Note that there are spoilers here, but you'll see all of them in the first ten minutes anyway, so caveat emptor.
We find ourselves in an upscale, beautifully-appointed kitchen, where an elegant dinner is being prepared by an impeccably-dressed host. We see the host's knife slicing the raw main dish, and then arranging it into a presentation that can legitimately be called art. He walks across the room and serves it to his guest, who is seated at the dining table, and they exchange words.
Host: This course is called ryukozuki -- seasonal sashimi, sea urchin, water clam, and squid. Guest: What a beautiful presentation, Doctor. Host: Kaiseki - a Japanese artform that honors the taste and aesthetic of what we eat. Guest: Well, I almost feel guilty about eating it. Host: I never feel guilty eating anything. Guest: Hmmmm...I can't quite place the fish...
This would have been a cool "season opener" in itself, and a very funny one, given that the host in this scene is Dr. Hannibal Lecter, and you can't always tell what he'll be serving with the Chianti. :-)
But what makes this scene more powerful is that it wasn't the first scene. It was the second. The first was a type of flashforward known as In Media Res, a technique that dates at least back to Homer, and was discussed by Aristotle. In the real first scene, we're in the same kitchen, and a similarly elegant dinner is being prepared for the same guest by the same host. The host uses the same precision with his knife as he slices the main course, but doesn't get to the presentation stage because then his guest enters the room, they exchange glances, each of them seemingly realizing the same thing at the same time, and all hell breaks loose. (Details deleted) The screen goes black, and a title appears, saying "Twelve weeks earlier." Then we see the scene I describe above.
Very effective technique. It worked for Homer, in "The Iliad," it worked for "Breaking Bad," and it works for the season opener of "Hannibal." Something is going to happen during that twelve weeks (coincidentally enough the length of the season) that explains to us how the dinner scene we see second morphs into the one we saw first.
The third and forth scenes take an opposite -- or perhaps the same -- structure. In scene three we see Will Graham during on of his rare off-work moments. He's standing in a river in his waders, fly-fishing. He looks up, and on the bank of the river he sees a magnificent deer. We see the awe and reverence on his face as Will gazes at the deer. Cut to scene four, and the same face, staring at us from behind bars. Will is now in jail, charged with being the very serial killer he is chasing. So is scene three a flashback to the past, or a flashforward to the future? Guess we'll have to watch twelve weeks of television to find out. Since this was one of the best 40 minutes of television I've seen in a long time, I have no problem with that...
We find ourselves in an upscale, beautifully-appointed kitchen, where an elegant dinner is being prepared by an impeccably-dressed host. We see the host's knife slicing the raw main dish, and then arranging it into a presentation that can legitimately be called art. He walks across the room and serves it to his guest, who is seated at the dining table, and they exchange words.
Host: This course is called ryukozuki -- seasonal sashimi, sea urchin, water clam, and squid. Guest: What a beautiful presentation, Doctor. Host: Kaiseki - a Japanese artform that honors the taste and aesthetic of what we eat. Guest: Well, I almost feel guilty about eating it. Host: I never feel guilty eating anything. Guest: Hmmmm...I can't quite place the fish...
This would have been a cool "season opener" in itself, and a very funny one, given that the host in this scene is Dr. Hannibal Lecter, and you can't always tell what he'll be serving with the Chianti. :-)
But what makes this scene more powerful is that it wasn't the first scene. It was the second. The first was a type of flashforward known as In Media Res, a technique that dates at least back to Homer, and was discussed by Aristotle. In the real first scene, we're in the same kitchen, and a similarly elegant dinner is being prepared for the same guest by the same host. The host uses the same precision with his knife as he slices the main course, but doesn't get to the presentation stage because then his guest enters the room, they exchange glances, each of them seemingly realizing the same thing at the same time, and all hell breaks loose. (Details deleted) The screen goes black, and a title appears, saying "Twelve weeks earlier." Then we see the scene I describe above.
Very effective technique. It worked for Homer, in "The Iliad," it worked for "Breaking Bad," and it works for the season opener of "Hannibal." Something is going to happen during that twelve weeks (coincidentally enough the length of the season) that explains to us how the dinner scene we see second morphs into the one we saw first.
The third and forth scenes take an opposite -- or perhaps the same -- structure. In scene three we see Will Graham during on of his rare off-work moments. He's standing in a river in his waders, fly-fishing. He looks up, and on the bank of the river he sees a magnificent deer. We see the awe and reverence on his face as Will gazes at the deer. Cut to scene four, and the same face, staring at us from behind bars. Will is now in jail, charged with being the very serial killer he is chasing. So is scene three a flashback to the past, or a flashforward to the future? Guess we'll have to watch twelve weeks of television to find out. Since this was one of the best 40 minutes of television I've seen in a long time, I have no problem with that...