I will admit. Its been a little while since I've engaged with the subject material I'm about to discuss. But I need to talk about this because I have been losing my mind for the last few weeks of class.
Something clicked in my brain when we pulled up William Blake's artwork of Satan as the Great Red Dragon from the Book of Revelation. I wish it was something, yknow, art history related regarding the renowned work of William Blake or something adjacently scholarly... but it was notttttt... it was season three of NBC's Hannibal series...
Dolarhyde is haunted by the presence of The Great Red Dragon, leading to an obsessive fascination with its image and a compulsive desire to 'become' the beast. He is covered in tattoos of Blake's artwork depicting the dragon (seen above) and... I think at some point he breaks into the archives and eats the painting??? He also kills people but that's whatever.
On my first watch of this series I did not know that The Great Red Dragon was actually a representation of the devil. Although the series still reads incredibly clearly without having known this information, having the contextual basis proves for a much more interesting interpretation. Being able to connect this alter / figure of the dragon to the devil points to a greater trend of conceptualizing the devil as a malevolent being which tempts and turns man to evil and sin. I also think that there might be some layer of juxtaposing Dolarhyde and his love interest to Satan / The Dragon and the Woman Clothed with Sun from Revelation (also seen in Blake's artwork).
To conclude: I learned something that genuinely better informed my understanding and analysis of another piece of media! Nice!
"He also kills people but that's whatever." Totally crying, SB. You're hilarious.
ReplyDeleteI've only seen the first two seasons of Hannibal, and I thought they were both incredible. It's been about five years since I watched them, so maybe I should rewatch the show, especially since I now know the demonic imagery not just with the red dragon, but with the stag who makes regular appearances in seasons one and two.
ReplyDelete