ICYMI: HANNIBAL
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In Case You Missed It is a new series on PROVOKR highlighting cult series that have recently made their way to streaming platforms.
I’ll admit that I didn’t give Hannibal its due when it originally aired in 2013. Unfortunately, neither did most people at the time — at its peak, the show pulled in 4.3 million viewers, paltry numbers for a prime time network TV drama.
Why did Hannibal have so much trouble finding an audience? It had everything going for it: star power in Mads Mikkelsen and Laurence Fishburne, who play Dr. Hannibal Lecter and Jack Crawford, respectively. The Thomas Harris-authored IP that’s been a household name since 1991’s Silence of the Lambs adaptation. Rave reviews from critics, with the second and third seasons hitting 98% on Rotten Tomatoes.
It’s possible that Hannibal didn’t catch on because it arrived during a transitionary period in the so-called golden age of television. The show is, at least initially, a police procedural, complete with “monster of the week” (here, monster being of the serial killer variety) storytelling, a loose overarching plot and a forgettable supporting cast of FBI folks (are they lab techs? Field agents? They seem to be whatever each episode demands).
But that’s just season one, and really mainly the first half. Hannibal, like most shows, finds its footing after a couple of episodes and bucks many of the hour-long procedural tropes. Just as Dr. Lecter would while cooking, the writers trim the fat, cutting out superfluous characters and zeroing in on key relationships.
The series’ standout dynamic is the ongoing game of cat-and-mouse that plays out between FBI profiler Will Graham, a man with an empathy disorder that allows him to relate to just about anybody, and Hannibal Lecter himself. This back-and-forth is a fresh take on the key relationship in Harris’ first Lecter novel Red Dragon, most famously depicted onscreen by Edward Norton and Anthony Hopkins.
Though Hannibal was marketed as a prequel to the familiar events of the Lecter books, showrunner Bryan Fuller of Pushing Daisies fame brings in elements from Harris’ work, including popular characters such as Freddie Lounds and Mason Verger. A similar show, Bates Motel, managed a five season run on A&E while depicting events prior to and concurrent with Robert Bloch’s Psycho.
The most likely explanation for Hannibal failing to find viewership despite all that it had going for it? After giving up its procedural format and striving for heavily serialized storytelling like its contemporaries (Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead), the show’s lack of streaming presence made it inaccessible to first time viewers.
Bryan Fuller and the writers’ room wove together intricate, overarching storylines that played out carefully over three seasons, but with nowhere to catch up aside from the DVDs, there was no way for this series to build an audience outside of its cult fan base. Now that Hannibal is available on Netflix, there’s no reason not to dive into one of the best (and most overlooked) dramas of the past decade.
