Above left: William Blake's The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun. This painting refers to Revelation 12:12-17, and is the one Francis Dollarhyde shows to tabloid reporter Freddy Lounds, but it is misidentified by Dollarhyde, during his session with Lounds, as "The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in the Rays of the Sun", which is an alternate name for Blake's The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun. Above right: William Blake's The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in Sun, which refers to Revelation 12:1-4. This painting is not shown in Manhunter, but going by what Dollarhyde says to Lounds, Francis has the (alternate) name of it in mind when speaking to him. [Images from the Wikipedia 'The Great Red Dragon Paintings' page, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.]
Above left and right: Francis Dollarhyde shows Freddy Lounds his slide of William Blake's The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun, but, as noted above, he refers to it as "The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in the Rays of the Sun".
In part 13 of the analysis, we established that Manhunter makes reference to the biblical book of Revelation. Now we will examine parts of chapter 12 of that book, which falls under the heading, "The Woman and the Dragon." Below are quoted Revelation 12 verses 1-4, which, as indicated at the top of this post, are referred to by the yellow-themed painting:
1. A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. 2. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. 3. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. 4. Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. [New International Version]
The great red dragon in the foregoing passage represents Satan, and verse 4 above depicts Satan's first downfall. Recall that Dollarhyde tells Lounds that he (Lounds) is "privy to a great becoming", and then a short while later in the same scene, in the note he records Lounds reading (shown below), he identifies himself as the Red Dragon. This implies that he identifies with the great red dragon from Rev. 12:1-4, so we can conclude that he represents a 'Satan figure', i.e., he in some way represents Satan's presence.
The beginning of the note Dollarhyde forces Lounds to read into a tape recorder, reads, "I have had a great privilege. I have seen with wonder and awe the strength of the Red Dragon. All I wrote about him were lies." Lounds had written lies in his Tattler article about the 'Tooth Fairy' (Dollaryhde) in order to draw him into a trap. The point is that in the note, written by Dollarhyde specifically for Lounds to read, Francis is referring to himself as the Red Dragon.
Revelation 12:12-17 are the verses referred to by the left-hand painting above, and read as follows:
12. Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short. 13. When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. 14. The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time, out of the serpent's reach. 15. Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. 16. But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. 17. Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring--those who keep God's commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus. [New International Version]
Above left: Later in the movie than the scene with Lounds discussed above, while Dollarhyde and Reba are standing outside together after having had sex, Dollarhyde tells Reba she looks good in the sun; these words used by Dollarhyde evoke the image of the yellow painting. Above right: Still later, when Dollarhyde stands over Reba menacing her near the movie's ending, with Reba wearing a reddish blouse, it evokes the image of the red painting. All of this indicates that Reba herself represents the woman in Revelation 12. Also, this woman is said to be pregnant; the reason Francis hesitates when it seems he is going to kill Reba, is because he impregnated her when he had sex with her, and at some point while standing over her, he 'senses' that she is carrying his offspring.
