FBI Quantico Trainees

Lore & Background

It focuses exclusively on Clarice Starling, a young FBI trainee at Quantico, who is recruited by Behavioral Science Unit chief Jack Crawford to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Officially conducting a psychological survey, Starling is actually meant to draw out insights that could help capture 'Buffalo Bill', a serial killer who murders young women and removes their skin.

In Their Own Story

Clarice Starling, a young FBI trainee at Quantico, is recruited by Behavioral Science Unit chief Jack Crawford to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant and cannibalistic psychiatrist imprisoned at the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. Officially conducting a psychological survey, Starling is actually meant to draw out insights that could help capture 'Buffalo Bill', a serial killer who murders young women and removes their skin. At the hospital, the manipulative director Dr. Frederick Chilton makes unwelcome advances toward Starling before escorting her to Lecter's cell. Initially courteous, Lecter grows dismissive upon deducing Crawford's ulterior motive. As Starling departs, inmate Miggs flings semen at her, provoking Lecter's disgust. He summons her back and offers an anagram as a clue that leads her to a storage unit containing a severed head in a jar—later revealed to belong to Benjamin Raspail, a former patient of Lecter whose killer is believed to be Buffalo Bill. Soon afterward, Miggs is found dead, having swallowed his own tongue—implicitly orchestrated by Lecter as retribution. Lecter agrees to assist in exchange for a transfer away from Chilton. Meanwhile, another victim is discovered with a death's-head moth lodged in her throat—the same species later found inside the severed head.

Reader's Guide

It focuses on Clarice Starling, a young FBI trainee at Quantico, who is recruited by Behavioral Science Unit chief Jack Crawford to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter. The source details her interactions with Lecter, her investigation into Buffalo Bill, and her eventual graduation from the FBI Academy. No other trainees are mentioned, and no guidance is given for a cohort.

Did You Know?

• Clarice Starling is a young FBI trainee at Quantico recruited by Behavioral Science Unit chief Jack Crawford to interview Dr. Hannibal Lecter.
• Starling's father, a police officer, was murdered when she was ten, leaving her orphaned.
• Starling recounts a traumatic childhood incident: after her father's death, she lived on a relative's Montana farm, where she failed to save spring lambs from slaughter.
• Starling graduates from the FBI Academy at the end of the film.
• The film is based on the 1988 novel by Thomas Harris.