making sense of Hannibal

I'm going back in to rewatch and finish Bryan Fuller's Hannibal. I watched through the second season previously, but stopped tracking around the fourth episode - I couldn't figure out where the story was going, and thus couldn't identify hopes or fears to propel me through the matter of the story. I followed recaps and discussion of the third season, because I wanted to know what kind of a thing Hannibal was going to turn out to be. And now we know.

I feel like I approach narratives really differently based on where I think they're going. It has to do with how much I'm willing to let myself hope, and also with what the narrative is positing as the highest good. For example, one of the reasons why White Collar lost me was that it couldn't decide if it was Neal needed leashed or Peter needed freed, what kind of an ending would count as a "good one," and things got stretched tight across the polarity. So: there isn't going to be a happy ending in Hannibal; this is a study of a downfall. Will is to be empathized with, but not hoped for.

( this is some bleak and gnarly analysis; tw maybe not good reading for people currently in the depths of despair  )

I wish the first episodes hadn't cued the show up as a procedural; although maybe the genre confusion is meant to be part of the effect?