Hannibal (TV series)

Hannibal is an American psychological horror-thriller television series developed by Bryan Fuller for NBC. The series is based on characters and elements appearing in Thomas Harris' novels Red Dragon, Hannibal, and Hannibal Rising and focuses on the relationship between Federal Bureau of Investigation special investigator Will Graham and Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a forensic psychiatrist destined to become Graham's most cunning enemy and, at the same time, the only person who can understand him.
The series received a 13-episode order for its first season. David Slade executive produced and directed the first episode. The series premiered on NBC on April 4, 2013. In May 2014, NBC renewed Hannibal for a third season, which premiered on June 4, 2015. On June 22, 2015, NBC canceled Hannibal after three seasons because of low viewership. The series finale aired in Canada on City, on August 27, 2015, and aired two days later in the U.S. on NBC.
The series received critical acclaim, with the performances of the lead actors and the visual style of the show being singled out for praise. The first two seasons each won the Saturn Awards for Best Network Television Series, while both Mikkelsen and Dancy won Best Actor, with Laurence Fishburne winning Best Supporting Actor for season two. The third and final season won the inaugural Best Action-Thriller Television Series award, while guest star Richard Armitage won Best Supporting Actor. The show has garnered a cult following and is considered by critics and audiences as one of the best series of the horror genre, and one of the greatest network TV series of all time.

Plot

FBI profiler Will Graham is recruited by Jack Crawford, the head of Behavioral Sciences of the FBI, to help investigate a serial killer in Minnesota. With the investigation weighing heavily on Graham, Crawford decides to have him supervised by forensic psychiatrist Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Initially, Lecter—who is secretly a serial killer and a cannibal—works to manipulate the FBI from within. The bond Lecter builds with Graham begins to threaten his longevity. Lecter is fascinated by Graham's ability to empathize with psychopathic murderers and tries to push the boundaries of Graham's fragile sanity to turn him into a killer.

Cast and characters

Main

Hugh Dancy as Will Graham, a gifted criminal profiler and hunter of serial killers. He visualizes himself committing the murders he investigates to understand the killers' behaviors; throughout the series, Graham's involvement with the investigations takes a toll on his psyche. The emotional relationship between Graham and Lecter forms the foundation of the series.
Mads Mikkelsen as Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant forensic psychiatrist and gourmand, who is also secretly a serial killer and a cannibal, known as the Chesapeake Ripper.
Caroline Dhavernas as Dr. Alana Bloom, a professor of psychology and consultant profiler for the FBI who has professional relationships with both Graham and Lecter.
Hettienne Park as Beverly Katz, a crime scene investigator specializing in fiber analysis.
Laurence Fishburne as Jack Crawford, head of Behavioral Sciences at the FBI and Graham's boss.
Scott Thompson as Jimmy Price, a crime scene investigator specializing in latent fingerprints.
Aaron Abrams as Brian Zeller, a crime scene investigator.
Gillian Anderson as Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier, Lecter's psychotherapist, who was once attacked by one of Lecter's former patients.
Recurring
Raúl Esparza as Frederick Chilton, administrator of Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.
Kacey Rohl as Abigail Hobbs, daughter and accomplice of serial killer Garrett Jacob Hobbs, who develops a complicated father-daughter relationship with Lecter and Graham.
Lara Jean Chorostecki as Fredricka "Freddie" Lounds, a tabloid blogger and journalist who runs the true crime website TattleCrime.
Eddie Izzard as Abel Gideon, a transplant surgeon institutionalized for killing his family, who is led to believe that he is the Chesapeake Ripper by Dr. Chilton.
Gina Torres as Phyllis "Bella" Crawford, Jack Crawford's wife, who is suffering from terminal lung cancer.
Vladimir Jon Cubrt as Garrett Jacob Hobbs, a serial killer known as the Minnesota Shrike.
Anna Chlumsky as Miriam Lass, an FBI trainee and Jack Crawford's protégée. She mysteriously disappears while investigating the Chesapeake Ripper.
Katharine Isabelle as Margot Verger, one of Lecter's patients; she has suffered years of abuse at the hands of her twin brother, Mason.
Michael Pitt and Joe Anderson as Mason Verger, Margot's sadistic twin brother, who develops several plots to impregnate his sister and bring down Lecter.
Cynthia Nixon as Kade Prurnell, an investigator for the Office of the Inspector General.
Jonathan Tucker as Matthew Brown, a psychopathic hospital orderly intrigued by Will who attempts to kill Hannibal.
Richard Armitage as Francis Dolarhyde, a serial killer known as The Tooth Fairy due to his unsightly habit of biting the skin of his victims.
Fortunato Cerlino as Rinaldo Pazzi, an Italian inspector who teams up with Jack to search for Lecter.
Tao Okamoto as Chiyoh, handmaiden to Lecter's aunt, Lady Murasaki.
Glenn Fleshler as Cordell Doemling, the creepy yet gentle and intelligent nurse to Mason Verger.
Nina Arianda as Molly Graham, Will's wife, who helps him overcome his dark past. She continues to support Will when he is asked to return to the FBI.
Rutina Wesley as Reba McClane, a blind woman and love interest of Dolarhyde.
Production

Development

NBC began developing a Hannibal series in 2011 and former head of drama Katie O'Connell brought in long-time friend Bryan Fuller to write a pilot script in November. NBC gave the series a financial commitment before Fuller completed his script. On February 14, 2012, NBC bypassed the pilot stage of development by giving the series a 13-episode first season based solely on the strength of Fuller's script. The series went into production quickly thereafter.
David Slade, who had previously directed the pilot for NBC's Awake, directed the first episode and served as an executive producer. José Andrés was the series' "culinary cannibal consultant" and advised the crew on proper procedure for preparing human flesh for consumption.
Fuller discussed the limited episode order and the continuing story arc he envisions for the series. "Doing a cable model on network television gives us the opportunity not to dally in our storytelling because we have a lot of real estate to cover." Speaking about the Lecter character, Fuller said, "There is a cheery disposition to our Hannibal. He's not being telegraphed as a villain. If the audience didn't know who he was, they wouldn't see him coming. What we have is Alfred Hitchcock's principle of suspense—show the audience the bomb under the table and let them sweat when it's going to go boom". He went on to call the relationship between Graham and Lecter as "really a love story", saying, "As Hannibal has said in a couple of the movies, 'You're a lot more like me than you realize'. We'll get to the bottom of exactly what that means over the course of the first two seasons".
Fuller originally planned the show to run for seven seasons: the first three of original material, the fourth covering Red Dragon, the fifth The Silence of the Lambs, the sixth Hannibal, and the seventh an original storyline resolving Hannibals ending. After the second season, Fuller stated he later envisioned the show to run six seasons, incorporating the books differently than he originally planned. Season 3 used material from Hannibal Rising as well as Red Dragon and include a different origin story for Dr. Lecter; the season ultimately also adapted Hannibal as well. Fuller intended to include other characters from the book series if he could obtain the rights from MGM.
Franklin Froideveaux and Tobias Budge were created because Fuller could not secure rights to The Silence of the Lambs characters Benjamin Raspail and Jame Gumb. Fuller added they also tried to get the rights to Barney Matthews, an orderly at the Baltimore State Hospital, but were denied, thus a character based on Barney appeared in the second season, named Matthew Brown, but ended up being an antithesis to the original series' Barney. Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier is named after the character in Creepshow and author Daphne du Maurier.
Regarding the series' influences, Fuller stated: "When I sat down to the script, I was very consciously saying, 'What would David Lynch do with a Hannibal Lecter character? What sort of strange, unexpected places would he take this world?' I'm a great admirer of his work and his aesthetic and his meticulous sound design. Those were all components that I felt very strongly needed to be part of our Hannibal Lecter story. Between Lynch and Kubrick, there's a lot of inspiration." Fuller also cited David Cronenberg and Dario Argento as influences on the series. Fuller cited Tony Scott as an influence for the third season.

Casting

was the first actor to be cast, taking on the role of FBI criminal profiler Will Graham, who seeks help from Lecter in profiling and capturing serial killers. In June 2012, Mads Mikkelsen was cast as Lecter. Soon after this, Laurence Fishburne was cast as FBI Behavioral Sciences Unit commander Jack Crawford. Caroline Dhavernas was later cast as Dr. Alana Bloom, a former student of Hannibal Lecter, and Hettienne Park was cast as CSI Beverly Katz. Lara Jean Chorostecki, Kacey Rohl, Scott Thompson and Aaron Abrams were cast in recurring roles.
Gina Torres, Laurence Fishburne's wife, had a recurring role as Phyllis "Bella" Crawford, Jack Crawford's terminally ill wife. Ellen Greene, Raúl Esparza and Gillian Anderson were later cast in recurring roles and appeared later in season one, though Greene appeared in only one episode. Molly Shannon, Suzy Eddie Izzard and Lance Henriksen guest-starred during the first season.
Several actors on the series worked with creator Bryan Fuller previously, including Dhavernas, who played the lead role in Wonderfalls, and Torres, Greene, Esparza and Shannon, who appeared in the television series Pushing Daisies. Chelan Simmons reprised her role as Gretchen Speck-Horowitz from Wonderfalls in an episode of Hannibal. Ellen Muth, who starred in Fuller's Dead Like Me, guest-starred as a character named Georgia Madchen, a nod to her original character and a "reinterpretation of that character".
David Bowie was approached for the role of Hannibal's uncle Robert Lecter for the second season, but was unavailable. Gillian Anderson returned as Lecter's psychiatrist, Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier, in multiple episodes for the second season. Suzy Eddie Izzard returned as Dr. Abel Gideon for the second season. Cynthia Nixon joined the recurring cast as Kade Prurnell, an employee of the Office of the Inspector General, who is investigating Jack Crawford's role in the events of the first season.
Katharine Isabelle joined the recurring cast as Margot Verger, who was originally described as a potential love interest for Graham, but Fuller later clarified that, as in the novel Hannibal, Margot "... is a member of the LGBT community!" Michael Pitt joined the recurring cast in the role of Mason Verger, Margot's abusive twin brother. Amanda Plummer guest-starred in the second season, playing Katherine Pimms, an acupuncturist. Jeremy Davies and Chris Diamantopoulos appear in two episodes.
Fuller stated in June 2014 after winning the Saturn Award for Best Network Television Series that they were told by Bowie's management to ask again for his availability for the third season. He also went on to list David Thewlis, Brad Dourif, Kristin Chenoweth, Lee Pace, and Anna Friel as actors he would like to appear on the series. For the third season, Anderson was promoted to series regular after recurring throughout the first two seasons. Tao Okamoto was announced to play Lady Murasaki, Hannibal's enigmatic aunt, in season three, however, Fuller later confirmed at a PaleyFest panel in New York that Okamoto would play the role of Chiyoh, Lady Murasaki's handmaid.
For the third season, Joe Anderson replaced Michael Pitt as Mason Verger, as Pitt decided not to return to the role. In December 2014, Fortunato Cerlino was announced as portraying Rinaldo Pazzi. In January 2015, several recurring roles were cast, including Richard Armitage as Francis Dolarhyde; Nina Arianda as Molly Graham, Will's wife; Rutina Wesley as Reba McClane; and Glenn Fleshler as Dr. Cordell Doemling. In March 2015, Zachary Quinto was cast in a guest-starring role as one of Dr. Du Maurier's patients. Izzard reprised the role of Gideon for the season three premiere, although she was initially hesitant about returning.
Fuller stated that should the series continue, whether for a fourth season or feature film, and should they obtain rights to adapt The Silence of the Lambs, Elliot Page would be his ideal casting for Clarice Starling.
In July 2020, Fuller confirmed that NBC executives had pushed for John Cusack or Hugh Grant to be cast as Lecter solely to attract the most viewers for the series, while also saying that casting James Spader in The Blacklist that year was more akin to what they wanted as a series. David Tennant also auditioned for Lecter, although Fuller liked Tennant, he felt that Mikkelsen was the right actor for the role.