The Wrath of the Lamb Part II — The Mic Drop

Just before the mic drop is Will’s only conversation with Reba. Will’s clear parallel all along has been with Dolarhyde, and Molly is his Reba. It’s no mistake that his final conversation with both of them is in a hospital bed. Will defends Dolarhyde, saying he wasn’t a freak, but a man with a freak on his back. In defending Dolarhyde, he’s also defending himself — Hannibal is the freak on his back, and he deserves sympathy.

Reba’s having none of it, though, and she has a remarkably clear-headed view of her relationship with Dolarhyde. She’s used to drawing freaks, and she understands the need to avoid them. With this change of tone, Will’s focalization changes, too. He now sees himself in Reba, in her attraction of people who foster dependency. In Reba’s victimhood and survival, Will sees an opening for himself, for the salvation of his soul.

So he goes to Hannibal, to say goodbye. Hannibal knows that Will is leaving, so he pushes, hard. He tells Will he is responsible for Chilton (which Will doesn’t deny), and that he’ll never get his old life back.

So Will pushes back even harder. Both of them are making last ditch efforts, here. Hannibal is desperate to get into Will’s head, to keep him from drifting back into normalcy. And Will is desperate to hold onto that normalcy, even though he knows he’s slipping. Dolarhyde’s death is the last sliver of light for him to get out. And so he pushes back with that mic drop:

You turned yourself in so I would always know where you were. But you’d only do that if I rejected you. Goodbye.

This obviously has a lot of weight to it, but why? It’s fair to say that at the time, Will’s rejection broke Hannibal’s heart. That goodbye was harsh enough in its own right — why is this worse?

You might say that Hannibal loves two things — killing and Will. If Hannibal turned himself in of his own accord, then he willingly gave up killing in order to keep Will. But if Will anticipated his actions, then he took himself away in order to stop the killing. On one level, this means that Will’s thoughts were on catching the killer rather than respecting his friend, making it a repeat of his betrayal in season 2.

On the other, more emotional level, it means Will broke Hannibal’s heart in order to take away the only other thing he loves. And what’s worse, he made Hannibal think it was his own choice.

Whichever way you cut it, that is quite the mic drop. It’s cruel, and it may not even be true, but it’s done out of necessity. Will’s afraid for himself, so he makes it as clear as he can that he’s in charge.

Does he seem full of conviction in this scene? Far from it. But he’s making an effort. He hurts Hannibal to prove (probably largely to himself) that he doesn’t need him. So how do we get from this false ending to the real one? I believe the pivotal moment is the next one, in the motel room. Something happens to make Will about-face (and face a direction that is unclear to us). Let’s see what it might be in Part III.