Hannibal & Freud: An Analysis

Bedelia Du Maurier, Alana Bloom & The Wendigo: Three New Convex Mirrors to Analyze the Unanalyzable Cannibal

The impenetrability of the mind of Hannibal Lecter is a theme within the Lecterverse as central as cannibalism, gothic horror, and fine art. Clarice Starling famously remarks in the 1991 film, “They don’t have a name for what he is,” which spawned decades of literary and critical examination of the Lecter character. Bryan Fuller brought refreshing new light to the psyche of Dr. Hannibal Lecter via the original characters Dr. Bedelia Du Maurier, Dr. Alana Bloom (a reimagining of Thomas Harris’s Alan Bloom), and The Wendigo — also known as the Stag Man. These three characters not only tease out more information about Hannibal himself, but also can further be read psychodynamically as literary reflections and externalizations of Hannibal’s Id, Ego, and Superego structure. Bedelia, Lecter’s psychiatrist, analyzes, experiences, speaks with, protects, lies for, and largely mediates with the external world as Hannibal’s ego (“Person Suit”/“Human Veil”). Superego Alana Bloom acts as the series’ vocal moral judge and eventually becomes Hannibal’s personal warden and punisher–Bloom even goes as far as wearing modifications of Hannibal’s own signature wardrobe while attempting to confine and control him. All the while, the bestial Wendigo haunts over Hannibal (and the nigh telepathic Will Graham) in a phantasm space reminiscent of the Unconscious as a non-verbal but nevertheless communicative/articulate (indeed shapeshifting) representation of Hannibal’s publicly repressed homicidal psychopathic id. A Freudian reading of Fuller’s new characters can be viewed as a device to give fans their first dramatically and critically robust access (albeit scintillatingly minimal) into the psyche of one of fiction’s most alluring and elusive villains.