[[meta]]] Some notes on playing Dr. Hannibal Lecter in Milliways

[cook_the_rude]

1. Hannibal is not going to feed your character people unless expressly wished for by the mun. He's never going to kill anybody in Milliways, unless it's part of a plot where somebody has to be killed. If he does feed people people, they'll come from his freezer.
   
2. If I tag out with him and you're in any way uncomfortable about him, drop me a PM, and I'll have him wander away on the next tag or two.
3. If you want him to feed your character people, or have any other idea you'd like to use him for, drop me a PM. I'm always up for plot or profit!
   
4. He does look like: a) Mads Mikkelsen and b) a younger version of the Hannibal that was in the bar for a long time. If your character knows anybody played by Mads Mikkelsen, or has known that former Hannibal Lecter (name used to be doc_lecter on LiveJournal), you're welcome to have them recognise him.
5. By old, old Millicanon, it had been established that Sara Sidle of CSI had recognised the name of Hannibal Lecter as a famous serial killer from her world. Through that, Security has probably heard of him. If your Security pup has been around long enough (that probably means only Mel or Alanna, I guess), then feel free to know about that. Other than that, please go easy on the 'OMG famous cannibal' thing, even if your character is a) from CSI or b) from another Bryan Fuller series that shares a universe with 'Hannibal'. If it happens, it's not that bad, either; see next point.
6. Hannibal will probably think that he either grabbed the shrooms by mistake instead of the funghi porcini, or has taken a very strange turn in his memory palace, or both. I'm not sure, see next point.
7. Thomas Harris, the author of the Hannibal Lecter books, in his 2000 preface to 'Red Dragon' describes his writing process, which is extremely 'headvoice' oriented; in an RP context, it would be impossible to interact with a person with so little perceived control over his characters. He claims to have been as scared of Hannibal Lecter as anybody else. As this clever meta (among others) points out, Hannibal is only ever seen as the other, never somebody we are invited to identify with -- not even in 'Hannibal Rising', when he is the PoV character, do we get to see through his eyes, we merely watch him doing his thing. I will have to curb the narration and leave off most of the internal monologue when playing him. For potential telepaths, I will provide what he is thinking or picturing, but it might just be a corridor in his memory palace, but I will go light on the asides and motivations.
   
8. I do not intend to do the full 'OMG a bar in my waiting room' thing with him, that is old. See point five. Also, as Eric brilliantly argued, his world is rather magical realist, even if not openly populated by angels and demons, as some are. It does share a universe, apparently, with some other Bryan Fuller shows that definitely are magical realist, while on the other hand Georgia Lass from 'Dead Like Me' is a very, very sad expy of herself, so it doesn't go that far. Hannibal is not very likely to flail, but will be curious about many things.
9. There will be awful cannibalism puns and Cleolinda references.

Thank you!

Comments

[bjornwilde]

For those of us with pups with heightened senses, would Hannibal have any scent of human blood and such to him? Sorry, I don't watch the show and have only seen Silence of the Lambs.

[cook_the_rude]

Hannibal himself has an extremely heightened sense of smell, and is incredibly neat to the point of OCD. That said, if somebody has a canine sense of smell that can tell the difference, say, between a vegetarian and a vegan even if both are freshly showered, then that same person can probably not only tell that Hannibal eats meat, but also that he eats unusual meat.