Hannigram and the animus and anima of it all.

The soulmate, different from what is popularly known as, isn’t the perfect match in terms of a benevolent relationship filled with care and respect. Esoterically, it is the concept that one’s unconscious is manifested in another body.

Being the part of the self that became separated, was casted out so that one could experience oneself directly, it represents the shadow that once integrated, holds the potential for enlightenment.

In order for the consciousness to reach that enlightenment, it undergoes tremendous amounts of pressure, triggered by the soulmate, who comes to shed light upon all the lies we tell ourselves, and the illusions we hold about who we are and how we see the world.

If Adam was one, and he took a part of his flesh so that his beloved could be born, then Hannibal aborted himself from Will, the moment he felt Will would cast him out. Hence the stag dying on the floor at the final scene in Mizumono.

As Lilith, the New Moon, Will resides in the darkness until Hannibal begins orbiting his life, and starts transitioning into Eve, the Full Moon, reflecting the light of the the brightest star. The Full Moon 🌕 is very prominent symbol towards the end of the show.

Will knew. He knew it all. And he fooled you.

On Will Graham’s active role in the scheme from season one.

I don’t believe Will was truly mourning Abigail’s death. There, I said it. I think he believed that was the source of his grief, sure. But in reality, he barely knew her. Their dynamic was fraught with discomfort; she was wary of him, and he was largely awkward around her. They didn’t see eye to eye, and more than anything, he projected onto her relentlessly.

From the very beginning, I think Will clung to the idea of Abigail because of Hannibal. “Feeling paternal?”, and Will responded, “Aren’t you?”, only to dramatically nod in agreement when Hannibal said yes. Both of them felt a pull toward each other. Hannibal more consciously so, but both used Abigail as a tether, a justification, a way to hold onto one another. The fandom often frames this dynamic as Hannibal using Abigail to baby trap Will, but the truth is, Will was just as complicit. They were both using her as a baby trap.

The evidence is there: Will lets Hannibal into his home, allows him to care for his dogs, despite barely knowing him and, more importantly, despite his instinctive wariness of him. Logically, it makes no sense for Will to be so trusting of Hannibal that early on. He even calls Hannibal out for subtly trying to isolate him from Jack, only to dismiss far worse and more overtly suspicious behavior later. The argument that Will’s illness clouded his judgment is flimsy at best: he was still solving complex cases, demonstrating sharp deductive reasoning throughout season one. His blind spot for Hannibal wasn’t due to sickness; it was due to something else.

Will was feeding into several illusions during that period. The illusion that he could maintain a normal relationship with someone like Alana. The illusion that he could bond with someone genuinely good and benevolent—someone who would accept him for who he was. The illusion that Abigail could be redeemed through guilt and coercion, and that if she could be saved, perhaps he could be too.

So, he ignored everything that contradicted these fantasies.

When Hannibal “killed” Abigail, he severed the one excuse Will thought had for maintaining their bond. And, crucially, he did so after Will felt betrayed by him, not by being a killer, but by lying to him personally. That was the real betrayal. It wasn’t about murder, or even morality; it was personal. And while Hannibal understood the depth of their connection beyond Abigail, Will needed the illusion of her to justify it to himself. That’s why, when Will mourned her, he wasn’t mourning Abigail, he was mourning what she represented.

Hannibal, on the other hand, had no such illusions. He might have used Abigail as a means to draw Will closer, but he never saw her as the glue holding them together. He believed in their bond beyond her, which is why he was visibly hurt, even teary-eyed, when Will turned on him both before and after prison.

Will Graham might play the victim well, and Hugh Dancy may have an achingly beautiful face, but let’s be honest: Will is worse than Hannibal. Hannibal is, at the very least, honest about who he is. Will is a hypocrite, a killer masquerading as a reluctant bystander. A borderline, sociopath draped in the skin of an awkward, introverted, misunderstood man. And yet, he fooled most of you, just as he fooled the other characters. Just as he intended.

Hannibal and the submission kink of it all.

Why is it that Hannibal didn’t yield to Will’s “please don’t lie to me,” yet folded so easily for “I need you, Hannibal, please”? What kind of submission truly excites him?

As someone who is, objectively, more dominant than most people around him, Hannibal rarely finds anyone genuinely enticing. Submission born from weakness bores him. Franklyn is a prime example of this, and even Tobias, to an extent. There is no thrill in dominating someone who was never a challenge to dominate in the first place.

Will, of course, is the opposite. Had Alana been more intelligent, she might have been as well, Hannibal admires those who are not easily controlled. This is precisely why he likes Bedelia. And Will knows this, which is why he hates her. Both Will and Bedelia are dominant individuals who submit selectively, of their own volition. For Hannibal, the pleasure lies not in forcing submission but in earning it, making a dominant individual choose to yield.

This is where Will distinguishes himself from Bedelia. While she is dominant and an active agent in her fate, her submission leans toward subtle coercion, as she relishes the role of the beast’s chosen one. There is a degree of arrogance in that. Will, on the other hand, actively resists Hannibal, challenges him outright, yet still allows himself to submit, gradually, deliberately. And after season one, those moments of submission come freely, no longer from fear or what Hannibal would perceive as weakness.

Which raises the question: is Hannibal truly the dominant one?

In any power dynamic, is the dom truly in control when it is the sub who decides to trust, to open, to place the weight of choice into the dom’s hands? Will constantly manipulates situations to make it appear as though he has no agency, as though Hannibal is the one pulling the strings, tossing him around like a helpless pawn. But the truth is, Will is always choosing. He saw the red flags and still chose to trust Hannibal. He chose to lead him on, despite knowing how unnatural the dynamic was. He chose to lure him in, then to switch sides. He chose to go after him, to betray him, to leave, and then, to return…again and again.

No one calls the shots more than Will.

And Hannibal loves to see it.

By blood and by me, I’ll follow your lead.

Will Graham aches for Hannibal Lecter. His hunger for him is undeniable, a marrow-deep craving that eclipses reason. But can he love him?

We know little of his past. He is motherless, raised in poverty. These sparse details serve as the only signposts of his history; beyond them, he remains a mystery. If Hannibal’s heart is a frozen well, sealed until a vast enough void summons its waters, then Will’s is a black hole. It does not overflow; it only takes in, swallowing light, swallowing feeling, endlessly consuming. If Hannibal has an excess of nectar, awaiting the perfect chalice to hold it, then Will is the abyss that ensures it will never stop flowing. He is not the receiver of love…he is its devourer.

Unlike Hannibal, whose affections extend to art, cuisine, philosophy, and the aesthetics of violence, Will is curiously bereft of passion. He does not love people; he does not even try. He cares for his dogs, but he belongs to them as much as they belong to him. He is drawn to Alana yet does not pursue her beyond what serves his own narrative. His colleagues orbit him, but he keeps them at arm’s length. Beverly sees him as a tool. Jack values his utility. And Alana pities him, plays at saving him. But no one, not a single soul, is truly his.

Hannibal, by contrast, cultivates a social life, a network of admirers, colleagues, and so-called friends. He is an artist of experience, capable of relishing beauty despite his wounds. But Will? Will does not live. He seemingly rots in his home, fishes, works, and in the spaces in between, just exists as if waiting for something. And then there is his fascination with murder. Not justice. Not retribution. His empathy stretches only toward the grotesque, to killers and the bloody fingerprints they leave on the world. He has no patience for the dullness of normal minds, but he delights in the labyrinthine corridors of the violent ones. They alone are worthy of his attention, his passion.

Abigail Hobbs was never truly seen by him. He fashioned an idea of her, an innocent he could redeem, an emblem rather than a person. He sought to mold her into something that suited his own reflection, never once stopping to ask what she desired. In this, he was not unlike Hannibal, but he was less honest about his intentions. He did not love her, not in the way Hannibal did, with full recognition of who and what she was. No wonder she preferred Hannibal.

Will sees himself as a stray, one of his dogs. Not their owner, not their friend, not their father, but one of them. This view of himself bleeds into his understanding of others. He sees Hannibal as a stray too, something wild and wounded, something that calls to him. He is drawn to beasts because taming them is the only way he knows to grapple with his own monstrosity. To control the external is to impose order upon the internal. And yet, he fails. He fails because he is not, at heart, a tamer.

He is hunger.

Others on the periphery recognize Hannibal’s danger and step away. But not Will. He follows, chases, again and again. Every decision, no matter how self-destructive, leads him back to Hannibal.

He cloaks himself in morality, in duty, in obligation, but it is a flimsy disguise. He does not pursue justice. There are many ways to save lives, many avenues to do good in the world, and yet Will chooses only the path soaked in blood. He merges with brutality because it is the only thing that stirs his soul. His supposed righteousness is a mask, and his masks are legion.

So can Will Graham love? He sees through people, sees their fears, their desires, their wounds…and he is bored by most of them. But Hannibal is different. Hannibal elevates violence into beauty, makes death into art. Will fears his own love for darkness, while Hannibal worships his without shame. That, more than anything, is what ensnares him. Not the mystery of Hannibal’s mind, but the freedom in it. The freedom to love the grotesque without fear or shame.

Will was always attuned to the Ripper. He spoke of him not with detachment, not as a scholar, but as a lover speaks of a distant beloved: admiring, mesmerized. When he discovered the Ripper was Hannibal, he recoiled, not out of moral horror, but out of personal shame. He had already loved him. He had already desired him. But to admit that desire, to acknowledge that the only man he ever trusted was the monster in the shadows, was too much. It was, as he would say, “too ugly a thought.”

He ran to Alana, to normalcy, to tradition, in a desperate attempt to convince himself he could belong in a world that did not smell of blood. But he could not. He never could. Because Hannibal was the only one who had ever made him feel anything at all. And when he finally understood that, he surrendered.

So what is Will’s heart? It is not like Hannibal’s. It does not overflow. It does not yearn to give. It is a void, an absence, a hunger. Will is the abyss waiting to consume love. As Hannibal connected in Dante’s poem, mentioned in my previous essay. He does not love in the way others do, he reflects, he absorbs, he mirrors. He is nothing until he is filled. Like Maha Maya, the Grand Ilusion.

And Hannibal, with his boundless, inexhaustible love, is the only thing that can fill him. The only thing he will ever crave.

Is Will Graham capable of love? If love is something that binds, that consumes, that reshapes the self in the image of another, then he has never done anything but love Hannibal Lecter.