Hannibal has been canceled by NBC, but that didn’t stop producer Bryan Fuller and the series cast from appearing at Comic-Con at a scheduled panel for the show’s fans.
But rather than hold a wake for the grand, artistically grisly retelling of the Hannibal Lecter mythology and taking a virtual victory lap, Fuller showed a five-minute clip reel of what was ahead for the show in the remainder of its third (and presumably final) season. We’re getting an adaptation of Red Dragon, the novel (and movie) in which Lecter and Will Graham were first introduced to pop culture.
Here’s the video:
https://youtu.be/loOgfXNs-VI
The highlight reel hints at what Fuller revealed during the “Pannibal”: The series is going to jump ahead three years, at which point Lecter has been captured and is in his famous cell, Graham has retired from the FBI and is married, and a new serial killer named The Tooth Fairy (otherwise known as Francis Dolarhyde, with a fetish for William Blake paintings) is on the loose.
Dolarhyde — complete with cleft palate and massive back tattoo — will be played by Richard Armitage (The Hobbit), who appeared on the panel with Fuller and Hugh Dancy.
As exciting as it is to jump ahead to the Red Dragon storyline, one familiar to fans of Thomas Harris’ Lecter novels and their movie adaptations, a concern is that it feels as if the story is cheating a bit. For example, will we never see how Graham captured Lecter?
Maybe Fuller and his writers knew cancellation was imminent and decided to get to the story they really wanted to tell. If so, it’s too bad that the threat of the series is ending is what pushed the action to pick up a bit.
Meanwhile, Fuller also revealed that Amazon was interested in a fourth season of Hannibal, but wanted it more quickly than producers were comfortable with. (Fuller is now working on American Gods for Starz.) There’s still hope that the story could continue in a movie.
