TV Review: ‘HANNIBAL Season 2, Episode 3: HASSUN’

In our third week of Hannibal, we find the show shifting gears already in an unusual way: A courtroom drama. For a show built on being so unconventional, an episode focused around a trial would seem oddly out of place, but as always with this show something always takes a turn for the sinister.

We open on a nightmarish scene where time moves backwards, smoke pours into a masked prisoner’s clothes, and the electric chair brings him to life. Behind the mask is Will Graham staring at the man who is about to pull the lever and end his life… himself. All of the confidence Will has built up is starting to erode. He is woken up by an orderly who hands him a suit and kicks off my favorite sequence of the episode. Both Hannibal and Will get prepared for the trial by getting dressed in the exact same fashion. It’s shot almost so that Hannibal and Will are looking at each other through a mirror, despite the fact Will is the one in prison. They both finish by putting on cuffs, although the good doctor’s cuff links are much more fashionable than Will’s handcuffs.

In the courtroom, the prosecuting attorney brings up names we haven’t heard in a long time like Abigail and Garrett Jacob Hobbes, among other victims, and blames their death on Will’s psychosis. It seems as though this bit was intended as a refresher course for those who hadn’t watched Season One since it aired. Outside of the courtroom Kade Prurnell is coaching Jack to let himself off the hook and take no blame for “Will’s” crimes. However, once he gets behind the witness stand he starts telling a different story. We see a different side of Jack finally as he admits he knew he pushed Will to far. He put his career on the line to save his friend, but will it work? Probably not, as six time libel lawsuit loser Freddie Lounds takes to the stand to spew lies about how Will wished to spill Abigail’s blood, and the kidney-less Chilton’s testimony doesn’t help either.

This episode for the most part is gore free. That is until Will’s lawyer gets an ear in his mail. Or when they find the bailiff, sans ear, burnt and impaled on antlers in his apartment. Also the judge with his brain and heart removed and his body fashioned into a cruel pose mocking the “Blind Lady Justice” statue. Who could possibly be murdering courtroom personnel in order to help Will? If you didn’t guess it was Hannibal then you must not be watching the same show I’m watching. Of course the real question is ‘Why?’ The simple answer is that Hannibal is a psychotic lion toying with his mouse, but the more complex answer will be stretched out over the rest of the season.

This episode gave Jack a lot of excellent scenes. After the opening title sequence (which came oddly late in the episode) Hannibal and Jack share a drink and Jack is commended for his bravery in the courtroom. Jack opens up about how he knows he’s at the end of his career and is thinking about moving him and his cancer stricken wife to Italy. It’s where they met and it’s where she could die. It is rare we see Jack soften like this, but it also provides an excellent contrast to the vicious Jack we see in the opening of the season.

This episode is definitely a change of pace for the show, but just like all of my other favorite shows, I’ve noticed that a slow episode is usually followed by an intense one, like a calm before the storm.