This is a show that NBC showed a lot of hope for in the beginning. They hired a quality team to get it going and gave it a straight-to-series order after reading the pilot. However, then they forgot about it and gave it a late release date that resulted in skepticism from many potential viewers. However, the premiere was met with a high viewership and much praise from critics and fans of Thomas Harris' original novels, and it brought in a lot of new fans. And the premiere is everything that you could imagine and so much more in terms of style and insane creativity.
As an introduction to this universe, Bryan Fuller (the creator of the show and writer of this episode) does an excellent job of setting up the characters with all the details that we need to know about them. Will Graham is set up as the focus point of the show and quickly breaks free of the expectations that many fans had about him. He's such an interesting character right off the bat, with the opening scene showcasing a side of him that we've not been as thoroughly introduced to before. His ability to figuratively enter the minds of the killers he's investigating is shown in a literal way and you're immediately onboard due to the effect of it. At the same time, Fuller doesn't feel the need to wait with the introduction of our titular character's real persona. There's a scene in the film that shows Hannibal Lecter preparing a set of lungs that he proceeds to eat. This could have easily been a revelation set for a future episode, but Fuller knows that the audience is expecting this, so he doesn't wait. It sets the stage for such an interesting cat-and-mouse game between these two characters. And on the side, the show presents itself as a procedural drama, but it does it in a highly intelligent way, setting the mystery as a background for the character interactions. The development is first in line, and that's one of the main reasons as to why this show works, aside from the great performances from the cast.
"Apéritif" is in many ways the perfect premiere for a show as it gives us everything, we need to know without having to wait long. It introduces the characters and the issues, while using the procedural structure to support the character development and not as the main focus, which is how it should be done.
