“Will and Hannibal’s relationship… has taken on nearly every possible facet of intimacy that human relationship can. The two are therapist and client, friends, confidants, mortal enemies, and in a way lovers.” – Jonathan Raeder
We know where we are with each other, shouldn’t that be enough?”
By its very nature, the relationship between a therapist and a client is one of the most intimate relationships possible. You spill your secrets, hopes, fears, and darkest desires to someone you can only hope will keep them secret and not judge you for it. You even hope that this person will somehow know you better than you could ever know yourself, will be able to grasp an essential part of you that you can’t notice with your own subjectivity. In a way, it mirrors the vulnerability of a new close relationship. You bare your chest, hand the other person a knife and hope they won’t stab you with it.
Will and Hannibal’s relationship – pointed out deftly by Freddie Lounds and Alana Bloom – has taken on nearly every possible facet of intimacy that human relationship can. The two are therapist and client, friends, confidants, mortal enemies, and in a way lovers. The romantic/sexual subtext between the two has been there from the start, and while it will likely never reach the status of an actual physical romance, it’s come the closest it’s ever came in this episode.
“Naka-choko” features a strange sex scene that manages to be sensual, confusing, and disturbing all at the same time. In actuality, Hannibal and Alana are having sex while Will and Margot do the same, but the scene operates on a number of levels. It’s also another example of how Will grafts those he’s close with onto the bodies of those he’s not in order to play out fantasies he can’t manage to realize in real life: He still has feelings for Alana and so imagines it’s her instead of Margot. Yet it’s also, most importantly, a love scene between Will and Hannibal. The two merge together so often during the scene that it’s nearly impossible to tell where one ends and the other begins, or even who is sleeping with whom. The final scene of Hannibal, Alana, and Will in bed together, even metaphorically, totally captures how the bonds between all of them have become hopelessly entangled. It’s impossible to know where exactly they stand with each other, as lover, friend, patient, client, enemy, and therapist all blend into just one strand: intimacy.
Will continues his seduction of Hannibal, quite possibly to the very limit. He’s returned to therapy, considers Hannibal his friend, made metaphorical love to him, killed a man and strung up his body in a creepy way for Jack to find, and most likely eaten a human that he killed with his own hands. He’s gone to such lengths to trick Hannibal into thinking he’s finally on his side, all with the intention of finally springing the trap shut. Of course, the theory that Will knows what he’s doing is just speculation, and regardless of his intentions, he did keep his role in Randall’s death a secret from Jack. The scene where Will and Hannibal profile Randall’s killer (Will himself) is an intriguing twist on the usual crime reconstruction scene. It gives Will’s catchphrase of “this is my design” an especially dark new meaning. For once, it actually is his design. Will Jack be suspicious again? Can Will be charged with this crime again after everything it took to exonerate him?
We can’t discuss “Naka-choko” without talking about the Vergers – both of whom play prominent roles in the Hannibal literature. Mason Verger finally appears as a larger than life maniacal killer who’s spent a good deal of time and money to cultivate a way of feeding live humans to pigs. Pigs generally eat dead corpses anyway, so Verger’s even more twisted for purposefully teaching them to eat the living. He’s obviously unstable, obviously hoping to manipulate Hannibal in the same way he’s manipulated Margo, and yet he will mostly likely end up on Hannibal’s chopping block. At least, Hannibal has done so much to convince Margot to kill her brother. It’s still unclear as to how they fit into the larger plot of this season, but we’ve only a few more episodes to find out.
The episode’s climax comes inexorably wrapped around Freddie Lounds, intrepid reporter and fearless plot device. She’s not convinced that Dr. Chilton was the Chesapeake Ripper, citing her investigation into his dismal abilities at surgery, and she’s even concocted a theory that Will and Hannibal together are the Chesapeake Ripper. It’s not exactly true, but there are enough shades of truth in it to ruin both Hannibal and Will’s lives were she to find some incriminating evidence. Hannibal even waits in her room in his plastic killing suit to rid the world of the intruding journalist, but death by Hannibal is not yet her fate. She stumbles across Will’s own killing shed, complete with the displayed cave-bear suit of the late Randall Tier. Horrified, she opens the frozen storage container and finds the dissected corpse of Tier, only to look up and see Will standing in the corner.
It’s amazing how this show continually draws parallels between Will and Hannibal, and while this one may be quite obviously recalling Beverly Katz and Hannibal, it’s also brilliant. Freddie has a gun, just like Beverly, but she ultimately loses, just like Beverly. Her fate is left unknown to the audience, but Will does show up at Hannibal’s the next day to enjoy a romantic dinner of human flesh. It’s too early to tell definitely who or what Hannibal and Will are eating at the end of “Naka-choko,” but it seems like Hannibal thinks it’s Freddie. The meat’s bitter about being dead, right?
Tidbits:
· Theory time: Freddie Lounds isn’t actually dead. Will “captures her” and then explains his whole plan, so she stays in hiding temporarily. The piece of meat that Will and Hannibal ate at the end of the episode was Randall Tier, not Freddie Lounds. Of course, that means that Will ate a human he killed, but at least it was someone horrible instead of someone relatively innocent. Will’s slipped into a dark place this season, but it’s a place he went willingly and I don’t think he’s gone far enough to kill Freddie Lounds. I could be wrong, of course.
· Perhaps Alana is starting to realize Hannibal’s darker side when she tells him that people aren’t instruments. Who knew the Theremin was such a sexy instrument?
· I’m still not happy with Alana’s portrayal this season. She’s essentially just become a sex object, but I’m hoping they can rectify that going forward.
· There’s a think-piece on the internet that suggests that it might actually be good if NBC cancels Hannibal, since so many other networks (like maybe Netflix) would snatch it up were they to cancel it. NBC’s budget for Hannibal is pretty small, and the show looks amazing even with it, but imagine it with a greater budget, freed from the limitations of what can be shown on network television, and without commercials. I’m still wary to hope for the show’s cancellation, but if that’s its ultimate fate, I hope it ends up on Netflix.
· Why did Margot have sex with Will, especially since in the books and in the show it’s said or implied that she doesn’t like men? I have a theory, exclusively from seeing the “next time on Hannibal” preview at the end of the episode. To keep you from being spoiled, I won’t post it here. But there are some clues in this episode.
· Will is definitely Hannibal’s perfect match now: he even makes jokes about cannibalism!
