ᴛʜᴇ Qᴜᴀʀʀʏ: ᴘᴀᴛʜ ᴅᴇꜱɪɢɴ
i seriously love how this game designed certain parts- this for example, are VHS covers of your chosen paths through the game
I had an image of him sitting in an oak paneled office in an old building in Baltimore; in his psychiatric office. In a black suit, white shirt, dark red tie, slicked back hair. Very charming, listening to his patients. That’s one of the images, of sunlight coming in to the room, a beautiful room, and the smell of coffee. This elegant man sitting behind a desk, studying his patients. That’s the only flashing image I had, of this man who’s capable of such horror – Anthony Hopkins, The Silence of the Lambs commentary.
Do you think Hannibal would have left Will to die at Muskrat Farms if he hadn’t promised Alana he’d save him? I saw something on the script I think once saying that Hannibal thought about leaving Will behind
No, definitely not! For one thing, Alana didn’t need to ask Hannibal to save Will - he would have done it anyway. Also, if he didn’t want to do that, he would have found a way to twist his promise to Alana and just leave anyway. But he didn’t just save Will: he killed everyone, carried him out in his arms, took him back home, changed his clothes, treated his wounds, and stayed by his bedside. Then he gave up his freedom for him.
As for the script, here’s that quote: “An open doorway filled with darkness. A blood-splattered Hannibal looms from within to fill it. The open fields and woodland of Muskrat Farm beyond. The huge moon hanging above and a myriad of stars. Freedom. He could run and no one would catch him. Leave Will and be free. The thought crosses his mind. He takes a deep breath of night air. And then he turns back into the house, and the shadows within envelope him once more…”
I actually love this because it’s a perfect portrayal of wistfulness. In this very moment, Hannibal contemplates the easier and painless times of having no attachments, just freedom ahead. It’s a reckless and impossible thought: to go there, forget about Will, about everything…
But then reality sets in. And in reality, Hannibal loves Will more than life itself, so with a defeated sigh, he turns and goes after him. Because their paths lie together now, it’s inevitable.
And this fits with what I believe is the fandom's collective idea that, it must have been horrible for Hannibal to realize that he loved will.
I mean can you imagine? Slowly he noticed that he was being more impulsive, he was going the extra mile, he was feeling and acting on those feelings. Basically in his attachment to Will, he became just a tiny bit more human. Will influenced him to betray himself, just like Mischa did.
When Hannibal says to Will that when life becomes too polite he should think of him. It echoes to Will who has never been quite a polite man but he tries because you need to be polite in society to be good. But it's definitely an effort. And he makes the effort but it's not his true nature.
What Hannibal is saying is that when you're tired of pretending to be who you aren't for the sake of 'others', think of me, because I succeeded in being who I am in that society and that dooming yourself to the boredom of others people is not a fatality.
There is freedom to be had. There is freedom to be who you are, truly
I love this scene. She preserves Hannibal’s image as an innocent, and creates her own. I think Bedelia may also have partially believed that she was enough to change him; I’m thinking about their conversations about peace, the preservation thereof, entropy, etc. Failure to help Hannibal overcome his obsession with Will Graham meant a lot of things to Bedelia–that she was not enough as a woman and a wife, but that she had failed him as a therapist, That’s what broke her heart.
#also implies that hannibal provoked in her#what will provoked in him#an inconvenient compassion (via @bedannibal-lectaurier)
Chiyoh herself explained its significance: to convince Will that “there are means of influence other than violence.” And the other mean of influence is love.
As I’ve said before, Will and Hannibal both awaken emotions in one another that they’ve fought to repress their whole lives— Will’s capability and desire for justice through righteous violence, and Hannibal’s capability and desire for love. They both awoke that in one another. Consider this exchange in 2x13, ‘Mizumono’:
HANNIBAL: Do you believe you could change me the way I changed you?
WILL: I already did.
One of the best metaphors for love I’ve ever heard is this: when you fall in love with someone, you grow another limb. You are now conscious of a world you did not have access to before, were not capable of before. And when they break your heart— or when you break their heart— you lose the limb. So you’re suddenly conscious of its lack, though you’re back to the same as before. Before you and after you, as Will says. And sometimes that separation cannot be survived or endured.
Will isn’t able to almost capture Hannibal in season two because of violence; he’s able to because he essentially seduces him. I don’t think Will is capable of killing Hannibal (or at least not without killing himself). He doesn’t shoot him in ‘Savoureux’, he doesn’t shoot him in ‘Yakimono’, he doesn’t feed him to Mason’s pigs in ‘Tome-Wan’, he doesn’t shoot him in ‘Mizumono’, and he can’t bear to watch him be killed by Dolarhyde in ‘The Wrath of the Lamb’. And when he finally manages it (or doesn’t manage it, depending on whether we get a season 4) he has to kill himself with him. Hannibal and Will can’t survive separation. And death would be permanent separation if only one of them died.
When Chiyoh kisses Will, she’s leading with evidence. She starts with one mean of influence: sexual desire. She kisses him. And then she follows up with the other: violence. She throws him off the train. Chiyoh knows Hannibal has a fundamental desire to be understood, to be seen. And she’s trying to convince Will that he can exploit that vulnerability. Part of it is in her own self-interest. As she says in 3x06, ‘Dolce’, she wants to cage him— she doesn’t want him dead. And what is the most effective kind of cage? Love.
Will listens to Chiyoh. He opts for the other means of influence. As he says in ‘The Wrath of the Lamb’: “You turned yourself in so I would always know where you are. You’d only do that if I rejected you.” It’s a more effective cage than any one Chiyoh could contrive herself.
I think I got blocked so I will now talk about Silas and post in his tag and you all have to suffer... or you like what I'm going to write.
The white wolf really is such a mysterie which is a pity. Whe know literally nothing but his name and what he kind of looks like.
All we know about him are from very untrustworthy sources.
One is Travis who is telling us what Kaylee told him.
Travis assumes that Eliza is not Silas' real mother. But we don't know that. Eliza looks really old so how likely is it? Well, it can still be true that Eliza is indeed Silas mother since the game is taking place in a world where werewolves, witches and ghosts are real.
But all of this just raises more question and we get literally no answers.
Like how old was/is Silas?
Travis says Kaylee wanted to help the child. this means that Silas was in his human form, right? And Travis also says that even six years later there are sightings of a feral albino child along the coast.
Of course if Silas was something like 6 years old when Harum Scarum got destroyed, he could be 12 when he was finally "caught".
That again raises the question if no one ever tried to find him and bring him inside? A naked child in the woods that was seen multiple times?
Anyway let us look at the poster on the cage:
compared to the new flyer, we find all the time, the one from six years ago:
In the first one Eliza looks a lot younger. Of course that could have been the artist of the poster deciding to just pretty her up. But if you look at the design, the first ones looks older... like it could be from decades ago.
But Silas was already a part of the show then. So... how old is Silas really? Is he Elizas son? She sure seems to think so.
"Mommy is coming Silas!"
(Sorry the screenshots I have are bad)
Eliza sees Silas as her son. Why did she put him in a cage? Maybe it wasn't as bad as Kaylee thought it was? It might have been good enough that people thought it is just an act? The cage itself is rather big... Maybe peope thought the feral thing was also just an act?
That would be what I might assume... children who grow up in a circus often help out with the acts.
Either way, Eliza loved Silas enought to stay in the real world as a ghost and to try to kill off a whole family to protect him (and maybe bring him snacks/campers into the woods, who knows).
Anyway talking about age, another thing is that both Kaylee and Caleb are (if we believe the family tree) 21 (*1999) and 26 (*1995)
Not exactly teenagers, even though Chris titles them as such. The developers are just not exact with the ages and all characters are unreliable narrators.
Also Caleb was 20 when he started the fire to help his 15 year old sister to free a child. Instead of asking their cop-uncle to help?
All of this just seems weird. Caleb should have known better. He was already an adult who grew up in the woods and at camp. He should know about the dangers of fire.
Even if they were both only 10 years old they should have known better...
Another thing is that we have to assume is, that Silas was in his human form when he got "rescued". And still he bit Caleb. He is multiple times described as feral (again by Travis who is not a reliable source) but it might still be true.
The fact alone that Silas bit Caleb while probably being human is an indicator for Silas actually being feral. That raises the question of why was Silas like that? Was he like that from the beginning? Or was he just not raised adequately? OR if he really is older than he looks did he become more feral with time?
All of those are valid options.
Another thing that always strikes me as weird is Kaylees letter. The first time I heard it, it sounded like she is not sorry about what happened. It sounds like she is only sorry about how it turned out.
Though, many people died she does not sound like she feels any regret... maybe werewolves really become more feral with time?
Gammy,
How long we gonna drag this shit out? I know family is the most important thing, but I wanna know what's outside the forest, outside this damn house and camp, and I sure as hell know that ain't about to happen 'cos of who we are. Maybe we can explain what's goin' on. Fuckin' show people. Then they'll know we got no control over it. I know you just tryin' to protect us, but one day you won't be here no more and right now it feels like we stuck in a dark hole. I can't sleep Gammy. Or if I do I dream about that fuckin' fire. We were just dumbass kids back then. I wish it never happened.
Love, K xoxo
Also Kaylee writes that they were just dumbass kids, which might be true for her but not for her brother (again, 15 and 20).
BUT THEN we have this photo:
We don't know when it was made but it could be from six years ago? But Caleb does not look 5 years older than Kaylee... all of this is just one big mysterie.
Anyway I wish we would have learned more about Silas because the things we do learn are not really anything to go with... all we can do is take those and put our own preferred headcanons around them.
@alienslover
Thanks for the analysis! This part of the game is really interesting. But, I think, we should not forget that maybe these inconsistencies are just developers' mistakes.
You're very welcome and they certainly are. But while doing an analysis it's important to not take that too much into consideration since that can explain everything. Which durorholmes says so correct:
@durorholmes
A lot of the lore and backstory feels like how someone writes an essay and makes changes along the way but doesn't proof-read before they submit to make sure it flows well. We could go with the inconsistencies being a combo of suppression and ignorance, Eliza being crazy etc but it's more likely they had to submit before it was late. BUT this is what those mad-talented talented fic writers are for.
It sure looks like the developers just stitched together different ideas and designs without having the end product in mind. Or more like the end but not the way there... but the analysis I did was done without thinking "This is a story written, programmed, designed and produced by multiple people under a lot of pressure."
Because it explains everything. It explains why the timeline is wobbly, why Laura apparently runs around for a whole month in bloody clothes and why there seem to be some reactions that feel like they were supposed to even more different outcomes, like storylines that lead to nowhere. It explains why some character can die in a lot of way and others in only one.
The Quarry is basically feels like an unfinished game that acts like it's finished.
And that is the Doylist explaination.
I tried to write this essay from a Watsonian perspective. xD I wanted to talk about what I think about Silas and the possibilities and conclusions that can be drawn by all the canon hints we get.
It's like... was Silas an abused child? Maybe. Or maybe he was an adult in the body of a child but overall happy with his life?
Was Kaylee really a good hearted child? Or was she an entitled teen?
I don't know. No one knows. So, headcanons it is! I agree that fanfiction writers do an amazing job with that xD
People who look down on fanfiction writers don't understand how much meta analysis goes into those fics.
durorholmes
Also, I found the photo in-game. It's at the sideshow and the date is placed in November 2015 (can't remember the date but you also find the ticket stubs with it).
You are right!
I forgot about the stub. "Admit one | October 27th 2015"
It more makes it look like that the photo is from six years ago but either they really gave Caleb the wrong age (Doylist) or he was a chronic babyface (Watsonian).
Where do you find the Nature of Evil poster? Is it in Hackett House?
That is correct! To be more precise in Bobby's room. His room is kind of sad (lots of empty bottles) but it shows that he is a fan of horror movies.
And here are the pictures once more to click through, all lighten up a bit:
Question asked on this post:
Some screenshots of the station and mostly of Travis office.