| “ | I've been doing some accounting of what's important in my life and what isn't. You are important, Abigail.
— Will to Abigail
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” |
Will Graham and Abigail Hobbs first met in Apéritif, when he shot her father to save her life. Recently he found out that Abigail killed Nicholas Boyle, even though he was trying to lie to himself about it. He, like Hannibal, felt resposibility and obligation to help her. Will was one of her legal guardians, next to Hannibal.
Season 1[]
In Apéritif, Hannibal rushes in and helps stabilize the girl's bleeding. She's rushed to the hospital. When Will goes to the hospital later on to check on the girl, she and Hannibal are both sleeping, his hand holding hers.
In Potage, Back in Abigail's room,Freddie Lounds has somehow found a way in, and she's interviewing the poor girl. Before their conversation gets out of hand, Will Graham and Hannibal burst in and order her to leave. Abigail seems to remember Will as the man who killed her father. This haunts Will. Will opens up to Abigail and explains his nightmares surrounding the traumatic event. They bond over their shared pain. Later, Abigail's return home is immediately disrupted by the word "Cannibals"
vandalized on her front door and garage. Alana, Will and Hannibal follow Abigail inside as she retraces her memories of the crime scene. When they get to the kitchen, Will and Alana ask Abigail about that final phone call she answered before her father died. Hannibal watches from a distance, silent. Abigail does not remember the voice on the other end, presumably that of the copycat killer.
For Hannibal's sake, it's better that way.
In Trou Normand, At the psychiatric hospital, Will and Hannibal try to dissuade Abigail from writing a tell-all book with Freddie Lounds. If Abigail publishes this book, she'll be putting her privacy - along with Hannibal and Will's privacy - in jeopardy. Abigail just wants the truth to come out, but once the door is open, Abigail will have no control over what people say or write about her. Is she ready for that?
Later, Will and Hannibal express their concerns about Abigail's tell-all to Freddie over dinner. Freddie just wants to tell Abigail's version of the truth, and though Hannibal and Will just want to protect her, Freddie thinks her silence until now has suggested guilt.
In Relevés, Elsewhere, Abigail tells Will she knew she was different when she killed Nick because it felt good to her. Will tells Abigail that killing her father was empowering. He also tells her he might have a lead on her father's copycat... but he's going to need her help. Will takes Abigail back to the cabin where her father killed all of his victims. It's
there that Will finds out Abigail was the bait in which her father lured in all the girls he murdered. This shocking revelation taints the image Will has of Abigail and sends him into a psychotic episode. Will begins to struggle with reality and hallucination, until he wakes up on an airplane, back in Virginia. He's the only one left. Abigail is nowhere to be found.
In "Savoureux," Will returns home without knowing how he got there, covered in grime and dried blood. He immediately retches up an ear in his kitchen sink. Believing it belonged to Abigail due to his hallucinations of killing her and worrying that he might've actually done so, Will calls up Hannibal and tells him his concerns. Once Hannibal arrives, Will is manipulated into thinking he really had killed Abigail and is taken to jail. When Beverly tells him to interpret the evidence, in a broken voice Will says that according to the evidence, he killed Abigail Hobbs. However, he becomes aware that it is Hannibal's doing and gaslighting techniques used on him, and that if it was either him or Hannibal who killed Abigail, with Hannibal as more the reasonable suspect. After he is apprehended by Jack Crawford and Hannibal, Will is taken to prison to await trial for the murder of Abigail and all of the other victims belonging to the Chesapeake Ripper, successfully framed by Hannibal.
During Will's trial in "Hassun," an image of Abigail is displayed along with all of Will's other supposed victims. It is only the image of Abigail that attracts Will's attention, and his expression is wrought with pain as he observes her photographed smile.
In the episode "Takiawase," while still in prison, Will dreams about teaching Abigail how to fish. The conversation starts off similarly to their last conversation in the Hobbs cabin in Minnesota with Abigail. "Same thing, isn't it? One you stalk, the other you lure." When she asks him what he's trying to catch, Will replies that he's trying to catch the one who got her. The one who got away. Dream!Abigail voices that everyone thinks Will is lying about the one who got away -- Hannibal -- but Will assures her that's why he's going to catch him. He smiles fondly down at her and she returns the gesture. Continuing the lesson, Will tells dream!Abigail to name the bait on her line after someone that she cherished. Abigail asks if it's to say goodbye, but Will tells her that according to the superstition, if you name the bait after someone that you cherished who also cherished you, you can catch the fish. Abigail asks Will who he named his bait after, and he solemnly replies, "Abigail." This suggests that any reservations Will had extended to Abigail before her death had diminished and he only sought to remember her for how he had always perceived her before he knew she had been complicit in her father's crimes.
Later, in "Kō No Mono," Will is about to become a father. Hannibal asks him if he will protect this child in a way that he couldn't protect Abigail. Will admits to Hannibal that he still dreams about Abigail. He dreams he's teaching her how to fish. Hannibal appears to have a moment of genuine sincerity and apologizes for taking that from him, saying he wishes he could give it [her] back. Will agrees, but acknowledges that it's too late now, and a single, lone tear slips down his face. Hannibal tells Will that sometimes he shatters a teacup, in reminiscence of Abigail, and isn't satisfied when it doesn't gather itself up again. "Someday, perhaps, that teacup might come together."
In the season 2 finale, "Mizumono," while intending to help Alana and Jack apprehend Hannibal, Will finds Abigail in Hannibal's kitchen, who is presumably missing an ear and had been held captive by Hannibal since the day in Minnesota. Will is stunned to see her again, alive, and lowers his gun as he utters her name. Abigail stands before him barely containing tears and explains that she only did what Hannibal told her to, as she didn't know what else to do. The emotional reunion is cut short when Abigail and Will become aware of Hannibal's presence behind Will. Hannibal uses the linoleum knife to stab Will, nearly disemboweling him. Abigail stares on at the scene in shock and terror, and attempts to go to Will as he slides to the floor but restrains herself, aware of Hannibal's unpredictability. After a short moment of conversation between Hannibal and Will, in which Hannibal tells Will that this is the moment once again that the teacup shatters, Will quickly gathers what Hannibal is about to do and pleads with him not to, horrified.
Hannibal beckons Abigail over to him as Will's pleas grow more desperate and coated in emotion, and once again a knife is directly at Abigail's throat, over the scar that her father gave her in a perfect, tragic reenactment of that day in the kitchen at the Hobb's house. Will is powerless as Hannibal deliberately and coldly slits open Abigail's throat before him. Hannibal ignores Will's cries, depositing Abigail to the floor beside him as she bleeds out and gasps for breath. Once Hannibal departs, Will struggles over to Abigail, his own wound bleeding and painful, and places a hand over the open slit in her neck, attempting to stop the bleeding, another parallel to their first encounter. However, Will's wound proves to be too much and his slackened fingers fall from Abigail's wound, leaving the two of them bleeding out and breathing heavily near death on Hannibal's kitchen floor.
The two appear to have a close relationship resembling father and daughter but it is ultimately tainted in its intricacy due to Will's connection to her father and having killed him. Will holds paternal feelings towards her, such as when Hannibal asks him if he's feeling particularly paternal towards Abigail after desiring to teach her to fish and Will admits that he is. He seeks to protect her even when he finds out that she killed Nicholas Boyle. His image of her appears to shatter and then reassemble after he learns that she was an accomplice to her father's crimes, but any sense of distaste is quickly dissolved in his memories of her, as it is insinuated that in Will's dreams they are closer than they were in a world where Abigail was still alive, a manifestation of what Will wishes they could have been like had she survived. Abigail appears to be fond of Will but weary of him, and eventually terrified. However, it is not known how she felt about him in between the time that Hannibal took her captive to frame Will for her death and her reappearance in "Mizumono." Abigail appears to want to help Will after he's been stabbed and becomes emotional when she first sees him, attempting to explain that she did what Hannibal told her to do in an attempt to perhaps engage Will once more. When they are both bleeding out on the floor in Hannibal's kitchen, they are shown with minimal eye contact, and are in close proximity as they presumably die alongside each other.
Quotes[]
- "How many nights did you spend in Abigail Hobbs's hospital room?" (Jack)
- "You saved Abigail Hobbs's life, but you also orphaned her. That comes with certain emotional obligation, regardless of empathy disorders." (Lecter)
- "I've been doing some accounting of what's important in my life and what isn't. You are important, Abigail."
- "Just because you killed my dad doesn't mean you get to be him."
- "You have nothing to apologize for."
- "Sorry Will. I'm not confident in your ability to be objective about Abigial Hobbs right now." (Jack)
- "You must understand our concerns. We care about Abigail. Our only thought is to protect her." (Lecter to Freddie)
- "I remember you. You killed my dad."
- "There was planty wrong with your father, Abigail. But, there's nothing wrong with you."
- "Teaching her how to fish? Her father taught her how to hunt." (Lecter)
- "I could take you, if you wanna go?"
Conversations[]
- Will: "Last time he sent me into a dark place, I brought something back."
Lecter: "A surrogate daughter?"
- Alana: "Abigail Hobbs is a success for you."
Will: "It doesn't look like success."
Alana: "Don't feel sorry for yourself because you saved this girl's life."
- Will: "Abigail Hobbs doesn't have anyone."
Alana: "You can't be her everyone."
