Bigger spoilers than you can handle lurk bellow.

As anyone will know who has read my two previous posts on Dexter’s fourth season, Family, Suburbia, and Killing for Two and Road Kill, or The Jumping of the Snark, my attitude toward season four is veering dangerously close to the double-yellow line of disappointment. And now that Rita has been found in a blood-filled bathtub and a becrimsoned little Harrison gets a chance to develop a sociopathology just like his dear old dad, I’m supposed to have arrived at a definite opinion about season four.

Thing is, I haven’t. Not really. I’m still ambivalent — which is probably condemnation enough for a show I once loved.

There seems to be a speculative ritual common on all the forums and groups that discuss Dexter, something almost akin to a game. Over the course of a season increasingly ridiculous theories are advanced as to the identity of such-and-such a person — Masuka is the Ice Truck Killer, Rita’s Mom is the Skinner. They’d be laughable if it was the case that no one believed them, but someone always does. Someone out there posits them in earnest, under the theory that if you throw enough darts at a dartboard without looking you’re bound to hit a bull’s-eye eventually.

In the character of Christine Hill it seemed to me the Dexter writers were following the blind dart throwing method of integrating character and plot. Sure, at first it seems like Hill’s role is essentially to be shamelessly topless as often as possible (which naturally predisposes one-half of the audience to think kindly of her), but she turns out to be the Lundy shooter AND the daughter of the Trinity killer. Why not make her Angel’s ex-wife’s aerobics instructor and Miguel Prado’s former PA while we’re at it? Sure, Hungry Man’s “Hi, Dad” when she opened her door to a livid Arthur Mitchell was a nicely handled surprise — the capacity for shock is still there. But does this twist hold up above the level of melodrama? Is it on par with the thematic unity of season one’s unraveling of Dexter’s past, or the slippery cat-and-mouse of season two? Now that we’ve experienced season four’s twists and turns, will there ever be a reason to revisit it?

I don’t think so; and this is where the show is starting to fall flat. For every legitimate turn over the course of this season, there are three gimmicky ones. Discovering that Trinity was in fact a family man as Dex follows him home one evening was the highlight of the entire story for me — a surprise both revelatory and thematically relevant. It changed things in a way that a ‘plot twist’ is supposed to, and it did it without feeling like the hand of the writing team was on the back of the audience’s neck, steering them in the desired direction. It was elegant, intelligent, emotionally-freighted, and reminiscent of what we’ve come to expect from the show.

Which is more than can be said for Christine Hill or, even, Rita dead in a bathtub — which I will get to in a moment.

The last four episodes of this season played out the inevitable endgame between the Bay Harbor Butcher and the somewhat inaccurately named and by now thoroughly un-mysterious Trinity Killer. From the dawning realization that Dexter’s confidence in Trinity as a suitable mentor is misplaced, to the well-turned revelation that Trinity actually kills in groups of four, to the rather silly Christine Hill stuff, the appalling Angel and LaGuerrta romance, the molehill of Deb’s uncovering that Dex and the Ice Truck Killer are brothers, and the hastily executed discovery of Dexter’s true identity by Trinity, quite a lot happens in these last four episodes. The pace is there, and the performances certainly, and it’s all enough to keep the plot ticking along quite briskly. It kept me watching, even shook me out of some of the ambivalence I fell victim to mid-season, but ultimately all the shocks and twists illustrated to me just what it was that is bothering me about this season.

I can see the strings.

That’s the big problem — Dexter now feels like it is leading the audience around by the nose. The master-touch isn’t there, the puppets are all strongly illuminated by the cold light of day. The soap opera feel, the melodrama, the big emotional scenes that leave the audience rolling their eyes more often than not — the illusion of reality is now gone, and with it goes any emotional attachments. Compared to the yearning for emotional connection Dexter experienced in season one, the pit-of-the-stomach thrill ride of season two, and even the weirdly intense friendship with Prado in season three — season four’s meditations on family, loss, and love feel shallow and affected. Granted, the suspension of disbelief in Dexter was always tenuous — but the fact that it was maintained so deftly in early seasons is what made this show one of the most compelling and satisfying on television. A show that once navigated the deliciously dark borderlands between thriller and satire with a stylish and expert cool, has now gone over to the ham-fisted Hollywood thriller model of twist-a-minute plot points heavy with shock-and-awe and light on narrative and thematic logic.

And the culminating example of this is the conclusion we are left with at the end of season four, episode twelve. It’s a well-constructed scene even if the ultimate emotional moment is held a beat too short. Dexter returns home from dealing with his nemesis du jour and calls Rita to join her on the honeymoon they never got to experience as newlyweds. But her phone rings from inside the house, the baby starts crying, and a sanguinary scene reminiscent of Dexter’s own birth in blood is shown with the sort of hallucinatory abruptness that must have had some watchers questioning whether or not it was a dream. A surprise, to be sure (though, of course, not wholly unanticipated by the dart throwers among us), and one that does thematically line up with the rest of the show. But it was a lazy move, one that felt more like a stroke of convenience for the writers, rather than one of genius.

Some of the cheapest characterization in storytelling — and something many comics and pulp stories are guilty of in spades — is giving the hero something to love and then taking it away purely to generate a little angst and cheap sympathy. Call it the dead girlfriend syndrome. Rita was inconvenient, unpopular with fans, and she complicated Dexter’s life — bumping her off probably made a lot of people happy since she limited Dexter’s freedom. But, beyond the ‘new dad is tired’ and ‘fish out of water’ bits played for laughs at the start of the season, the themes of marriage, family, and responsibility really were not enlarged upon as completely as they should have been. Marriage, fatherhood — all seems like a fairly cheap stunt in an increasingly long line of cheap stunts that, when arranged in a pattern, create something a lot more like a comic strip than a real life.

Therein is the problem — Dexter is dangerously close to becoming a parody of itself. The final ‘stunning moment’ will no doubt function, next season, as an excuse for all manner of bad behavior from a dark and haunted Dexter. But fundamentally I doubt it will have any more lasting relevance than the psychic wounds sustained by the woman who loved Miguel Prado finding out he was a monster, the friends and coworkers of James Doakes discovering he was the Bay Harbor Butcher (well, not really), or the fiance of the Ice Truck Killer nearly consummating their union by being chilled, exsanguinated, and cubed. Sure, that’s the limitation of television — but it is also a limitation that is knocking the feet out from under this particular show.

In the end, Dexter is still entertaining. Slick, well-acted, legitimately surprising and containing some good writing. But with season three, a great show became a good one. This season it has slid even further, but it now strays in the direction of farce. What remains for it, whether its enormous popularity will drag it out even further and into even greater heights of absurdity, remains to be seen. While season four contained some real flashes of the old brilliance, and still gave a better hour of TV than much of what else you will find out there, I think it has also proven that Dexter has truly run its course. Personally, I hope Dexter will be ushered into a final season next year with some of its dignity still intact.

Best idea for a good final season: fast forward fifteen years to an older and cagier Dexter dealing with a teenage Harrison’s psychotic urges.

• More Reviews of Dexter Season 4
• Dexter Season 4: Family, Suburbia, and Killing For Two
• Dexter Season 4: Road Kill, or The Jumping of the Snark

Insert spoiler warning here.

We are eight episodes into season 4 and I’m getting sort of an uncomfortable sensation, the kind of thing I’d prefer not to notice — like I just stupidly sat in a puddle of rainwater and was hoping in the few seconds it took for it to soak through to my drawers that I hadn’t actually just gone and sat in that damn puddle. The uncomfortable sensation that finally soaked through to my drawers last Sunday night is ‘meh.’

So the season so far, though I hadn’t really wanted to admit it to myself in my last write-up, is giving me a dose of ennui. It isn’t bad per se — but neither is it as good and compelling as Dexter should be. As it has been. As it very well may be, in the final four episodes of the season. The horrible sensation I have is indifference, something I could never have said about this show in the past.

Granted, this began insidiously last season with some of the side plots. As I said in the Dexter Season 3 Recap, Dexter is not an ensemble show. Meaning the cast is there to support Dexter, and not each other. Or, in the absolute worst case scenario, they aren’t there to engage in a very forced inter-office romance with all the sexual chemistry of a box of baking soda french-kissing a can of creamed corn and expect us to care. LaGuerta and Angel writhing on the conference room table while Henry Winkler soars overhead in Daisy Dukes is not what is good about Dexter.

Not that the season hasn’t had its moments. The revelation in episode five that the Trinity Killer was, contrary to all expectations, a family man and pillar of the community was really nicely done — the best surprise of the story so far. But what came after, Dexter’s curiosity and conflicted interest in Trinity, has fallen flat. Strangely enough, while every other actor is better and more interesting when they are in scenes with Michael C. Hall, I’m not seeing that dynamic when he is paired with John Lithgow. Lithgow as Trinity has a scary intensity that works well when he is on his own, but seems rather camp when paired in scenes with Hall. Whether it’s just the contrast of over- versus understated acting, or weak writing, I can’t really say. Jimmy Smits chewed the scenery but he and Hall seemed great together, and I always wanted to see the next scene with those two. But in the case of this season . . . one thing I can say for sure: when the Trinity Killer and the Bay Harbor Butcher get together we should hear thunder rumbling in the distance, not elevator music.

The snark is heartfelt — and it’s a substitute for me expressing just what is wrong with the season. Because, frankly, I don’t know. Is it that Dexter himself isn’t in danger as he was in previous seasons? True enough, the early storyline of the accident and missing body did feel more interesting than most of what followed. Is the problem the repetition of story elements? Deb as victim again — this woman should be in some heavy therapy at this point — Quinn as Doakes, Jr., only with all the predatory menace replaced by clumsy amiability. Is it the falling back on easy formula — right down to the cinematograpy — that just feels wrong in a show that was so daring in its inception?

And what about the shitty sets, or the green screen body dumps off the Slice of Life, complete with (I suspect) CGI water splashes? Is it just me, or is this show getting smaller? Do runaway hits often demand budget cuts, or is it more of a case of slashing costs to up the profits when it’s assumed we’ll watch anyway? The parking lot set is small and crammed, the exterior shots rarely give us any sense of place (I suppose when the ‘place’ isn’t actually the city it’s supposed to be, that might be a good thing), and everything, aside from the constantly exposed breasts of Courtney Ford, just seems fake.

Any one of these things wouldn’t bother me. Or even any two or three if the core elements of the show that had kept it compelling over three seasons were still in place and firing on all cylinders. But something is off. I should care that Dexter feels real emotion after mistakenly killing an innocent man, but this time I’m the one left feeling empty. The road trip culminating in Trinity’s attempted suicide and Dexter’s ironic rescue should be a classic act two climax — but when I sat down to write this review I actually had to rack my brains to remember what happened.

Maybe it’s just me.

And now we have a possible Rita affair plot? Are we expected to care? The reveal that Deb and Lundy may not have been shot by Trinity was interesting, but then who was it? That might be the clincher that gets me back into the resolution of this storyline but, so far, I just can’t summon the interest. Used to be I couldn’t miss this show, looked forward to it all week. Now I DVR it and try to remember to watch it before next Sunday rolls around.

Road Kill indeed.

At least Masuka is still funny.

• More Reviews of Dexter Season 4
• Dexter Season 4: Family, Suburbia, and Killing For Two
• Getaway: Dexter Season 4 Finale and Recap

As I did with the previous season of Dexter, I’ve decided to write about season four in three chunks, one blog post to follow each fourth episode — thematically an appropriate place as a season of Dexter generally follows a three act structure. Which means, of course, each fourth episode is going to offer some big climax or revelation that makes for perfect blog fodder.

And big time spoilers — you have been warned.

Big time warned.

So, last night’s episode ‘Dex Takes a Holiday,’ didn’t disappoint in the climax department — we had both the culmination of the whole ‘Dexter needs his space’ theme that has been building since the first episode, and a big banging surprise in the Lundy-Trinity plot-line — namely Lundy and Deb getting gunned down by an unseen assailant (who probably looks a whole lot like John Lithgow).

I’d say episode 4 was the best so far, and hopefully marks the season hitting its stride. I thought the first few episodes laid the ‘new father is sleepy’ thing on with all the subtly of a spackle knife — pushing Dex past the point of reasonable exhaustion and painting his wife as some sort of oblivious and unreasonable task master. Yes, it made for a bit of cuteness as New Dad Dex yo-yoed between late nights with the kid, long days at the office, and extra curricular activities involving yards of saran wrap and surgical saws. But, as annoying as Rita can be as a character, it felt like a stretch to suggest that someone with her experience raising children — and obvious concern for her husband — would cheerfully let him shoulder so much of the load and even have the gall to suggest Dexter hadn’t been as ‘together’ with the family as he should be. The writers could have done this a bit better — didn’t he just get into an accident because of sleep deprivation and she’s haranguing him the next episode about not doing enough?

Speaking of which, great little mini-arc with Dex potentially losing a body. I’ve always thought he was rather vulnerable when transporting his kills — just one serious car accident away from getting caught. Having it happen at the end of the first episode was a nice touch, and got the whole season rolling with some immediate suspense of the season 2 variety. Further points awarded to episode 1′s ‘tonight’s the night’ shtick at the beginning, and the skewed credit sequence of missed mosquitoes, broken laces, and stained shirts that shows just how off his game Dex was at the start of the season.

Trinity has proven an interesting presence, and Lithgow doesn’t disappoint — managing to exude creepy menace without any sort of haminess. Trinity’s MO is interesting and suitably dark, but I hope the writers are smart enough not to spin out the mystery of it for too long. It seems rather obvious that the Trinity killer is reenacting his family history — sister either a suicide or killed by Trinity or their father (my bet is on Dad), mother jumping to her death, and finally Trinity killing his father . Last night’s episode with Trinity picking a fight from a random stranger, and letting himself get punched around, only reinforces that his third victim is a stand-in for an abusive father (who is surely to whom he offers a whiskey ablution in episode three). Trinity is reenacting his early life, and stuck repeating it.

Dexter in suburbia offers some more fish-out-of-water fun for a guy that just doesn’t get how us mundanes navigate the weird rituals of social interaction that vex our every step. Dex’s new environment has everything from swimming pools to car pools — and nosy neighbors willing to set up high-powered halogens and organize a militia whenever something threatens the suburban status quo. Episode three’s vandal shared a bit of Dexter’s fish-out-of-water nature — a damaged man having seen past the veneer of civility that governs the manicured and picket-fenced world — but in the end Dex comes down on him like a hammer to protect himself and, by extension now, his family.

But what is really interesting about Dexter’s confronting the vandal is of course the parallel with the Trinity killer’s threats to kill his second victim’s children in the same episode — Dexter, who understands all too well that ‘fear is a powerful motivator’ uses the same tactic, sending a bit of a reminder to an audience that has been no doubt vicariously enjoying his handling of the situation thus far that, yes Virginia, Dex is a monster.

I will admit that I saw Frank Lundy’s death coming, if not from miles away, than at least by a good few football field’s lengths — but it worked well and still registered as something of a surprise when it happened. The surprise was more Deb getting shot than anything — poor Lundy just had martyr written all over him from the beginning. A good motivator for Dex and Deb to crack the Trinity case, and at least superstar FBI agent Lundy goes out having been right about the hunt and, by virtue of being attacked, proving he was close to his quarry. He got the girl, too — bravo Frank, you’re way cooler than Anton.

Speaking of Anton — there’s his sort of buddy Quinn, last year’s red herring, trying to puzzle-out how to handle Dexter’s witnessing of his cash grab. Quinn, a man with good taste in women and horrible taste in music, is surprisingly amusing as he tries to curry favor with Dex, and his ‘this is how it is’ refutation of the ‘crooked cop’ label worked for me. He’s certainly not in the same category of moral failing as, say, a serial murderer. And speaking of serial murderers — poor old Quinn apparently can’t remember not to mention the hush-hush and unofficial Trinity killer investigation going on when there is a gorgeous topless reporter on his back. Actually, I guess I can’t really blame him for that.

And then there is Batista and LaGuerta — seeing the two of them embrace is like watching Grover hook-up with Oscar the Grouch. Which isn’t a good thing, if you were wondering. Doing the obvious ploy of throwing these two together (hey, they both speak spanish and neither of them has anything to do this season!) and giving them a cutesy little ‘hidden’ affair feels forced, lazy, and pretty much undermines what little respect the audience has for them. Everybody likes Batista, because he’s a Teddy-Bear with a hat affectation, and everybody hates LaGuerta, for reasons too numerous to mention (at least she stopped hitting on Dexter — aye carumba!), but putting the two together makes them both . . . pathetic. Really, them both asking Dex for advice in last night’s episode felt like High School all over again, only with smaller stakes.

But what last night’s episode really delivered on was a thematic climax. With the annoying family gone and Dexter breathing a sigh of relief, he goes off to hunt a cop who killed her own family in cold blood — all to be free. Can he, or can’t he, relate? The cat-and-mouse between the two was handled nicely, and Dexter’s provocation of their final confrontation exhibited the kind of lateral thinking that makes for so many interesting twists in the show. But finally it was the revelation — spoken at the ‘moment of truth’ when Dexter is his most alive and honest — that Dexter would rather risk getting caught than be without his family that is the true climax of the first act of season 4. He does love them, inconvenient and perplexing as they may be, and this shows how his character has changed subtly since the ‘little wooden boy’ was introduced to us in season 1.

A final word should be said about a big character missing from the last two seasons of Dexter — Miami. Now, sometimes Long Beach kind of works — I mean, it has palm trees and water, just like Miami, right? — and sometimes it really doesn’t. Go back and look at those first seasons of Dexter to see what I mean — you can feel the heat of the place, and smell the Cuban food wafting over from the yard next door. There was much more of a sense of place and style in earlier seasons, and the absence of that does lend these later seasons a somewhat less authentic feel. I don’t think that’s a deal breaker — but it does mean that these seasons are less than they could (and should) be.

And another thing — how about some continuity references for us long-time fans? I understand the need for a clean slate with each season — but has anyone even so much as uttered the words ‘Bay Harbor Butcher’ since season 2? Shouldn’t Prado have suspected Dex as being the butcher? Shouldn’t Prado himself be mentioned or name dropped at least once? Or Rita hint at Dex’s supposed substance abuse problems, or the kids once being kidnapped by a crazy British firebug? Stuff like that reinforces the illusion of reality, and it’s a shame there isn’t more of it in evidence in subsequent seasons of Dexter.

Oh, and Harry. The actor is consistently great, and I liked the premise of his ‘visitations’ in moderation, but Harry having a chat with Dex three times an episode has become a bit formula at this point — and half the time it isn’t anything that couldn’t be handled with a Dex voice-over. What this does is kill the dramatic potential of the exchange — so when the big climax comes later in this season as it did in the last and Harry talks Dex through some dilemma we, the audience, will be saying ‘ho hum, there’s dead Harry talking his kid’s ear off again.’ Flashbacks to young Dexter were much, much better, and something I miss. I mean, Michael C. Hall spent less time talking to dead people when he ran a funeral home!

And, purely as a thought exercise and proof that producers should at least occasionally consult me for ideas, you know what would show some real innovation? How about making Doakes Dexter’s invisible conscience for a season? Don’t tell me the premise wouldn’t automatically make the show twice as interesting.

But, overall, Dexter continues to deliver what audiences have come to love from the show — dark thrills, wow-worthy surprises, and explorations of a first-rate character in Dexter himself. The writers have never been afraid to really advance the plot, and they keep Dexter evolving right along with it, which is a rare and wonderful thing in television. The new family, the child, and the new nemesis-slash-role-model — a man who does what Dexter does and has done it more successfully than anyone else — has created a whole new slew of possibilities and complications, something the writers have done well to capitalize on. I have to say the new season has me hooked and, at the end of the day, that is how I know whether Dexter is doing what it’s supposed to do — when I can’t wait to see the next episode.

• More Reviews of Dexter Season 4
• Dexter Season 4: Road Kill, or The Jumping of the Snark
• Getaway: Dexter Season 4 Finale and Recap

It’s been a few years now since the premiere of Dexter, and I’ve yet to rewatch any episodes. Given the popularity of my Dexter Season 3 posts, and with the fourth season on the horizon, I thought it would be a nice idea to revisit the first and second seasons and give my impressions of them in light of the overall Dexter experience.

This post will contain big spoilers of the first three seasons of Dexter — you have been warned.

“Tonight’s the night,” Dexter’s first words to us. The scene is a Miami street at night lit by the familiar electric warmth of busy bars and restaurants. But the darkness clings to Dexter as he slides by in his car, a sleek modern predator in a silver Ford Taurus.

A memorable opener — and one I remember feeling vaguely hostile to when I first saw it. I was on board for Dexter since its debut, but I had my doubts as I sat down to watch the first episode. I’m as sickly fascinated with serial killers as the next citizen of the modern world — after all they are our trolls and bogeymen, the monsters of our collective psyche. But, let’s not forget, they are also very real. My concern with Dexter, initially, was that in an effort to make a serial killer sympathetic, the heinousness of his occupation would be glossed-over or ignored. What I really didn’t want was to feel manipulated as a viewer.

So, when Dexter hunts, terrifies, and kills that vilest of all modern monsters — the child-killing pedophile — in the opening of the first episode, I rolled my eyes a bit. Of course no one could really object to Dexter killing the lowest form of life there is, how very manipulative of the writers. But how also very smart, I acknowledged, because let’s face it, if he’d gone after any one more sympathetic the average viewer might just decide the show wasn’t for them after ten minutes. And Dexter is a show that really, really needs more than just ten minutes to get across everything it’s brilliant at.

The first episode introduces Dex and his favorite pastime rather efficiently, and moves quickly to present us with the rest of the major players in the drama and the season’s overarching confrontation — namely, the quest for the Ice Truck Killer. Seasons 2 and 3 are likewise set-up in the same way and, watching these episodes a second time and often in large chunks, I am impressed at how well paced this show is. Every episode of Dexter advances the A and B plot threads, and generally does so in unexpected ways. Dexter is never, ever boring, nor is it predictable.

What’s more, this is a show that does not insult the reader’s intelligence. A perfect example would be in season 1, episode 8 when the Ice Truck Killer’s identity is finally revealed. Most attentive viewers will have guessed his identity at that point, or have been fairly certain, and a lesser show would have handled the whole thing badly by taking it past the point where it began to insult the viewer’s intelligence. But when we first see Rudy as Ice Truck, the scene isn’t played for surprise because it should no longer be a surprise, rather it is played for dramatic effect. Questions of the killer’s identity were the subject of earlier episodes, especially those with the red herring (what will become a Dexter staple) Neil Perry. What Dexter does is move from the whodunit stage to a higher level of drama and peril, and link that ultimate conflict intimately with the protagonist’s own motives, history, and inner turmoil.

It’s damn good writing on every level imaginable. Fast-paced, insightful, funny, dark, and absolutely compelling stuff. Whatever objections I entered season 1 with were blown away after the first episode and, like a lot of people, I was hooked hard. Dexter himself is a sympathetic demon, one could almost term him a vigilante if he wasn’t always and uppermost a predatory animal with a taste for blood. Blood is a primary image in season 1, and Dexter’s outsider status a theme brilliantly highlighted by the choices he has to make. It’s blood that Dexter knows better than anything else, as a blood-spatter expert for the Miami Police Department it’s the art and science of blood that link his daytime world of social responsibility to his nocturnal passions. It’s the lack of blood in the drained bodies of the Ice Truck Killer that set him up as a kind of anti-Dexter, a fellow traveler with his own eccentric orbit. It’s a room full of blood, left by the Ice Truck Killer, that triggers Dexter’s repressed memories of his own childhood, and eventually leads to the discovery of his buried past.

The friendly game of cat-and-mouse between Dexter and his counterpart reveals a great deal about Dexter’s past in a way that makes it of immediate concern to the present — again, that’s fine writing. The flashbacks to a young Dex and Harry that introduce Dexter’s code and expose us to his raw, unfinished self in a way that illuminates his psychology are an important feature of seasons 1 and 2, and in this season are used not only for characterization and ‘backstory,’ but to reinforce the current plot. Examples include young Dex’s need for a blood donor proving his connection to the man thought to be his biological father (and also, in point of fact, that Harry lied to him), and the Ice Truck Killer’s gruesome messages that correspond to Morgan family photographs.

All of this serves to erode Harry’s grip on Dexter. What seems a strong ethos of behavior early in the season –  after all in the series’ first murder Dexter disdainfully tells his pedophile victim that he has standards, and he even goes out of his way to help a young man he suspects of sharing his homicidal tendencies in a pair of earlier episodes — is undermined by the Ice Truck Killer’s machinations. When we get to the final confrontation, we perceive that Dexter does indeed have to make a real choice.

And choice is at the heart of drama. The Code of Harry seemed a bit of autopilot for Dex, the unvarying thing at the center of his worldview he didn’t have to question. His faith, in other words. The Ice Truck Killer works to unravel it, showing Harry as a liar, appealing to Dex’s ‘true’ nature. Offering him acceptance, brotherhood, and a relationship based on a unsentimental look at his life as a Morgan. The contrasting relationship is with Debra, someone he has lied to and hidden from his entire life, and throughout the season we see how poorly Dex understands her and fails to live up to her emotional expectations. This sets up the big question of the whole season nicely — can Dexter feel anything?

He doesn’t think he can, but he’s wrong. And that is perhaps the most interesting aspect of Dexter’s characterization and Michael C. Hall’s performance. The “little wooden boy” who only felt alive when dismembering a deer or standing at the edge of a rooftop somehow internalized enough of those lessons in normal behavior that he gained some sort of humanity. Ultimately, he may not know if he is acting or really feeling when he makes his choice to save Deb from his brother — for one could perhaps argue that it’s the reassertion of the will of Harry that stops the Ice Truck Killer’s knife, and not Dexter’s own choice at all –  but I think most viewers will have to agree that in this case the acting and the feeling are indistinguishable. Dexter makes his choice at great sacrifice to his more selfish needs, and shows himself to be neither monster or hero, but human being.

The look of season 1 differs a bit from the others, especially the third season where the show unfortunately is no longer filmed in Miami. But the Miami of season 1 feels tropical and cloying in a way that doesn’t come across much in later seasons. Exterior scenes are often washed out by sun glare and have a grainy quality, and the actors sweat through their clothing. We see a larger variety of interiors as well, and everything conspires to create the illusion of realness. Perhaps understandably things have streamlined in later seasons to some extent, but the Miami of season 1 comes across as every bit as important a character as Dexter himself. I don’t really get that sense from later seasons.

In a finale that combines the poignant with the gruesome Dexter kills his own brother, and kills an idea of himself as he does so. It’s a reaffirmation of the Code of Harry, and of Dexter’s choice to remain fundamentally alone to protect those around him. In a season that wrestled with questions of identity throughout, Dexter chooses for himself how he will be defined.

The last image we are left with is Dexter walking away from the crime scene and the brother he has murdered. He imagines the gathered crowd cheering him, his sister and co-workers looking upon him with approval and adoration and all of Miami hailing him as a hero. A powerful and darkly humorous closing scene, where a smiling Dexter’s fantasy isn’t a longing for fame or glory, but for acceptance. That we the viewer inevitably smile back indicates he has gotten his wish.

• More Reviews of Dexter Season 1
• Official Dexter site

I will always like John Lithgow for one thing above all — The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai. So my first thought upon hearing that he was joining the cast of Dexter for the fourth season wasn’t “oh great, the guest star thing is formula now,” it was, in fact, “laugh-a while you can, monkey boy!” But that thing about formula crept in after the glow wore off on all the goofy, nostalgic quotes from BB that filled my head at the mere mention of Lithgow.

But the folks behind Dexter have earned my trust, and I think Lithgow is a great piece of casting for what should prove an interesting character — a suburbanite and family man who is a serial killer. That’s exactly what Dexter is becoming, and apparently he will look to Lithgow’s character for some advice on that front.

So are we getting another ‘friend’ character that Dexter finds himself cooperating with for a time before they inevitably clash? Probably, as Lithgow’s character is already described as an antagonist by the executive producer. Is this like the Sopranos formula, where someone was let out of jail at the beginning of the season only to become a pain in Tony’s ass over the course of it and eventually end up in a Jersey landfill?

Well, denouncing formula is a bit like bitching over seeing the strings at a puppet show — I mean, you knew it was a puppet show, right? Ultimately it’s how the whole thing is handled and, as I said in my Dexter Season 3 recap, I think the writers have been smart in steering a course for this show so far, avoiding some of the more obvious shoals of sensationalism and formula that they very well could have run aground on, as well as showing an ability to misdirect the audience with skill and intelligence.

I’m really looking forward to the Sept 27th premier of the new season, that’s for sure.

And apparently Keith Carradine will be reprising his roll as Deb’s FBI love-daddy as well, and my first thought there, of course, was “listen to the thunder.”

The Season 3 finale of Dexter managed to wrap everything up neatly, if a bit hurriedly, concluding with a big, happy wedding scene and the same words the season opened with: “Life is good.” Dexter has grown into a new role, the supporting cast have all had their own personal triumphs, and the dangers set in motion by rogue elephant Miguel Prado have been defeated. This is the first truly happy ending the series has had, and all things — save for that single spot of crimson that dripped from Dexter’s sliced arm onto the white of his bride’s wedding dress — seem to point toward a rosy new beginning for all concerned. Of course, that won’t really be the case, and already the set up for next season promises to by an interesting one.

But what of the season we’ve just finished? Opinion seems divided on Season 3, and I think I understand mostly why that is. Each season has had its own tone. Season 1 was our introduction to Dexter, and here he is at his darkest and most dislocated, and perhaps most plausible. Season 2 was a thrill ride, with the discovery of Dexter’s crimes and his dangerous relationship with Lila threatening to push him beyond the code. Season 3, then, is the season in which Dexter’s place in the world is examined. Like the first two seasons, the writers refuse to leave Dexter standing in one place for too long by creating some real changes in his life.

In the finale, Dexter watches the dead body of Miguel Prado being loaded into the back of a coroner’s van and reflects that you can tell a lot about a person by looking at their best friend. In many ways Prado is the motive force of this season, once Dexter himself early on loses control of events through the accidental encounter with Prado’s youngest brother. This feels a bit different than the first seasons where, although Dexter has always had to react to the likes of the Ice Truck Killer, or a hyper-vigilant Doakes, Dexter remained the pivot point upon which everything teetered.

Of course, once Prado steps outside the code by killing Ellen Wolf in ‘The Damage A Man Can Do,’ the ball is firmly back in Dexter’s court. The next three episodes were the best of the season, as Dexter and Prado volley back and forth in a battle of wills that gradually built into a lethal crescendo. I really enjoy what the writers have done in handling the two primary conflicts of the season, Prado and the Skinner, as their refusal to do the obvious — certainly in the case of new guy Quinn — kept me guessing to the end. More importantly still, the lack of outlandish twists of the kind posited by some fans — Miguel’s wife is the Skinner! Masuka is another serial killer! — kept the show grounded in a way that is vital if we are to take the premise at all seriously.

‘Do You Take Dexter Morgan?’ was in many ways a fitting end to a quieter season. With Prado dead in the penultimate episode, our thunderous climax had passed. But, the clean up was at least as interesting as it reinforced those things the season truly was about. Dexter’s conversation with an imprisoned Ramon, for whom he approached a kind of empathy by channeling his own brief experiences of brotherhood, was an unexpected scene, perhaps my favorite of the episode. For the first time we see the similarities of these two adversaries, how they were both damaged by Prado, and how both of them had come to learn the truth behind the facade.

And again, it is Dexter’s insight into the mind of his opponent that informs his second showdown, this time with the Skinner. I felt the build up to this was a bit rushed, and I personally wasn’t completely on board for the conversation with Harry, but I loved Dexter’s taunting of the Skinner. He hit him exactly where it hurt, and his willingness to break his own hand to escape nicely highlighted his practical ruthlessness. Yes, he did turn into super-Dexter, but he always does — he has, after all, basically trained himself to be proficient at killing at an intimate distance — and his prowess is no more implausible than that of any other action hero.

There were a few things that I found mildly disappointing in what was otherwise a fine, and necessary, season. One very simple thing I wanted to hear from Prado was his realization that Dexter was the Bay Harbor Butcher — but those words were never said. Too obvious and important a thing to miss in my opinion, and it would have been a nice tie-in with the previous seasons as well as a touch of reality in the relationship between Dexter and Prado.  I also felt the Skinner was a bit bland — surely an ex-member of a South American torture-squad could have more oompf? Another thing I felt could have been handled with a bit more flare were the appearances of Harry in nearly every episode. The focus was on fatherhood, which was good, but I felt the dialogue was sometimes flat and perhaps a bit oversold in places. Previous seasons made excellent use of Harry in flashbacks with a young Dexter and Deb — let’s hope we see those again, as I think they work much better than the ghost of Harry, and I don’t need to be reminded of Six Feet Under by having Michael C. Hall talk to yet another dead father — especially when Six Feet Under did it better and more organically.

Dexter is not an ensemble show, that much is very clear, and at times I found the sub plots of the supporters less than interesting. I should care about these characters, but for the most part I don’t get much beyond merely liking them. All of them are in fact far more interesting in relation to Dexter himself than when they are doing their own thing. For example, Batista’s few exchanges with Dexter this season, congratulating him on marriage and fatherhood, or contemplating a vigilante attack on the man who beat his girlfriend, were far more compelling and emotionally-charged than any of his relationship woes or his admission to LaGuerta that he’d been chasing hookers. The same goes for Deb and LaGuerta. Rita I have never found particularly interesting as a character, and in a season building up to her marriage with Dexter she still never really found a chance to shine. I don’t think any of this has to do with acting, as there aren’t any performances that draw attention to themselves as flawed, in my opinion, and there are certainly more than a few good ones among the supporting cast. I’d have to chalk it up to writing, but moreso to the essential framework of the show.

And that framework is, of course, all about Dexter. Which is what makes this season a winner, because it explores the character in new and unexpected ways, and refuses to let him become a caricature of himself as would be all too easy in a show of this kind. Dexter creeps toward developing his own moral compass, working outside the code to, first, protect his new family, and then to spare a friend’s suffering. He reaches out too in a very human way to Miguel Prado — sharing the dark part of himself in a bid for real, if admittedly pretty damned twisted, friendship. He took the chance on Miguel, and in the end found himself manipulated and used, but it was as much his own reasoning as it was the dictates of the code that guided how he dealt with the situation. He wonders as he mimics the right words and actions (in particular in the brilliant ending of episode 4 in which Dexter proposes with the words just uttered by an obsessed murderess) if he might one day become something like a normal person — if by acting out his role, he can become it. So, in the ultimate expression of that desire for normality, we see Dexter not only married but soon to be a father — a big change in his life, and one that opens all sorts of possibilities for next season.

Of course, it seems Deb might be poised to find out more about her brother as she investigates Harry’s infidelity, and the contrast between Dexter’s more-than-likely constrained nocturnal pursuits and the prosaic demands of his new life should make for some interesting television. But one does have to wonder, as Dexter did upon contemplating marriage, just what will he do if they move into a house with central air? The real challenge for Dexter has always been the keeping of his secret, and I’m looking forward to Season 4 in which I expect that secret to again be threatened in new and interesting ways.

• More Reviews of Dexter Season 3
• Dexter Season 3: Still to Die For
• Dexter Season 3: The Damage a Man Can Do