Hannibal: Season Three Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		4.5
Overall		4.0

Hannibal: Season Three Blu-ray Movie Review

You were what he eats.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman November 25, 2015

Unless some kind of gastronomical miracle intervenes, it appears that Hannibal will be a meal consisting of only three courses. Bryan Fuller’s audacious reimagining of the inimitable Hannibal Lecter never seemed to be a really good fit for broadcast television (as I discussed in my interview with Executive Producer Martha De Laurentiis when Hannibal: Season One was being released), and though the series started (at least relatively) strongly in the ratings, its viewership experienced a certain attrition over the two intervening seasons, and NBC finally pulled the plug on the show shortly after the third season began airing. That means that some of the stated plans for how the series would continue to redefine the Lecter legacy were never realized, and some viewers who put in significant viewing time in anticipation of watching supposed later developments may feel like they’ve been cheated a little. That said, when removed from any overarching context, the third season of Hannibal continues the series’ odd but oddly compelling combination of a generous helping of horror and a dash of pitch black humor, all wrapped up with a soupçon of whimsy that gives the show, well, a rather distinctive flavor.

To say that Hannibal: Season Two ended with a bloodbath might be a bit of an understatement, since the typically hyperbolic imagery the series employs made the incident seem more like a blood ocean. In fact the third season repeatedly returns to this climactic showdown, as if to suggest the post traumatic stress disorder experienced by the victims can’t be conveniently escaped. However, there’s also a certain artificiality in the denouement the third season offers, where both Will Graham (Hugh Dancy) and Abigail Hobbs (Kacey Rohl) have made it through the maelstrom, seemingly not that much worse for the wear, physically speaking at least, with a few bandages covering what looked like pretty serious knife wounds. Hobbs gives a little lip service to the fact that Hannibal Lecter (Mads Mikkelson) attacked them with the precision of a surgeon, obviously wanting them to make it through his gauntlet, but the whole escapade may smack some as overly contrived, an aspect this season tends to repeat in other plot developments.

The fate of Will and Abigail is actually delayed for a while, as the season opens focused more squarely on Lecter and his erstwhile psychoanalyst, Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier (Gillian Anderson), whose “about face” in the second season provided that year’s finale with a bit of dramatic juice. That “conversion” continues even more forcefully in this new season, with the character becoming a Lady Macbeth of sorts. As is discussed in one of the supplements included on this new Blu-ray set, Bryan Fuller and the rest of the creative team wanted to get away from the “killer of the week” strategy that had largely informed the series’ first two seasons, and that approach offers a more languid, organic opportunity for elements like the relationship between Lecter and Du Maurier to unfold.

While ostensibly eschewing the “killer of the week” strategy, the third season of Hannibal nonetheless follows a more episodic approach for at least the first half of the year, albeit within a simmering pot of various subplots that finally converge for the second half, when the series addresses one of the monoliths of the whole Lecter mythology, namely the “Tooth Fairy” killer story that has been previously depicted in both Manhunter and Red Dragon. If the third time isn’t exactly the charm (I’d still give the edge to Manhunter, in some ways one of my favorite films in the Lecter oeuvre), there are some interesting interrelationships explored in this arc. That said, all that has gone before in Hannibal makes the teaming of Will and Lecter perhaps slightly more preposterous feeling than it does in the feature films. Fuller may have been intentionally referencing another famous detective’s “exit”, namely the iconic battle at Reichenbach Falls between one Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty, in the series’ closing moments. As Arthur Conan Doyle aficionados will know, the supposed demise of the hero wasn’t quite as final as it may have seemed at the time. Maybe dessert’s on the menu for Hannibal after all.

Hannibal: Season Three Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Hannibal: Season Three is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer (mostly) in 1.78:1 (some interstitial elements are in 2.22:1, as can be seen in some of the screenshots accompanying this review). This digitally shot series has consistently been one of the more interesting looking shows on television, which is not to say things always are well detailed. Due to the series' emphasis on color grading, low light and low contrast sequences, there's quite a bit of murk apparent in virtually every episode. A lot of the show is graded to either sickly yellow or equally odd greenish tints, both of which tend to deprive the image of fine detail at times. Low contrast tends to cast a haze on many dimly lit sequences. As I mentioned in our Hannibal: Season Two Blu-ray review, the series is so relentlessly dark so much of the time that shadow detail all but disappears. This season at least has some decently lit sequences outside in various European locales, and those (while again often color graded) pop with greater clarity and detail.

Hannibal: Season Three Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Hannibal: Season Three continues the series' exceptional sound design, offered here via DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1. The series makes brilliant use of LFE, including both effects and score, and there are a number of standout moments where rumbly tumbly low end effects spill through the surrounds and up the angst level measurably. Dialogue is very cleanly presented and well prioritized. Fidelity is excellent and dynamic range very wide on this problem free track.

Hannibal: Season Three Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Disc One

• Audio Commentaries:

  Antipasto with Bryan Fuller and Gillian Anderson

  Primavera with Bryan Fuller and Hugh Dancy

  Aperitivo with Bryan Fuller, Raul Esparza and Steve Lightfoot

• Producer's Cuts of Antipasto (1080p; 43:07) and Primavera (1080p; 43:09)


• Beyond the Mind Palace (1080p; 18:54) is a slightly spoiler-ish look at the different directions the third season takes.


• Gag Reel (1080p; 8:47)

Disc Two

• Audio Commentaries:

  Dolce with Bryan Fuller, Steve Lightfoot and Don Mancini

  Digestivo with Bryan Fuller and Steve Lightfoot

  The Great Red Dragon with Bryan Fuller and Richard Armitage

  And the Woman Clothed With the Sun. . . with Bryan Fuller and Rutina Wesley

• Producer's Cuts of Dolce (1080p; 43:09), Digestivo (1080p; 43:08), The Great Red Dragon (1080p; 43:09), and And the Woman Clothed With the Sun. . . (1080p; 43:09)


• Avid Fannibals (1080p; 18:38). Fannibals? Get it?


• Hannibal on the Run (1080p; 20:26) centers on some of the killer's world travels this season.


• Hannibal Season 3: Killer Intentions (1080p; 16:56) is more spoiler-ish content giving an overview of some developments for this season.


• Post Mortem with Scott Thompson Webisodes (1080p; 59:37)


• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 10:06)

Disc Three

• Audio Commentaries:

  And the Woman Clothed in Sun with Bryan Fuller and Richard Armitage

  The Number of the Beast is 666 with Steve Lightfoot and Lara Jean Chorostecki

  The Wrath of the Lamb with Bryan Fuller and Hugh Dancy

• Producer's Cut of The Number of the Beast is 666 (1080p; 43:09)


• Getting the Old Scent Again: Reimagining Red Dragon (1080p; 2:03:43) is a pretty amazingly in depth feature length piece on the creative efforts to approach what is probably the big calling card this season for longtime Lecter fans, the show's "reboot" of the Red Dragon arc.

Hannibal: Season Three Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

There's still plenty to chew on in Hannibal's third season, even if a few of the plot dynamics feel like they were arranged on a flowchart. There's some rather dark humor sprinkled on various episodes, and so I'll continue in that vein by saying maybe a certain tendency on the part of several characters to amputate a certain limb and dine on it is one reason this show evidently didn't have legs. Highly recommended.