You know that this a slightly different show from the moment the credits roll with a still sleeping Dexter killing a mosquito with a close up of the blob of blood left on his arm. The opening montage is Dexter going through the normal routine of getting ready for the day, except that everything from shaving, to tying his shoes, to pulling on a shirt is shot as if it were a violent crime. It is grim and bloody, and perfect for Dexter. The theme music is wonderfully offbeat as well, it has kind of a Hope and Crosby Road film feel to it. If Hope and Crosby were killers on the side.
The overall story arc on Dexter Season One was catching the notorious Ice Truck Killer. This story started in the opening episode and reached its shocking conclusion in the last episode. But this is a normal crime drama as well as a long narrative. Each episode has its own little tale to tell, its own little crime to be solved, its own evil doer to butcher. Dexter is CSI Psycho.
And really, it is easy to look at shows like CSI and imagine one or more of the main characters whiling away the odd day off by killing one or two of the bad guys that The Law couldn’t deal with. Law and Order would be a good fit for a Dexter type character, the occasional rouge judge or prosecutor that takes out the trash on his own time.
Still, Dexter has a few oddities that are never fully explained. Our hero, the mass murder, was found when he was a three year old child in a shipping container. He was sitting in a pool of blood, surrounded by dead people, his mother among them. It was this moment that changed Dexter from a normal person into an unfeeling monster. It is an important moment for Dexter, but one that we may never fully understand. Why was his mother killed like this? And more importantly, why did the chainsaw wielding madman not kill Dexter at the same time? And how did Harry get to adopt Dexter? Though it is a minor question in this kind of show, seeing as laws tends to be a bit more flexible than laws as we know them. And what is up with Dexter dumping his victims into the bay still wrapped in plastic bags? The implication is that he likes to visit them, but he is supposed to be a super genius evil fellow, and this seems a bit dumb. It does help the setup for Season Two, where the overall story arc is about catching another serial killer, Dexter.
I like all the characters on Dexter, especially the recently separated Angel Batista, who seems to be a bit lost. Dexter’s sister is also a bit lost, and a bit over excitable for a police officer. There are hints that she has a darker side as well, we just haven’t seen it yet. The addition of a Carradine who is a Zen Master as well as a profiler is fun, surprisingly the Carradine in question is not David, but Keith. His forced smiles and subtle lust for Dexter’s sister is very interesting.
There is also a lot of blood. Dexter is a blood spatter expert and so is on the scene for all kinds of gruesome crimes. He is fascinated at first by the Ice Truck Killer, as he seems to favor removing all the blood from his victims. After seven episodes of Dexter Season 2, our hero is finally starting to fight back against Sgt Doakes. He uses blood to do it, of course. Bloody Great Stuff.
There is also a great fondness for flat chested women on Dexter. Of course, I guess all women look pretty flat chested while laying dead on their backs. And this is Miami, not L.A. so maybe that’s the way they like them in South Florida. Still, lots of shots of women with tiny boobs. Ponderous, man, ponderous. Most recently on the small breasted woman front is Dexter’s pyromaniac girlfriend/AA sponsor Lila. She understands our boy Dexter as she has a bit of a Dark Passenger herself.
This is a well made show with high production values and great acting. It must say something about how America feels about the Justice System if we have no problem rooting for a hero who gets off slicing his victims to bits. Well, we all need to blow off a little steam now and then
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