Francis Dolarhyde (Hannibal)

''This page is about the incarnation of Francis Dolarhyde from the TV series. The mainstream version can be found here: Francis Dolarhyde.''

"I am smiling."

- Dolarhyde to Reba

Francis Dolarhyde is the main and final antagonist of the third season in the TV series Hannibal. He is also the very unseen murderer of the Marlowe family of the series premiere.

On January 13, 2015, The Hobbit star Richard Armitage was cast as Dolarhyde and appeared in season 3 of the television series Hannibal, beginning in episode 8, "The Great Red Dragon".

Season 1
In the series' premiere, Apéritif, a graphic double murder has taken place in a residential neighborhood. Will Graham, a brilliant but socially awkward savant, is examining the crime scene. Putting himself in the mind of the criminal, Will uses extreme focus to hone in on the details of the murder. Every bullet was shot with expert precision. The killer tapped the phones in the house a week prior in order to record a conversation between one of the victims and her security company. When the murder was committed, the culprit played her voice back to keep the authorities at bay. Whoever did this was a professional.

Season 3
Coming Soon!

Adaptational parts
Dolarhyde's character arc in the TV series broadly followed that of the novel, but a few significant changes were made:
 * Dolarhyde communicates with Lecter directly via telephone, and engages in a kind of "therapy session" with the doctor.
 * He first encounters Graham at the Brooklyn museum while devouring the Blake painting, and attacks him.
 * After receiving Graham's address from Lecter, Dolarhyde attacks and wounds Graham's wife, Molly.
 * He kidnaps, mutilates and burns Frederick Chilton, rather than Freddy Lounds.
 * After faking his suicide, he confronts Graham, who tells him to go after Lecter.
 * He attacks a police convoy carrying Lecter to a new prison facility, unaware that it is a trap orchestrated by Graham. He kills the guards, but spares Graham and Lecter. He follows them to a beach house, where he shoots Lecter and stabs Graham in the face. They get the better of Dolarhyde, however, and kill him together: Graham stabs him in the chest, and Lecter tears his throat open with his teeth.

Victims

 * 2013: The Marlows:
 * Thomas Marlow (shot twice in the chest, severing jugulars and carotids)
 * Theresa Marlow (shot once in the neck and tortured to death)
 * 2018: The Dragon's rampage
 * The Jacobi family:
 * Mr. Jacobi (sliced his neck)
 * Mrs. Jacobi (shot once in the chest and tortured to death; put pieces of glass on eyes post-mortem)
 * Two Jacobi boys (both shot once)
 * The Leeds family:
 * Mrs. Leeds (shot once in the chest and tortured to death; put pieces of glass on eyes post-mortem)
 * Two Leeds children (both shot once)
 * The Graham house shooting:
 * Molly Graham (shot once non-fatally in the ear; survived)
 * Walter Graham (attempted)
 * Unnamed man (shot to death)
 * The parking lot abduction:
 * Two bodyguards (shot to death)
 * Frederick Chilton (kidnapped, ripped his lips off and set on fire; survived)
 * The break-out:
 * Six police officers (shot to death)
 * Hannibal Lecter (attempted)
 * Will Graham (attempted)

Trivia

 * Dolarhyde could be considered as the series' Bigger Bad, since he was the unseen murderer of the Marlowe family, at the very time he did not appear yet. In addition, Fuller confirmed in interviews that this is an early kill of Dolarhyde's, before he perfected his full pattern of home invasion and decorating corpses with pieces of mirrors.