. tentative belief that Hannibal's Isley tableau is, in fact, in reference to Hanahaki disease, but not simply because Will tried to kill him. He realizes his love is unrequited because Will is truly angry with him, and Will does not realize that Hannibal is the one that has led him to his Becoming. Will does not even realize that he is Becoming. Throughout the entirety of Hannibal, Hannibal's one goal is to lead Will to his Becoming, to get Will to see the beauty in Becoming. Will's attempted murder of Hannibal, although Hannibal applauds his effort, although Will is finally succumbing to his urges, is not his true Becoming yet because Will still doesn't see the beauty in it. And he was hiding behind the gun, as Hannibal says later. And that is why Hannibal feels his love is unrequited. That is why his heart feels skewered.
Not because Will tried to kill him, but because he didn't see the beauty of it, of his imminent Becoming. It was uninspired. It lacked the intimacy that it deserved.
And so, Sheldon Isley's tableau is a display of Hannibal's realization of Will's resistance to see the beauty of his becoming. Hannibal's love, which he shows through manipulating Will to his Becoming, is not returned by Will, or at least not in the same way. Because of this, I believe, Hannibal decides to change his tactics. Or, maybe, he planned this out, and this is the point where he planned to change his tactics.
THE FOLLOWING EPISODES:
Either way, at the end of Futamono, Hannibal takes Gideon from his hospital bed, kills the guard, and strings them up with flies with human remains of Will's alleged victims in them, effectively proving that Will Graham is not the Chesapeake Ripper and absolving him of his crimes and freeing him from the BSHCI. As I mentioned, I believe Hannibal decided to do this at this specific point because he realized Will had taken a step closer to Becoming... by being more in control than he had ever been. He adapted, evolved, became. Now, Hannibal believes is time to bring Will to his final, true Becoming.
In the following episodes, we see Hannibal lead Will to what Hannibal believes is Will's imminent Becoming. Despite the fact that Will was playing both sides, I do agree that he was Becoming, to a point, nonetheless (but his lies were a true betrayal, no matter how caught up he did or did not get in the killing, and Hannibal made sure he knew that in Mizumono). In the episode directly following Futamono, Yakimono, Will nearly kills Hannibal in his kitchen with a gun, but Hannibal talks his way out of it. In the next episode, Suzukana, Hannibal stops will from killing the social worker with a gun, but praises him for his attempt anyway. In this episode, Will and Hannibal have the "hiding behind the gun" talk where Will realizes that he has not been intimate with his instincts.
They are also depicted having this conversation both sitting on the same level, on Hannibal's desk, aligning with the two windows in Hannibal's office, which I feel gave the impression of Will and Hannibal finally being equals.
In the next episodes, Shiizakana/Naka-Choko, Will finally kills Randall Tier. He throws his shotgun to the side after Tier bursts through his window and snaps Tier's neck with his bare hands. Then, he displays his body in a tableau at the Natural History museum. The symmetry of Hannibal's payback for Will's attempted murder-by-proxy that was his almost-not-really-Becoming being to attempt to murder Will by proxy through Tier, whom was the catalyst for wills Actual Becoming is very poetic to me! Not to mention the line that Will's imagined Randall Tier says in the episode: "This is my becoming... and it is yours." Chills!!
in hannibal's tableau of the judge, the heart is ever so slightly outweighing the brain on the scale. it is also illuminated in light, while the brain is in the shadow. could this be an allusion to (or at least foreshadowing of) hannibal's love/heart beginning to outweigh, outshine, and eclipse his usual sense/mind when it comes to will?
i'll write a proper long post about this thats more detailed eventually, but another deliberate way hannibal manipulated will in s1 is by blurring the lines between their therapy sessions conversations about will's emotions and killers' emotions/motivations.
for example:
will is frantic and traumatized by his hallucination of killing the girl that georgia madchen killed in 1x10. hannibal responds to that, then relates will's experience to the killers experience. uses the word delusion as a bridge. this prompts will to dig further into the killer's head. while he's responding, will is closing his eyes and staring off into the distance, as if he is seeing what the killer is seeing. then, using the word lonely as a bridge, he brings the subject back to will.
hannibal does this constantly.
even in episode two, the second time they had ever been alone in hannibal's office together, hannibal does this.
will is frantic and traumatized from his hallucination of hobbs in the grave of one of the mushroom garden people. hannibal just barely talks him down from it, then instantly changes the subject to the killer. forcing will back into the killer's head. then changes the topic to will again. blurring the lines between them, again, and again, and again.
re: this reddit post i found that discusses the idea that bedelia was too focused on being safe from hannibal, and that she neglected to consider the danger of actively provoking will (and his jealousy), who is just as dangerous. she did this by taunting him about how she was hannibal's wife, and with him "behind the veil" unlike will. OP says that bedelia seems like will's primary post-fall target because of this, and mentions the end credit scene of bedelia in TWOTL. (i really recommend reading their whole post! it was a very interesting observation and theory)
i am going to work with this idea that will is jealous of/angry at bedelia for her being in italy with hannibal instead of him (because will was supposed to be the one hannibal ran away with), and that the end credit scene of bedelia is reality.
i think there is significance to the fact that bedelia specifically had her leg (and most likely the rest of her limbs) cut off, cooked, and eaten by will and hannibal.
who is the only other person we have seen killed this way? gideon. why did hannibal want gideon dead in the first place? because gideon was effectively stealing hannibal's identity as the chesapeake ripper.
both gideon and bedelia were living lives that were not their lives to live. gideon falsely living as the chesapeake ripper, and bedelia falsely living as hannibal's companion, "behind the veil," in will's place.
i also thought it was interesting that in antipasto, the episode switches between the b&w flashback of hannibal cooking and eating gideon's limbs, and hannibal and bedelia's life in europe. i thought this could've been some subtle foreshadowing — as bedelia is living a life that wasnt hers to live, we see what happened to a man who was living a life that wasn't his to live.
as hannibal and gideon eat together, gideon learns about the real chesapeake ripper ("you were determined to know the chesapeake ripper, gideon. now is your opportunity"). i imagine that will and hannibal would do the same thing to bedelia. explaining their life together post-cliff, which what was supposed to happen post-mizumono, to bedelia who was in will's place, living a life that wasn't hers to live.
even further, i noticed that the painting changes in the room bedelia is in from the last time we see her in TWOTL (when will tells her his plan to fake hannibals escape) to the post-credit scene, which indicates that time has passed. so, they didnt instantly go to kill bedelia after the cliff. this time between the cliff and the post-credit scene could be the story of will and hannibal's life together that they explain to bedelia
so, bedelia gets the same treatment as gideon. they both get to see how it feels to (literally) have a part of them, their identity, their lives, taken from them. as they learn about the life they were stealing from the person whose life they were stealing. the divine punishment of a sinner mirrors the sin being punished.
i want to talk about how the parallel between gideon and bedelia mirrors the parallel between pope nicholas iii and lucifer in dante's inferno
contrapasso: "the divine punishment of a sinner mirrors the sin being punished"
in dante's inferno canto 19, the pilgrim and virgil are in the eighth circle of the inferno where those guilty of simony (corrupt churchmen) are punished. these people (including pope nicholas iii) are eternally, with flaming feet, upside down in baptismal font-like holes.
their contrapasso is their baptism being perverted in the same way they perverted the church. upside down in holes like baptismal fonts, their feet are "baptized" with fire instead of their heads being baptized with water.
(left is pope nicholas iii's flaming feet. right is dante and virgil reaching the other side of earth after climbing lucifer's body, where lucifer's legs stick out.)
in mark musa's notes for canto 19, this specific line lit my brain up like fireworks
"in the final canto of the inferno…dante pauses and looks up to see the raised legs of lucifer protruding from the crevice in which he is frozen, like a magnification of the legs of nicholas. just as nicholas defrauded god's church, so lucifer tried to defraud god himself"
(the beginning of gideon and bedelia's contrapasso-esque punishments. i just noticed the same leg is the first to go for both. and theyre both wearing blue. hmmm....)
in november, i made a post connecting gideon and bedelia's fates in hannibal: their limbs being cooked and eaten one by one in front of them. both gideon and bedelia were living lives that were not theirs to live. gideon as the chesapeake ripper, and bedelia as hannibal's companion in italy. so, they both get to see how it feels to (literally) have a part of them, their identity, their lives, taken from them, just as they took those things from another. the divine punishment of a sinner mirrors the sin being punished.
just like nicholas defrauded god's church,
gideon mocked the chesapeake ripper
so lucifer tried to defraud god himself,
bedelia tried to mock hannibal and will themselves.
hannibal draws a lot of inspiration from manhunter (1986), which was the first film adaptation of the hannibal books, and i want to talk specifically about the scene where randall crashes through will's window, because it derives from a scene in manhunter. i am going to compare these two scenes, and use this to further my discussion of hannibal, which will be the focus of this. (there is a TLDR at the end of this!)
in manhunter, at the end of the movie, will runs and crashes through dolarhyde's window, shattering it and directly jumping into a fight with him. now, there is a copious amount of imagery in manhunter depicting will talking to his reflection in glass, windows, etc as if his reflection is dolarhyde. we get the sense that dolarhyde is inside of will’s head, and they start to blur as will has to relate and empathize more and more with dolarhyde to catch him.
will crashing through the window is him meeting the darkest parts of himself face-to-face – now, he and dolarhyde are on the same side of the glass. will kills dolarhyde, which represents will overcoming (or, at least, suppressing) his violent urges and the turmoil that comes with understanding killers so deeply.
so, will crashing through the glass to meet dolarhyde is him meeting the ‘bad’ part of himself, the part that understands killers and lets them inside of his head, and by killing dolarhyde, he defeats this darker part of himself. will graham, in typical 80s fashion, ends the movie stable in his morality and can return to his heterosexual family life and watch the sunset with his wife and child.
the scene in hannibal is a bit different. instead of the identity parallel being between will and dolarhyde, it is between will and randall tier. randall is (if i am not mistaken) the first patient of hannibal’s we meet that has undergone his “therapy” and is considered a success. this is when we fully start to grasp what it is that hannibal does with his “therapy.” and what will could Become if he accepted hannibal's guidance.
instead of solely will’s violent urges, like dolarhyde represented in manhunter, randall tier represents, in a way, what will could be: a 'balanced' person who embraces his violence and becomes one with it. randall tier has the same violent urges and the dissonance in his identity that will has, but he accepts it, embraces it, and revels in what he is.
so, when randall crashing through will’s window, will not only comes face to face with himself, but the Higher Self that hannibal is guiding him to Become. this is why randall is depicted as the raven stag, and then the stag man: will is forced to come face to face with who hannibal is guiding him to be, hannibal's influence, and has to confront how to handle his violent urges once again by being forced to kill in self defense. however, his fight with randall does not represent him overcoming these violent urges, as was in manhunter. the fight does actually facilitate will’s Becoming. will throws his shotgun away and chooses to use his hands to kill randall, as hannibal suggested. through Will’s fight with and murder of randall tier, he actually becomes closer to his Higher Self and his Becoming.
this is furthered by will's choice to make randall tier into a tableau. will’s first tableau. in will’s pendulum conversation with randall, it is made even clearer: will says “you forced me to kill you” and randall replies “i didn’t force you to enjoy it.” !!!!!
TLDR: in manhunter, will crashes through the window to meet a man who represents the darkest parts of himself. by killing dolarhyde, will defeats this dark part of himself and fortifies his sense of morality. hannibal flips this completely around. in hannibal, randall crashes through will’s window. will comes face to face with him, who, in a sense, represents his Higher Self and who will could be if he accepted hannibal's guidance. his fight with randall marks the start of him beginning to embrace this intimate violence hannibal has been talking about. by killing and displaying randall in a tableau, will revels in his violent urges by killing him with his hands and enjoying it and becomes closer to his Higher Self and his Becoming. instead of will overcoming his violent urges through this fight between a him and a representation of his violence like in manhunter, will killing randall fuels these urges.
shut the fuck up why did i never realize that the heart tableau was held up by three swords. like the three of swords tarot card that represents heartbreak, sorrow, and betrayal. WOW
i think its also notable that when the three of swords is reversed (which is how it technically looks in the tableau), it represents optimism, forgiveness, and healing.
"In the reversed case, those three swords now point up, with their tips intertwined like they were poles holding up a tent. The heart has still been pierced, but the swords seem to have stopped the heart’s fall. And best of all, the dark clouds of the upright card are now pillowy and soft ground that is much safer." (x) — in mizumono, the betrayal was revealed and reciprocated, which would be represented by an upright three of swords (not to mention the clouds and rain in the background of the card, like when hannibal left everyone for dead, walking out into the rain). in primavera, hannibal displays the heart tableau — the reversed three of swords — for will. it says "you broke my heart, but i still forgive you (represented by the reversed three of swords), like i said. i can move past this. can you?" we are reminded of what he said in mizumono: "i forgive you, will. will you forgive me?" yes. will finds him in the catacombs and tells him: "i forgive you." and despite the betrayal and heartbreak, they move past the events of mizumono. and betrayal has reversed to become forgiveness, once again.
