5USA acquires Hannibal

Hannibal was surely the grisliest and one of the most intriguing crime dramas to come our way in the last decade.

Developed for television by Bryan Fuller, it’s is a contemporary take on the characters from Thomas Harris’ Red Dragon novel and as such will revolve around FBI Special Agent Will Graham and his mentor, Dr Hannibal Lecter (Mads Mikkelsen).

Read more: Is a Hannibal revival one step closer?

The drama series, produced by Gaumont International Television, stars Hugh Dancy as William Graham, Caroline Dhavernas as Dr Alana Bloom and Lara Jean Chorostecki as Freddie Lounds, with Laurence Fishburne appearing in a recurring role. Notable guest stars include Gillian Anderson, Lance Henriksen and Eddie Izzard.

It ended after three spectacular series.

Read more: All our Hannibal reviews

Now we’re hearing that 5USA has acquired the show and will broadcast it from the beginning.

It really is well worth a watch.

Look out for it from Saturday 25th May at 10pm.

Is a Hannibal revival one step closer?

 

Ever since Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal was canned at the end of series three by home US network NBC, fans of the show were hoping that someone else would pick it up. The series, starring Hugh Dancy as FBI special investigator Will Graham and Mads Mikkelsen as Dr Hannibal Lecter, had formed a rabid cult following during its three-series run, and any snippet of news has been devoured in the same way Lecter devoured his many victims. Now there’s another snippet…

Mads Mikkelsen: We want Hannibal to return for a fourth season

Hannibal is one of our favourite crime dramas. Its gloriously trippy, nightmarish retelling of the Hannibal Lecter story, starring Mads Mikkelsen and Hugh Dancy (among others), has, during its three series, pushed the boundaries of taste and credulity for US network dramas. Its charmed life seemed to come to an end last year when its home network, NBC, pulled the plug on the show, leaving fans aghast. But, just when you thought that Lecter and co were dead…

Review: Hannibal (S3 E12/13), Wednesday 26th August, Sky Living

Though Will Graham’s family have escaped death at the hands of the Red Dragon, the deranged killer is still a threat, all the more because he has become the pawn of an even greater force, Hannibal; Francis Dolarhyde has become Hannibal’s ‘agency in the world’. With Hannibal unwilling to reveal what he knows of Dolarhyde – was he in fact Hannibal’s patient? – Will has no choice but to turn to DuMaurier for some insight into Hannibal’s mind. DuMaurier is rather smug in her assertion that Hannibal won’t kill her, unless he can eat her – and he can’t do that from a cell. But we all know that he could escape any time he wanted to.

Review: Hannibal (S3 E11/13), Wednesday 19th August, Sky Living

So, Will Graham has met (rather unexpectedly) The Tooth Fairy, Francis Dolarhyde; of course, he still doesn’t know who he is, how he selects his victims, or the fact that Hannibal is in contact with him and may be manipulating him. Will, Crawford and Alana discuss this development, and the significance of Dolarhyde having eaten the Blake painting (they seem rather surprised by this act of madness, as though destroying art were somehow more shocking than killing families). Alana uses the word ‘docent’ to describe the museum guide Dolarhyde attacked; the Americanism seems chosen for its obscurity, in a typical trick of this series’ dialogue. Oddly, the ‘docent’ isn’t, as we assumed last week, dead, just stunned; why did Dolarhyde leave her alive? Is he trying to resist his urges, was the eating of the painting an attempt to subdue the Red Dragon?

Review: Hannibal (S1 E9/13), Wednesday 12th August, Sky Living

With Francis Dolarhyde established as the villain of the piece, and Hannibal Lecter almost having taken over Jack Crawford’s role as the investigator of the Tooth Fairy’s family murders, all the roles in Hannibal have been reversed; all save that of Will Graham, who still finds himself stricken with the ability to put himself in the mind of the killer. And Dolarhyde, unlike Hannibal, has no redeeming features; he isn’t, as Alana described Hannibal, not mad but something other; Dolaryde is mad, is a monster (even imagines himself physically transforming into one); so for Will, the experience of being in his head is even less tolerable.

Review: Hannibal (S3 E9/13), Wednesday 5th August, Sky Living

For many Hannibal fans, most familiar with the Red Dragon/Manhunter cycle, the story starts here, with the cannibalistic killer behind bars, and profiler Will Graham coming to him for help in the case of The Tooth Fairy, the serial killer who strikes at whole families when the moon is full. Hannibal, bored with his other visitors who he describes, ahem, as ‘pencil-lickers’, agrees to help Will discover how the Tooth Fairy chooses his victims. “We still help our families when we can” he says. From the safety of his rococo cell, Hannibal can’t possibly do any more harm – can he?

Review: Hannibal (S3 E8/13), Wednesday 29th July, Sky Living

If you only know Hannibal from the movies, not the books or this TV series, everything up to now has been a prequel; for you, the real story probably begins here. Because as scary as Hannibal is in the outside world, he’s almost scarier where he’s more familiarly seen, in a cage. Last week we saw the culmination of two-and-a-half seasons of groundwork, with Mason Verger dead, Hannibal captured, and Will Graham apparently free of Hannibal’s influence. But such is Will’s infatuation with Hannibal, that this situation cannot last. All it needs to draw the two together again is a catalyst, and this comes in the form of the Red Dragon.

Review: Hannibal (S3 E7/13), Wednesday 22nd July, Sky Living

In some ways, Hannibal could finish here; plot-lines are resolved, old scores are settled, balance is restored, closure is achieved. But it can’t finish here; in fact, it’s hardly begun. Though this episode, Digestivo, ends with Will Graham alive and free, and Hannibal caged, that’s not the end of the relationship. It’s merely the beginning.

Review: Hannibal (S3 E6/13), Wednesday 15th July , Sky Living

Hannibal, battered and bloodied after Crawford’s attack, has made his way home to Bedelia, who stitches him up; Will, battered and bloodied after being attacked by Chiyoh, has made his way to Florence, meeting Crawford as the eviscerated Pazzi is cut down. Why did neither attacker follow through and make the kill? – because only Hannibal or Will can kill each other, and their inevitable reunion is coming closer. We’re now into the part of the story originally covered in the novel Hannibal, though of course there are many changes in plot and character, not least the absence of the character Clarice Starling.