BY: ORANGECHAIR
I need to start this post by making sure that everybody reading this knows that I love the show Dexter. Yup, its that kind of post. I’m going to be so mean to something I love that I need to state my love for it before I even really start writing. Dexter has been a show I have looked forward to watching for as long as I can remember. Seasons 1, 2 and 4 are some of the best television seasons out there. Season 3 and 6 are outstanding. Hell, I even loved the rape season (season 5) even though most people seemed to hate it. When I heard that Dexter was getting three more seasons I was ecstatic but now I am just nervous. What has changed you might ask. The only thing that has changed is that I have seen Season 7, a season that I thought was garbage.
I have no problem with a show trying to switch up its formula. In fact I like it when shows try to create new patterns for themselves as long as they don’t change the fundamental aspects that make the show great. I don’t think Dexter was trying to change but they changed a fundamental part of the show. Spoilers are rampant ahead. The best part about Dexter is watching him put himself against whatever obstacle is in his way be it the Ice Truck Killer, the Miami Metro PD, a group of serial rapists or the Trinity Killer. We like to watch Dexter go toe to toe with a season long villain. For some reason the writers decided to go to a villain of the week format this season. Granted Debra (Jennifer Carpenter) spent her time keeping an eye on Dexter but to have him go after small fry villains every time was asinine. Is there nobody left for Dexter to go up against?. The first half of the season, the half that was outstanding, had the brilliant villain I was looking for, Isaak Sirko (Ray Stevenson). Instead of using and developing this great character the show killed him off before letting him hit his stride. With Isaak gone, Dexter is forced to go toe to toe with the world’s least terrifying villain, Laguerta (Lauren Velez).
Now I’m not going to say I predicted the whole season but the second Isaak was gone and it became clear that Laguerta was to be the villain, the rest of the season became easy to predict. Was Laguerta going to try and catch Dexter? Yes. Was Dexter going to be incarcerated with two seasons before the end of the show? No. Was Laguerta going to push too hard and piss off Dexter? Yes. Was Laguerta going to survive? Hell no. The answers to these questions were not difficult to ascertain. Sure, it was a curve ball to have Deb kill Laguerta but as the scene unfolded, that situation became the only logical conclusion. When asked what the twist was at the end of this season, most people would say it was Deb killing Laguerta. Honestly I think the real twist was the fact that Laguerta got the drop on Dexter, that never should have happened.
Speaking of Deb, remember last season when a huge plot point was Deb being in love with Dexter? Well that entire thing got swept under the rug. I understand Deb’s entire world got rocked to find out the truth about her brother but there still needed to be some sort of closure or conclusion here. Instead the show just piled other issues on top of Deb’s love for her brother, effectively burying it without any resolve.
When it comes down to it, this season of Dexter was still some decent television. Comparing it to other television shows it was mediocre, watchable but nothing that would take the television world by storm. Compared to the previous seasons of Dexter however, this season was garbage. I love this show and probably will never stop watching it but this season has made me very nervous for the next few seasons. I want this show to end strong. I don’t want it to just fizzle out. As it stands right now, if something does not change, I’m afraid that when Dexter ends for good I’m going to be saying “they should have ended it two seasons ago.”
Approximately six days ago, I was searching through On Demand and became instantly elated and dismayed. The elation: for some reason, that I’m not complaining about, Showtime had put almost every season of every show that the network had created On Demand. Feeling quite like a kid in a candy store, I flipped through all the different shows trying to decide what to watch first. The dismay: the first 4 seasons of Californication were being removed from On Demand on April 3rd. So began my quest to watch four Seasons of Californication in six days. Throughout my quest I got to know the show’s main character, Hank Moody (David Duchovny) quite well. Here is what Hank Moody taught me.
