The long wait is over! Dexter is returning with a new season after the eighth season concluded with a bang in 2013. For those who haven’t already watched the series, this post will contain many spoilers. So do yourself a favor, grab some popcorn, and binge. It is certainly one of my favorite series of all time.
In the final minutes of Season Eight, Hannah McKay (Yvonne Strahovski), Dexter’s partner—and partner in crime—escapes to Argentina with Dexter’s toddler son, Harrison. She sheds a tear as she reads an article about Dexter’s boat crash in the hurricane that tore apart Miami, and his apparent death. After she and Harrison get ice cream, the scene changes to a wintry setting, one that never appeared throughout the course of the show’s eight long seasons.
This last scene shows a logging operation by a lake, which seems to be in the middle of nowhere. After a couple seconds, the audience can recognize that it is in fact Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall) working in the cold, with jeans, a vest, and a construction hat. We can assume that this is some time in the future, as Dexter has a full-grown beard and it looks like he knows what he’s doing there. The season ends with him walking into a cabin, sitting down, and glancing at the camera.
In the trailer for the upcoming season, titled Dexter: New Blood, we see that Dexter Morgan is still in this snowy setting—but he is no longer Dexter Morgan. People on the street refer amiably to him as Jim Lindsay. In Miami, Dexter was a nice guy, but he was reserved and didn’t say much to anybody. Most of the talking on the show was Dexter narrating the voice in his head, which is referred to in the show as his “dark passenger.” It is possible that in faking his death, we will see a new Dexter Morgan, one who does not kill morbidly for pleasure. However, I’d bet against it. First, creators chose to title the new season New Blood, which I think foreshadows Dexter’s hunt for criminals in a different location. It could imply that Dexter himself has new blood, meaning he has changed and will stop killing, but this is probably not the case. Additionally, the trailer shows Dexter working at a hunting store called “Fred’s” selling guns and knives, while his dark passenger says that he has “an urge too strong to ignore,” likely referring to his desire to kill.
The setting is expected to be somewhere in upstate New York, and we can see that Dexter is already making friends in this new town. People say hello to him on the street, and there is a glimpse of Dexter and a female character kissing each other intimately. This raises questions of whether or not Hannah will be in the season, possibly returning to see Dexter with Harrison, or if Dexter indeed faked his death to start over completely.
I assume that it won’t be easy for Dexter, knowing that his son and lover are without him, thinking that he’s dead. The first clip in the trailer has Dexter in what seems to be a therapist’s office. Here, he is asked how he’s feeling, and he responds, “It’s been a whirlwind,” metaphorically touching on the hurricane in which he presumably died. It isn’t clear whether Dexter is talking to this therapist for the rest of the trailer, or if it’s just his dark internal monologue reflecting on his past demons.
Dexter was never a drug user or a real drinker, so we can get rid of the idea that he’s going to a therapist for medication to help pass the time. Instead, we can hypothesize that he is trying to get better. Maybe, being forced to leave home, dropping his sister’s dead body in the ocean, faking his death, and forcing Hannah and Harrison to be alone was such a burden on Dexter that he wants to improve his mental state and get rid of that dark passenger. If he succeeds in this, maybe he has a chance at reclaiming the good parts of his old life.
The second half of the trailer is much more conventional—it looks almost fit for a movie. Dexter is shown behind the yellow tape at a crime scene, in a kitchen cracking eggs into a pan (like the opening credits of the show, where Dexter is seen cooking breakfast in a way that is made to be gory), inspecting knives and blades, and running (although whether he is chasing something or being chased is unclear). Also, there are other faces we catch sight of: one of an older man, who could be an antagonist, either a villain or a cop who recognizes Dexter, and another one being the woman that Dexter could be getting close to. I wonder if this woman will be shut out like all the other women Dexter got somewhat close to throughout the show. His connection with Hannah was the exception, given their bond over killing. The trailer then concludes with a spatter of blood, being covered up by clean, white snow while Dexter says, “This is all about blending in.”
There are many questions that have yet to be answered. Will there be any character comebacks? Will the title sequence and song remain the same, or will New Blood have a completely different feel? Will Dexter stay close to the action like he was in Miami as an analyst for the homicide department, or will he have a mundane job sitting behind a sales counter or moving trees? What we do know is that on November 7 at 9pm ET, we will discover if changing locations to a sanctuary, completely withdrawn from his past, will allow Dexter to run from the chaos, or if his dark passenger is a permanent part of him. I hope you’re all excited and ready to start watching with me—make sure to add Dexter: New Blood to your Watch List, and let your friends know when you’ve watched the first episode!
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