Fans of “Dexter” have had a roller-coaster ride since the original series first aired back in 2006. The series quickly developed a cult following, but similar to GoT it fizzled out by season 8. Although in the BR team’s humble opinion, nothing can be quite as bad as GoT’s untimely demise, the “Dexter” series finale was almost equally hated by longtime fans. 8 years after the season 8 fiasco, Showtime released “Dexter: New Blood” which somewhat retconned Dexter’s apparent death at sea in the series finale by having him alive and well living under an assumed alias. The series revival was met with mixed reviews by fans and critics, but held a very respectable franchise high 77% RT score and opened up the doors for 2 additional sequel series.
“Dexter: Original Sin” came first, a prequel series that some have hailed as the best prequel series out there, although the RT score stands a little lower than it’s predecessor at 70%. This was enough however to get the series a season 2. The other sequel series following ‘New Blood’ is called “Dexter: Resurrection” and it seems like the OG Dexter (Michael C. Hall) is back! The 2 episode season premiere just dropped…and there’s a lot to unpack. From Harrison’s struggle to contain his bloodlust to Dexter’s coping with his aging and now bullet scarred body. Warning, beyond this point there are spoilers for the series premiere of “Dexter: Resurrection”.
The 2 episode season premiere just dropped…and there’s a lot to unpack. From Harrison’s struggle to contain his bloodlust to Dexter’s coping with his aging and now bullet scarred body.“
Although Dexter’s survival from the near fatal gunshot he revived from his own son in the ‘New Blood’ series finale was teased in the ‘Original Sin’ series premiere, it wasn’t until the beginning of the ‘Resurrection’ premiere that we find out Dexter has been in a coma for 10 weeks in upstate New York and has lost a lot of muscle mass. During his coma, the series splits time between Dexter and his son Harrison (Jack Alcott), who is now working as a bellhop in a fancy New York City hotel. Harrison is wrestling with is own inner demons and still believes he murdered his own father while Dexter hovers between life and death in an enhanced dream state. During Dexter’s coma and early stages of awakened recovery, we are blessed with multiple high profile guest appearances from Lt. Doakes (Erik King), Miguel Prada (Jimmy Smits), the original Harry (James Remar) and Detective Angel Batista (David Zayas) who also played an important part in ‘New Blood’.
By the time Angel gets to confront Dexter, he is luckily nearly back at full strength. The meeting between the two characters is palpably tense but would seem benign to anyone else but longtime viewers. Batista clearly believes Dexter may in fact be the Bay Harbor Butcher instead of Doakes, but won’t come out and say it just yet. Dexter doesn’t seem to understand the danger that Angel poses. Dexter hears news about his son that may implicate Harrison in a murder, which prompts him to leave town in a hurry, only adding to the detective’s suspicions.
The first episode ends with Dexter seeing Harrison from afar in NYC and sets up an extremely interesting location for the rest of the season. Imagine Dexter in a city that’s only a few miles in diameter, but filled with 10 million people? The possibilities are endless and as anyone that’s ever spent time in a major city knows, it’s easy to feel anonymous surrounded by constant strangers who you often never see again.
Episode 2 picks up right where the first one left off, with Dexter in the big apple, trying to find a way to be there for his son Harrison. In the premiere, the viewer was witness to Harrison killing a serial rapist and chopping him up into 9 pieces, just like his Dad taught him…only this time, there is a shrewd NYC Detective, Claudette Wallace (Kaia Sarah) that is intent on finding the culprit. Harrison quickly and accidentally puts himself on the detectives radar, only upping the stakes. At the same time, Dexter is having some problems fitting in to such a big city, until he meets rideshare Driver Blessing, who is an absolutely positive and friendly influence on Dexter. It seems that Dexter’s urge to kill never really wanes though, as Dexter finds out there’s a serial killer in the city called the “Dark Passenger” and he instantly wants to go back to killing – forgetting his original purpose for being there was his son. Dexter justifies this by thinking his son doesn’t need his help and decides to become a rideshare driver himself, because the name-stealing killer targets rideshare drivers.
Episode 2 does a wonderful job of expanding Harrison’s character, while bringing Dexter’s mindstate back into a more killing friendly demeanor. All in all, both episodes were extremely well done and setup high stakes and lots of tension going into the rest of the season. It’s inevitable that Angel will come looking for Dexter and that when he does, Mr. Morgan might be put into another situation that compromises his code and forces him to kill a good man.
There is also the question of Harrison’s humanity and whether or not he will embrace his need to kill bad people or control his impulses. All in all, this series feels like the glory days of Dexter is back (including a kickass soundtrack) and we are there for it. Update: As of 08.08.25, the series stands at a franchise high 94% RT score!
What do you think? Can ‘Resurrection’ keep up this quality of episode? Will Nigel finally land his white whale? Will Dexter reunite with his son or watch from the shadows? Will Harrison continue to kill? Can Dexter maintain his code in New York City?
Let us know your thoughts about ‘Resurrection’ in the comments below!