FlipBoardSepinwall will probably do his reaction to Sunday’s (Dec. 12) “Dexter” finale on Monday morning, so I view this post as nothing more than a placeholder til he gets his analytic groove on tomorrow.
If you’ve been reading Alan, you’ll know his increased annoyance with the direction “Dexter” has headed this season and how closely it mirrors the direction that “Dexter” manages to head each and every season. I highly doubt that this finale will have changed his mind. You either love “Dexter” and its very familiar rhythms or you figure the show should have ended after Season 2. Or I guess a third category of viewership would be one where you marvel at how the show manages to lather-rinse-repeat-and-repeat-and-repeat in what wouldn’t seem to be a narrative that would sustain such a high-wire act each and every year.
I’ll confess that, more often than not, I fall into the latter category. Every season pushes Dexter Morgan to the brink of capture and then every season allows Dexter to squirm out, while nearly every season has ended with Dexter learning a Great Big Lesson About Himself, usually one that gets explained in conversation by the season’s Big Bad and in interior monologue by Dexter. “Dexter” is a show that likes to leave you guessing on its seasonal thematics for weeks at a time, but darned if it doesn’t like to spell everything out in its finales.
I don’t think I’m gonna do a full-on recap… Perhaps a little discussion, a personal query and then some random thoughts on the season… That’ll be after the break, where I can spoil things…
Before the start of the season, one of the big claims the showrunners made was that in this transitional season for Dexter, his first season without Rita as his normalized beard, we wouldn’t have a Big Bad. I’m not quite sure what happened to that plan. I guess we didn’t have a single superstar Emmy-bait 12-episode adversary, like we did with Jimmy Smits and John Lithgow the past two seasons, but the Barrel Girls were introduced in the second or third episode and alert viewers first spotted Jonny Lee Miller’s Jordan Chase in the third episode. By the end, Miller got to do nearly as much scenery chewing as Smits and Lithgow and his death was every bit the climax of this season that their deaths were.
The key difference is that Dexter didn’t actually get to kill Jordan Chase. Or he didn’t choose to kill Jordan Chase. Instead, he let his new protégé Lumen (Julia Stiles) do the dirty work. This season’s main icky theme appeared to be Empowerment Through Murder. Jordan Chase transformed himself through the rape and not murder of a gal from his summer camp, going from chubby wallflower to wealthy life-changing guru, regenerating his powers through watching his campmates commit a slew of ritualistic rapes and murders. Me? I befriend my camp friends on Facebook and then never communicate with them again. Jordan Chase and I are different in that way.
Similarly, Dexter empowered Lumen to strengthen herself and recover her identity through a series of revenge killings, even letting her kill the last two herself.
Yes, this season, Dexter learned how to share. Perhaps that was meant to echo the childish lessons being learned by his son Harrison, the scratcher.
But Dexter proved to be too good a mentor. While his Dark Passenger found purchase in his youth and gnawed deeply into his psyche, Lumen’s Dark Passenger was a new creation. And while Dexter’s Dark Passenger has proven to be insatiable, Lumen’s was easily satiated. Turns out all Lumen needed was revenge. All Will Hunting needed was to be hugged and told repeatedly that it wasn’t his fault. All Lumen needed was to track down, torture and murder the men who raped her and left her for dead.
In one piece of theme explication, Jordan tried telling Dexter, “You can save one thing to make up for another Dexter. It’s just not the way the world works.”
What Jordan didn’t understand was that even if Dexter was doing that, Lumen’s desires were far more linear. Chica wanted vengeance, nothing more and nothing less. And the next day, weight lifted off her soul, Lumen was done. Murder as emotional purgative. Why not. This was totally foreign to Dexter, who was already planning their life in the suburbs with a white picket fence and a Saran Wrap-lined Killing Room. Dexter understands only entropy. Killing silences the Dark Passenger, but chaos reigns again. In their mutual disorder, he saw the chance to be whole — like that darned ceramic bowl he was holding — and her confession that she’d recovered left him shattered — like that darned ceramic bowl he threw against the wall.
So here’s my question and really my only reason for writing this recap:
Does Dexter kill Lumen?
I’m gonna say “Yes.”
I *want* the answer to be yes. Because Dexter putting Lumen on a bus or on a plane is dreadfully uninteresting as a way of ending a season. Dexter taking the lessons Lumen taught him and killing her anyway? That’s provocative.
I don’t care that Dexter grew to love Lumen throughout the season and that she loved him for him and blah blah blah blah. He talked in many similar ways about Lila back in Season 2. Lila loved him for him. She saw his darkness. She didn’t know the full extent of the darkness, right? But he was amazed that unlike with Rita, he wasn’t play-acting with Lila. Lila made it so that she couldn’t mutually exist in the same world as Dexter. Similarly, though, Lumen knows everything about Dexter and just as Dexter wasn’t exactly sure what to do with her at the beginning of the season, there’s no reason he should be comfortable with her knowing about him now. She loves him? He loves her? So WHAT? If possible, a temporarily readjusted Lumen is even more dangerous to Dexter than an unhinged Lumen. She’s back in a place where someday she might feel guilt or remorse. We never heard Harry’s opinion on keeping Lumen alive, but I highly doubt Papa Dexter would be a fan of any plan where somebody who knows Dexter’s secret is allowed to roam free.
We know we didn’t see a farewell scene, with Lumen at the airport gate or Dexter at the bus station. How ’bout taking it one step further? Perhaps Lumen finally breaking up with Dexter was completely in his head, a manifestation of his need to sever ties with her for good and to sever ties with the absurd fantasy future he had planned. In that circumstance, the fantastical nighttime body dump, beautifully lit with unnerving happy music and that huge smile on Lumen’s face? Maybe that was the start of a fantasy?
I don’t need to tell you that “Lumen” means “light.” And I also don’t need to tell you that the finale ends with Dexter blowing out a candle, extinguishing a light. At the very least, it’s a metaphorical extinguishing of light, signifying Lumen’s temporarily absence, but in what way would it be out of character for Dexter to have made that corner of darkness permanent? Yes, Lumen “saw” Dexter. Yes, she loved the “real” Dexter. But that was Damaged Lumen. Dexter fantasized a life with Lumen that was an extension of his current life, where they were partners. Dexter loved Damaged Lumen, but Damaged Lumen became magically repaired when she reached her kill quota. She ceased to be Dexter’s potential partner and became just another threat.
Did she offer hope? Absolutely. But she ceased to be that hope herself. Totally fine. For now, Dexter has his family, his work family and hope. All he’s lacking is a sex-and-killing companion, but he lives in Miami where there seem to be a dozen active serial killers working at all times. He can find a less easily repaired soul mate at a different time. Now he knows it’s possible.
Dexter observed, “Lumen said I gave her her life back, a reversal of my usual role. Well, the fact is she gave me mine back too and I’m left not with what she took from me, but with what she brought — eyes that saw me, finally, for who I really am and a certainty that nothing, nothing is set in stone, not even darkness.”
So you can go and think that Lumen is back in Minnesota and that the season had a happy ending for her. I’ll prefer to think that Dexter noticed the change in Lumen earlier and worked his own particular, “You can’t break up with me, I’m breaking up with you” magic. That seems more interesting to me. Lumen served her purpose. Just as Julia Stiles was only contracted for one season and never felt likely to become a permanent part of the Miami scene, Lumen wasn’t long for this Earth.
Some other quick thoughts on the finale:
*** Another season, another step closer to Deb being ready to accept Dexter for who he is, even if she doesn’t know it. In the finale, Dexter and Lumen only escaped because Deb was able to cease to see the world in a detective’s black and white and to sympathize with the idea of a vigilante killer being capable setting things right outside the law. Deb giving Dexter and Lumen an hour to clean up their mess just positioned her closer to being able to do Dexter the same courtesy when there isn’t a dirty plastic sheet between them. I’ve read interviews where the writers say the show is over when Deb finds out. I think that’s a failure of creativity. The plastic sheet was Dexter’s most flimsy evasion-of-capture yet and its inevitability kept me from getting wrapped up in the tension of the finale. There are still things the “Dexter” writers can do that would surprise me, but none of them happened in the finale.
*** So Quinn didn’t instantly narc on Dexter because he knows how much Deb loves her brother. And Dexter fudged the bloodwork on Quinn’s shoe because he knows how much Quinn loves Deb? But now Quinn suspects Dexter of *something*. And Dexter knows that Quinn knows *something* but he doesn’t know what. I’m not sure where that goes. I guess I’m interested, though.
*** “Dexter” is a show that functions almost completely because of shoddy police work, but the failure of anybody to look up land-holdings for Eugene Greer is nearly as embarrassing as the fact that they hadn’t found out that Jordan Chase was an adopted name to begin with. That’s several episodes of plot that could have been erased through a little common sense. And speaking of shoddy police-work/writing, the street vendor who stands at a four-way stoplight and when he’s asked what’s down the road in one direction says that the *only* thing down that road is an old abandoned summer camp that hasn’t been operational for 20 years? That’s horrible writing. Or maybe it’s just horrible municipal planning, because one of those directions probably doesn’t need a light, because there’d never be any reason for somebody to drive down that road that way.
*** BTW, Jordan Chase’s full-on transformation into Jason Voorhees, complete with abandoned summer camp trauma? A little fun and a little cheesy. I loved Jordan’s retort, “You’re laughing like there’s some polite way to do this, like there’s some etiquette. Killing is killing, Dexter. Let’s be honest about that.”
*** I expected some sort of payoff for Maria Doyle Kennedy as Harrison’s nanny. She still gives me a creepy vibe and I’m not convinced we’re not headed for some “Hand that Rocks the Cradle”-style crazy next season.
Tick… tick… tick. That’s the sound of this season of “Dexter” running out. What’d you think?
Go fuck yourself.
Dexter is amazing.
you are so rude
Wow, and that was for a review that wasn’t nearly as negative as mine would have been. I imagine you’ll wanna skip Sepinwall’s tomorrow.
Heck, I didn’t think I was at ALL negative. I wasn’t all flowery and thrilled, but I tried to engage with the finale on its own level, rather than trying to tear it to pieces or whatever…
And yet? Not enough love, apparently…
-Daniel
Dexter fans are so pathetic. It’s probably because most of them are sixteen years old.
I love your theory, though I sincerely doubt it’ll prove to be true. The show won’t let itself be that dark. (Though it does remind me somewhat of my belief as a child that, absent an explicit death scene, Influence survived the final confrontation in Dick Tracy.)
I grew to quite like Miller, though I agree he was a little too much at times in this episode. And the scene with the hanging sheet separating Deb from Dexter and Lumen? Excruciatingly pointless. Yeah, great, you’re sloooooooooooooooooooowly building Deb into someone who could deal with her brother being a killer of bad guys, but why not just do it and challenge yourselves? Of course, I’ll be back next season, but I find my enthusiasm fading.
I disagree that the sheet scene was pointless…this season wasn’t about Deb learning about her brother, it was about her coming to terms with cutting corners as a cop.
Sorry to burst your bubble, Dan, but Lumen is alive.
[insidetv.ew.com]
Q: Is the door open for Lumen to return?
A: She’s alive, so therefore the door is, of course, open.
Andrew – It’s no “bubble.” It’s just a reading of the text of the finale itself.
You see, Lumen is a fictional character. She’s not ACTUALLY alive *or* dead. So if the creators decide it’s interesting for her to come back, she will. That’s fine. Sarah Wayne Callies’ character on “Prison Break” was *definitely* dead and she came back.
I *personally* happen to think my reading of the finale is truer to the character of Dexter and the universe of “Dexter.” But I also understand, and understood when I read it, that it might not be the primary reading. I’m just havin’ FUN.
But if my reading were “right” — again, she’s a fictional character… she’s neither dead nor alive — would the producers *really* be conducting interviews tonight going, “Duh, she’s DEAD y’all.” No. No they wouldn’t.
-Daniel
Interesting theory, but one that shows a complete lack of understanding of Dexter as a character. Having Dex intentionally break Harry’s code? And kill Lumen because she knows his secret? After he tried send her home withthe secret earlier in the season? That would have been more compelling, perhaps, but not true to the character AT ALL.
Thank you Ben. Totally agreed. I’m completely baffled by Dan’s “reading.”
Ben and Aamadis -I’m OK with my understanding of Dexter as a character and his motivations as they exist in this reading. Sadly, they’re also the only way I can avoid jumping on the “God, that finale sucked” bandwagon.
-Daniel
I think Dan’s reading would be in keeping with the fact that Dexter is a SERIAL KILLER. They are usually not great at maintaining an even keel, at least not forever. They lash out. But Dexter has been written as such a great guy lately that it would be hard to reconcile. I guess I’d be more interested in a version of the show where Dexter felt like a danger to those around him (and not just indirectly).
To DAN…
What about Dexter killing “shady-PI-guy,” whatever his name was? The ONLY reason he killed that dude was because he knew who Dexter really was. I honestly thought that was the most intriguing scene of the series, and I’m a bit disappointed that it wasn’t developed further.
Also, Dexter killed that greasy dude in the diner, just for insulting his wife’s memory. Where’s the code there?
I think I’ve been getting the vibe that the show runners have set in stone “Deb finds out about Dexter and makes a choice (or more likely Dexter makes the choice for her)” as the end game since the end of season two. So everything since that point has been just running out the clock.
Basically the show squandered a great opportunity to shake up the formula. The minute Deb arrived on the scene, all I could think was, “OMG, they’re finally going to do it! And with 20 minutes left in the finale! This is going to be EPIC!” And then they blew it. I couldn’t enjoy any of the second half of the episode, because I was so frustrated that they copped out. It was all well-acted, well shot, etc, etc, but it was so SAFE. This show needs to act like Weeds and grow a pair.
Oh, and if the writers think that Deb finding out would effectively end the show, then they need new writers. That plot twist would do the exact opposite. It would breathe new life into this increasingly stale premise.
Yeah tunnel from Florida to Mexico for the win!
I agree that this finale was underwhelming, for the same reasons, but I do hope that it creates a compelling hook for the next season, since Quinn is still out there, with Deb.
Aside from MCH, Carpenter, and Miller’s performances, this has got to have been the most unsatisfying finale and season ever. The writing is excruciatingly lazy. The suspense (which is as much a function of decent screenplay and direction, I guess) is still there, but the predictability of the show is astounding. There are no creative plot twists anymore, no creative ways to get Dexter out of trouble. The writing’s grown lazy and cynical – who gives a crap about how we get him out?, the writers think. It’s all about getting the show from A to C, without putting thought into B. Why waste time on such a minor and irrelevant thing as the PLOT OF THE STORY.
I can’t believe people have complained about Season 4. In retrospect, it was a masterpiece.
I still think Season 5 was better. I just didn’t really like anything about Season 4. Lithgow was very good, but it wasn’t enough.
They missed a golden opportunity for Deb to finally find out the truth. It felt like they were building up to that reveal the whole season. Disappointing.
It’s not really about where the show gets taken (i.e. the C part). I mean, yeah, we all have our preferences on where to take the show and where not to. I would say the S4’s (rather quiet and underestimated) brilliance was that it ended with a pretty deplorable, unexpected, earth-shuttering, and irreparable cliffhanger – Rita’s death. It’s not a satisfying ending to the show either – in fact, it’s uneasy. No matter how much the fanbase hated Dexter’s family life (and how many people bemoaned that Dexter wasn’t supposed to have feelings), it was a pretty bold way to end the season. I can’t say I was happy when I saw it, but at least the writing (the means, the plot, the “B” part in the A-to-B-to-C chain) was great. And obviously Lithgow was amazing.
This season we predicted the “C” step to be Deb finding out about Dexter. But it didn’t happen, and people (again) are sort of dissapointed. The “C” was very predictable and formulaic – but as a fan, I’d be okay with predictability and formula as long as everything else worked well. The writers, after all, have all the right to take the show wherever they want. But the means, the way the writers got to the end was cynical and sloppy.
I think the A-B-C “metaphor” is completely wrong. This series’ “A” was: “DEXTER IS A SERIAL KILLER”
The immediately implied “C” was that “HE GETS CAUGHT”
This series is all about the “B” part of that diagram, which is: who is Dexter, what kind of conflicts does he undergo, and what kinds of changes does he experience as a result?
As a series, exploring the “B” plot (which is what it has always been), this season was pretty solid. Dexter has grown [read: changed] as a character, and so have all the supporting characters [except Masuka, who is comic relief].
If you’re looking for a straight “A-B-C” then watch a movie.
This is episodic television, with no terminating point in sight. It just keeps developing that “B” point in your diagram.
Wow! to call this finale weak would be a disservice to writers and producers that actually try something. This was beyond weak, it was a limp crawl to the finish line. This season makes season 3 look like a season of The Wire. Now *that’s* hyperbole!!
No balls whatsoever. No cliffhangers. No big reveals to Deb or Quinn. A waste of talent (Robocop) and another big push of the reset button.
End it.
As a fan of both The Wire and Dexter, I think it’s fair to point out…The Wire has no protagonist.
None, or, maybe, the city itself.
Dexter has…duh…Dexter as it’s protagonist.
You can’t compare the shows, it’s not the same conversation.
You’re definitely being generous here Dan. The ideas about Dexter having killed Lumen and Lumen breaking up with him being in his head are actually pretty great. Those would likely have reversed my enormous hatred for the episode. But I don’t think there’s a chance in hell the show meant for it to be seen or interpreted that way. I certainly didn’t.
It’s infuriating how unambitious the people running this show are. The scene where Deb walks in on Dexter and Lumen without actually seeing who they are makes me want to abandon it completely.
Lots of harsh in the comments about the show. I find it so odd that people who dislike it so much keep watching it.
I liked the finale, and the season overall, which I didn’t think would be possible after last season, which I LOVED. There is no chance Dexter killed Lumen. He just doesn’t kill innocents. Even Lila turned nutty and threatened the kids before he killed her. He sent Lumen away once before, even though she knew he was a murderer. There is even less of a chance now that he’d kill her.
(p.s. – anybody watch the heavily promoted “Shameless” preview after the finale? It looks stellar.)
We continue watching because we’re hoping the writers will pull their collective heads out of their asses and give us something akin to what made us love the show back in season’s 1-2.
Consider it like being critical of your teenage child — they may be infuriating, and you can see every single flaw in their character, but you love them regardless because they’re yours. “Dexter” belongs to its fans because we’ve invested a lot of hours loving this show since it’s beginning. We’ll keep watching in hope that season 5 was an anomaly, vocally afraid that it wasn’t.
Evie – By no rules that the show accepts is Lumen *truly* innocent. She’s justified. But she’s justified by Dexter’s code. And in the end, it’s clear that Dexter’s path and Dexter’s code aren’t the ones she chooses. By the Law of the Land, Lumen is a killer, just like Dexter is a killer.
-Daniel
Luman may have decided not to follow Dexter’s path, but she never discarded his code. The code HE taught her. There is no way Dexter is killing Lumen.
Like I said last week in Alan’s review of the penultimate episode–the writing took a serious turn for the worse when the head producer Clyde Philips left after the big finale of season 4. (he developed a lot of the plot and storylines). I don’t know who is running things now but they are not very clever writers. The episodes keep going by and each week they are filled with plot holes, implausibile actions, and trite dialogue that lead nowhere.
I still think that season 5 was way better than season 3, but that’s not saying much. Imagine a show where Doakes had never left! He was Dexter’s best adversary ever.
All this season I’ve felt cheated. One of the things you know when you watch Dexter is that Dexter is going to get away with it. But along the way, you’re treated to an intelligent and tightly wrapped narrative. You can let yourself believe in it and root for the main character to overcome. But this whole season was just one lucky situation after another. The car crash that spilled the barrel girls made it so that just what Dexter needed fell into his lap. From then on it was just finding one guy and taking him down. Jordan Chase was actually pretty interesting being this looming, control-hungry maniac. I liked how he let Lumen run and him walking after her, but that was it. Not even a bit of rape.
They just have these isolated scenes of character development that aren’t consistent, like a cheesy practiced move from a guitarist. Everything settled itself just so fucking safely, it really shows a lack of imagination from the writers. Liddy getting stabbed, the plastic sheeting, the knife in Jordan’s foot, Lumen leaving so as not to complicate things any further, Quinn’s blood spot, Deb’s decision.
Nothing in this season stood out. This is not what I got into Dexter for. I’ve loved it since episode 1, when Dexter said “yes, i wanna play. i really, really do.” I immediately knew I would love this guy. So it hurts to see it go in this direction. For the first time since watching it, I wanted to see Dexter fucked. I rooted for Liddy in that one scene, thinking “Dexter has never been this fucked! He’s got a guy that knows a big secret, has evidence, and now has him tied up in his van.” But you know how that shit went.
I forgive it all though if this guy’s theory were right and that fire getting put out really were metaphorical. It’d be nice if when Dexter said “you’re right, we can’t change.” he took it to mean that he was forever a monster, and could dispose of Lumen. “No one knows her, she’s killed, I’ve seen her! Kill her with this plate shard!”
Fuck, man. Just like last year how I was wondering how the writers could pull themselves out of a hole of Rita’s death, I now wonder how they’ll do something to gain back my interest and respect. They’re going to have to strike some fucking lighting. I wanna see some scandalous shit. Dexter went from one to being #3 on my favorite shows list.
All the way down to #3. Wow!
I have mixed feelings about the season in retrospect.
I hated parts of the finale. Actually, I hated the damn sheet. There wasn’t anything else they could’ve done?
I also don’t think Deb finding out is the worst thing out there.
That said, in the broad spectrum of things, give the writers credit. They tried to have character development this year. Whether or not you liked what they did, they did try. We started off with a Dexter dead set on fleeing, and at the end of it, we have a Dexter who has a clearer understanding of who he is and his support network.
The process there was a bit shaky, as most Dexter seasons are, but they tried.
I was half-hoping they would have Deb see Lumen, but somehow miss Dexter, and thus setting up for a season where Deb is suspicious of her brother and finds out at the end.
Something just occurred to me. I have compared Dexter with a glorified Psych after last night’s finale, but that sheet got me thinking about what Psych did this year.
I half-expected that sheet to be there as one final tease to make us think Deb found another cheesy way to be oblivious about Dexter, then at the last moment have them both step out or even more intriguing just have Lumen step out and then Deb running away because she couldn’t take it, but they didn’t do that.
I compare that feeling with Psych this year having the two main romantic leads pussyfoot for years about their relationship and yet again a scene this season where it looks like they are prolonging that “tension” again, but then they resolve it by getting together immediately after you think they wouldn’t.
Even Psych knew when enough was enough. I was more surprised by Psych this year than Emmy winning Dexter.
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i think i’m done with this show. it’s so damn familiar every year and I knew they were too chicken to have Deb find out his secret.
I need to point out, how in the hell does the fact that the blood work came back negative for Liddy exonerate Quinn? I’m going to assume Dexter said it was Quinn’s own blood on the shoe. But the surveillance equipment had Quinn’s signature attached to them and his fingerprints were on/in the van? And all the phone calls? Speaking of which, isn’t it kind of dumb to delete the phone calls from Liddy from your phone? They would still be on Liddy’s phone! Holy crap, is the Miami PD this dumb?
He erased the calls on his phone out of panic. The calls were still on Liddy’s phone, that’s why LaGuerta pulled him aside at the scene
I know that, I’m just saying that a cop should know that’s going to help cover anything up. I guess you could call it panic, but he has to know it just makes him look more suspicious. My biggest problem is still that I don’t know how you could completely clear him just because someone else’s blood is on his shoe.
oops i mean “a cop should know that’s NOT going to help cover anything up.”
This season, I think, proved that Miami Metro is indeed that dumb.
That whole Quinn thing was complete bullshit. An utter cop out. Pardon the pun.
Gosh, I wish you were right, Dan, because that would be so much more interesting than what we got. I would actually understand Dexter more if he killed Lumen, because a serial killer you can break up with? Makes no sense to me.
But this show doesn’t really hide it’s plot like that. We would have seen, at least, conversation with Harry, or Lumen’s bag, just a little too full, in the back of Dexter’s car.
Oh, well. Stiles was very good, and this season was enjoyable. But it didn’t really hang together in the end.
A remarkably bad finale after a remarkably bad set-up episode. The writers think we want to see Dexter get away with murder, when really most of us want to see how Dex will react to a real threat. At least in season 4, which I think was the season’s best, there was a real threat in the form of the Trinity killer, and that threat left a real mark on Dex’s life. Here the threat is a weak-minded, poorly run Homicide department, a bat-shit crazy motivational speaker, and a bland partner-in-crime. Liddy was the only real threat to Dexter, and he was conveniently put to rest so easily as to make him seem like a footnote in the show’s history. It’s sad that this show, while sometimes inconsistent, has become the one thing it always strived to avoid: conventional.
OK, Dan, that was a pretty brilliant observation about the four-way light!
I thought the finale was “fine,” if way too pat. But I don’t think Dex finds/snuffs Lumen – she has as much to lose as he does by blabbing.
What an atrocious episode. The sister just “walks away”. Hey, there’s someone behind the curtain! Couldn’t possibly be, say, two more members of the merry bunch of rapists. Nah, it’s my vigilante and her boytoy, so I’ll let’em go, ’cause I’m just cool like that.
THE lamest, most cowardly cop-out in this entire series.
I suppose she also asked them to extract HER DAMN BULLET from the wall and tow away the wrecked car that would have been reported as stolen fifty meters away from the Liddy crime scene.
But who cares about the Liddy crime – Quinn is innocent, after all. Dexter “found out”. The blood was, uh… a pigeon’s! Or Quinn’s. He just cut himself shaving. While wearing shoes. At the crime scene.
And never mind Quinn’s name in the logs, his presence by the van, his logged conversation with Liddy 5 minutes before the man bites it, or his behavior at the crime scene. Nah, screw all that. He’s ours, he’s clean!
And that laughable beach ending was so lame I think I’d rather have Dexter waking up in the beginning of season 6, realizing he’s actually still trapped by Jordan and he has just dreamt half of S05E12.
I couldn’t disagree with your assessment of Lumen more. I see the metaphor, but other than that I just don’t think this show has any real balls to it. Maybe they open next season with a kill scene of Lumen, but that would have been an excellent finale scene. The fact that they metaphorically hinted at Dexter extinguishing the light in his life really is so tame that I find the argument barely interesting. If this show wanted to go “Breaking Bad”, it would have done it already. The writers just don’t have it in them. You give them too much credit.
Kro Lin – Again, this isn’t what I think the writers’ think happened. This is what I think I have decided I want to think happened, based on the text provided. I’m certain the writers didn’t intend the ambiguity. But if ambiguity exists — and I think my reading is at least amusing and not *clearly* invalid — that’s their darned problem…
-Daniel
No, your writing isn’t clearly invalid (if it was, who would be reading it?). But does what you have decided you want to think happen have much of a mental “lift” for you? Does it do something for your writing? I’m curious, because I have conversations with my wife all the time on how we wished shows had turned out…I’ve even written fan fiction for LOST on the same basis you’ve stated.
I guess I just answered my own question.
Lastly, ambiguity exists and it is their darned problem…but if it’s not intended than it’s certainly lazy.
Kro Lin – It’s not a mental lift so much as it’s a way of trying to find an approach to a show I often love that allows me to love a conclusion which, otherwise, I probably wouldn’t love. So it’s just me saying, “This isn’t interesting on the surface, so is there any chance that what’s under the surface is possibly more interesting.” And it’s *absolutely* a permutation on the instinct that drives people to produce fan fic. It’s not exactly the same thing, but it’s a variation on an instinct that says, “I could love this more and I wanted to love this more… Here’s how.”
And, on a side note, ambiguity is always acceptable. It’s often even preferred. I, like you, just prefer that the ambiguity be intentional rather than unintentional…
-Daniel
I don’t speak Spanish, but did the street bender really say that the *only* thing down the road was a camp? She asked him and he said the work for “camp”
Tom – She asked what’s down the road. I don’t think he said that the only thing was the abandoned camp, it’s just that the abandoned camp was the only thing he said. Now if you ask me what’s down a road, *I’m* gonna tell you the actual operational THINGS that are down the road. “Oh, there’s a McDonalds, a supermarket, three hotels and an office park.” I’m probably not going to say, “Well, there’s an old camp that hasn’t been in business since I was 2.” But that’s just me…
-Daniel
Ok. I see what you’re saying.
I didn’t love the finale either. I felt like if Deb didn’t find out in that moment, then she never will. I mean I understand why she let them go, but I still feel cheated.
hey im from south america argentina and the street bender say something like “not much.. an old abandoned camp” not enfasising the camp but still i cant find i tpossible that the one thing that the street bender though of was an old abandoned camp.
i hated the season finale, but i still love dexter and cant wait for it to retuned (:
He said “Not much, a camp”.
Not only am I 16 but I live in my parents basement. :P Seriously, Feinberg, I love the way you think. You’re nearly as twisted as I am. I mean I don’t think there is any point in this if you aren’t torturing your characters. Unfortunately, people like nicey, nicey and dull, dull and most television writing conforms to it. Still maybe someone will read what you’ve written and just, you know, have Lumen turn up on some missing person’s list somewhere.
What does Deb mean when she says “You must be happy too. Now that this is all over” Am I the only one that thinks Deb might know??? What else would she be talking about?
I think this reviewer is wrong to assume Dexter kills Lumen since he extinguishes the light on the candle.
He blew out the candle and said “Dreams are for children.” because Lumen was his “dream” of having an honest relationship with a woman.
Regarding the next season, I expect that the Deb/Quinn relationship will be a focal point, since Quinn “knows” and Deb is “ok with” his vigilantism. Just speculation based on their character developments, not any real evidence, understand?
I agree that the police-work is simply awful, but I guess that’s a plot-device.
“All Will Hunting needed was to be hugged and told repeatedly that it wasn’t his fault.” GOLD
this season was the weakest. so much build up that when it came time to fish the story lines everything seemed rushed. and that has to be the worse homicide unit in the history of TV. 1st how is the case wrapped up when they havent caught the “vigilantes”. and how did they let Quinn off so easy just b/c of the blood. I mean theres still the equipment signed out under his name and the phone calls
Interesting, the only way you could like this finale is if Dexter killed Lumen, while that would pretty much ruin the show for me.
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Same problem with this finale as last year’s. Jordan Chase as far as they should be concerned is still alive and out there. They act like the case is totally closed and without a body or him in custody they wouldn’t think like that, this was the same issue as last season with Trinity. If it was assumed that Trinity killed Rita than logically the Miami PD would not have dropped the idea of catching Trinity as easily as they appear to have.
Seasons 1-4 were great, 4 being the best, 5 being the worst. I agree with many of the complaints regarding season 5, but killing Lumen? That’s just not cool. And what’s the the bllod of that first victim theat Jordan wore around his neck? Why did he keep her alive? They never explained that shit. That was totally confusing.
“Empty, just like me”
That’s the line that hooked me on this show. It’s one of the earliest inner monologues that Dexter had, after he handed out all the donuts at the station.
He’s a Serial Killer, he can’t feel anything, he doesn’t have emotion he simply has actions. When the writers began trying to make him grow emotionally I really hated it and hoped he would have a total break down. I mean honestly, the guy is in his mid thirties, been killing since he was 13 and now miraculously he’s got feelings? riiiigght. Hopefully the next season has him slipping more and more to the “dark side” and dealing with a transformation to the dark passenger. Basically, he should “become” what he hunts, that way it plays on all of our emotions.
Deb should finally find out about Dexter, his brother, his mother and why their father killed himself. She should have a complete nervous breakdown and turn him in to the cops. Dexter can basically be trying to avoid the police while at the same time killing murderers and innocents alike, essentially turning into all the serial killers they’ve tracked over the years.
Then Dexter gets caught or better yet “put down” by the only family he ever had (ala first season) and then Deb finally loses her mind and kills herself with grief.
End credits.
Season 4 was good. Season 5 was so unrealistic and just horrible just like season 3. They shuda let John Lithgow escape at the end of season 4 and brought him back in a later season tht wuda been nice.