"Buffet Froid" is the tenth episode of Season 1, and overall the tenth produced hour of Hannibal. It originally aired on May 30, 2013.
Plot
The BAU investigates a murder in which two victims' faces are similarly mutilated with a "Glasgow Smile". After losing time and accidentally contaminating a crime scene, Will visits a Neurologist for an MRI.
Synopsis
It's a rainy night in Greenwood, Delaware, and Beth LeBeau is just getting ready for bed. As she tucks herself in, she notices a leak coming from the ceiling and goes to the attic to check it out. There is a hole in the side of her roof and after patching it, she returns to her room. Back in her room, hands reach out from underneath Beth's bed and yank her under; the splattering of blood that follows marks her end.
clock face
During another session♙ Will discusses his regret for the innocence he lost after killing Garrett Hobbs to Hannibal. Hannibal tries to get Will to live intentionally in the present by having him draw a clock, but the picture Will created is vexingly askew.
Later that day, Will brings fish home and slices it open on the kitchen counter. As he does so, blood comes out of the fish. He comes rushing back to reality, to see that he is covered in the blood of Beth LeBeau, in the midst of her brutal crime scene. Will stumbles back and runs out of the room, to find the FBI investigation team awaiting his results. Outside the home, Jack admonishes Will for contaminating the crime scene, but Will wonders aloud if Jack has anyone else that can do Will's job stable better than he can do it unstable. At the scene, Brian says the girl drowned in her own blood. Beverly thinks it's an old flame, as the photos in the room of her are scratched out. When Will realizes the skin on Beth's face was pulled back, he wonders if the killer was trying to remove her mask.
MRI
Will returns to Hannibal and tells him about the grandiose hallucinations he had at Beth's crime scene. Hannibal agrees to refer Will to a neurologist but warns him that if they don't find anything wrong physiologically, he has to accept his problems as mental illness. At Dr. Sutcliffe's office, Will is placed in an MRI machine to take a scan of his brain. Inside, Will hallucinates about being under Beth LeBeau's bed. The results of his MRI show he has Anti-NMDA Receptor Encephalitis, which Hannibal claims he already knew by scent alone. Off of Dr. Lecter's suggestion, however, Dr. Sutcliffe tells Will his brain scan was "completely normal" to keep him in the dark about his condition.
Hannibal and Jack converse over drinks. Hannibal accuses Jack of knowingly allowing the deterioration of Will's psyche by placing him in harm's way with these investigations. Jack thinks Will's temporary mental health is a small price to pay for the saved lives of many. Regardless, Hannibal knows Will has a psychological tendency to mirror what's around him, and so placing him at these crime scenes doesn't just rub off on him, the terror and macabre absorbs into his entire being.
Will visits Beth LeBeau's house late at night to look at the crime scene again. Inside her bedroom, he repeats Hannibal's cadence to ensure he's fully in the present moment. Suddenly, Will notices someone under the bed and when he kneels down to get a better look, the person makes a run for the door. He manages to grab the person's hand, but the skin on their entire arm slides off. In a blink, Will is in the middle of the woods in Delaware, scared and alone. Will begins to questions what's real, and what's a figment of his imagination.
Beverly accompanies Will to Beth's house and the two try to figure out whether Will was hallucinating or whether he actually encountered Beth's killer. Beverly thinks the skin peeling off the murderer would make sense, as the killer was cut during the crime but never bled. Will agrees, as it also may explain why they were trying to cut Beth's face off - they may have mistaken it for a mask and could also have trouble distinguishing faces. The killer came back to make sure they hadn't committed the crime, but their delusions would've been confirmed by the blood on the ground. The killer's profile is beginning to take shape.
At another session, Will and Hannibal discuss the latest with his hallucinations. Will is still drawing messed up clocks, despite his understanding that they're perfectly in order. When discussing his recent case, Will tells Hannibal about the killer's profile. Hannibal thinks the killer might suffer from a mental illness that dissociates recognition with faces or people. The killer may have reached out to someone they loved - Beth - but struggled to see the person as anything more than an imposter. If crossed, the killer may have lashed out and gotten violent. She can't trust anything or anyone. Will can't help but see the similarities in his own mental struggles.
That night, as Will has a nightmare in his bed, Georgia Madchen stands outside his house window and watches him. At Quantico, Will and Jack speak with the suspect's mother. The woman is relieved to hear she's alive more than anything; her daughter's suffered from mental illness her entire life and is definitely capable of violence. As the mother speaks of her frustrations with mental health rehabilitation, Will empathizes, having recently experienced the exact same thing.
Later, Jack confronts Will at FBI headquarters; he still harbors guilt for his handling of Miriam Glass, his fallen protege, and he can see a pattern occurring now with Will. What Jack wants to know is why Will still comes to work every day when he knows it's bad for him. Will can't offer an answer, so Jack provides his own hypothesis - he thinks Will comes because work is the only stabilizing force in his life at the moment. Jack tells Will, when he doubts himself, he doesn't have to doubt Jack too.
Hannibal and Dr. Sutcliffe converse over dinner. Dr. Sutcliffe asks Hannibal about his relationship with Will. Hannibal explains that he enjoys Graham's vivid imagination and pure empathy. There's nothing Will can't understand, and that terrifies Graham. Though he is intrigued, Dr. Sutcliffe continues to consider Will an asset. Especially with the diagnosis that they are deliberately withholding from him.
Will is eager to diagnose his mental problems, unaware that Hannibal and Dr. Sutcliffe are intentionally keeping him in the dark. Will returns for another MRI testing, but when it's over, no one is around to help him wrap up his appointment. The hospital is worryingly empty. As Will investigates, he finds Dr. Sutcliffe's office door dripping with blood, he covers his hand before he enters, and finds the doctor is dead at his desk, his head ripped apart at the jaw.
Dr. Sutcliffe's office has turned into a crime scene, and Brian sees a similarity in the weapons used at Beth LeBeau's house. The only connection between the victims is Will, though. Will wonders if Georgia mistook his doctor for Graham, as she struggles to identify faces. Will tells Jack he might have contacted her that one night in the forest when he was going through his cadences. At that moment, Will shouted out "you're alive," and if Georgia was listening, it might've been the first time she realized that in a long while.
That night, as Will sleeps, he awakens from a dream. His dogs are growling and he realizes he is not alone. He looks under his bed to see Georgia is lying there, watching him. Will falls to the floor and calmly attempts to bring her into the present moment. When Georgia asks if she's alive, Will says yes, and reaches his hand out to hold hers. Later, Georgia is taken to ICU and treated for her loss of vital fluids. Jack wonders to Hannibal whether she'll make a full recovery, and more importantly, whether she'll remember what she's done. Dr. Lecter says he hopes she doesn't, for her sake, as it is then revealed that Hannibal was the one who killed Dr. Sutcliffe - not Georgia. She wandered into the room that night, and Hannibal handed her the weapon.
Extras
- The episode's title, Buffet Froid, is the French word for "cold cuts".
- Will Graham's head is placed into a G.E. Lightspeed C.T. Scanner. In spite of this, the scanner sounds like an M.R.I. scanner, and is later referred to as an 'M.R.I. machine by Will , rather than a C.T. scanner
Jamon iberico -
Jamon Iberico is made from the Iberico pig, a breed in Spain that descended
| Season 1 Episodes | |||||||||
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Apéritif • Amuse-Bouche • Potage • Oeuf • Coquilles • Entrée • Sorbet • Fromage • Trou Normand • Buffet Froid • Rôti • Relevés • Savoureux | |||||||||