Dexter’ Season 6, Ep. 4

The rehabilitation of <i>Dexter</i> continues, with a big assist from Mos Def. And murder.

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  • Showtime
  • “Um, weren’t we supposed to be investigating something?”

Last week found Dexter hunting a semi-retired serial killer at a nursing home, a plot I found convenient, unconvincing, distracting, and not nearly as funny as it seemed to think it was. Elsewhere on the nets, though, it was seen as a return to form, a throwback to the first season’s killer-of-the-week procedural format, before the show got overly invested in its guest stars, its Big Bads, the soap opera cast of Miami Homicide, and attempts to domesticate Dexter. We saw that in the season opener, too, with the high school reunion killer that Dexter was only able to trap because of a convenient (and unconvincing, and distracting) floozy gave Dex a hummer in the chemistry lab. In episodes two and four, however, there is no killer of the week: just the master plot.

Last year had this same feeling, like the cooks at Dexter HQ were trying to combine the show’s two main flavors—killer-of-the-week procedural and serial adventure-drama—into a single, satisfying slurry. This led to A) a clunky, repetitive ring-of-rapists master plot that provided Dexter with all of his kill-of-the-week targets, and B-) a bunch of hour-padding filler in the form of homicide-department-in-love soap opera hijinks. I didn’t like A), but I felt actually offended by the lameness of B-), and I think Showtime heard an earful about it. Switching out pointless office romance subplots for pointless kill-of-the-week subplots is a major improvement. Sure, they may be convenient and not entirely satisfying, but at least they hinge on something more relevant, fan-wise, than “Will Batista and Laguerta’s marriage ever work out??” Besides, if it means we get more episodes like this week’s I think I’ll be content to hang in there.