‘Dexter’ season 7, episode 3 review: Everything’s different

“Dexter” has brought us some great moments over the past several years, and over time, one of its most effective narrative devices has been finding a way to make us actually want to cheer on a man whose sole goal is to literally take out the trash and murder just about every person out there who has done some wrong to him. It’s certainly a tough pill for anyone to swallow, but it is something that we have come to do is realizing that while we may not agree with why Dexter does what he does, he is keeping people alive in some twisted way by taking the lives of others.

What was particularly interesting about this episode Sunday was that it turned the tables a little bit on this idea; instead of having the story merely revolve around us being convinced that Dexter is morally justified, it put Deb in our shoes through the lens of a man who she watched kill again thanks to her own insistence on following the letter of the law. Thanks to some chilling scenes where she effectively saw this man execute his ritual on an innocent young woman, she is at least at the point now where she “understands” what her brother does. That still does not mean that she supports it, though, and it led to him being tossed out of her house.

What was a little bit more disappointing that this excellent story was seeing the end to a character we never quite understood: Louis.  It was hard to buy anything that the guy did from the moment he approached Dexter about his serial killer game, but maybe the point was that we weren’t supposed to get it; we just liked the idea of having a new intellectual rival around for him, but it never really went anywhere major. Regardless, his own rage towards Dexter caused him to be taken down by Isaac, and it happened Dexter cut him out of the force and with his own babysitter in Jaime Batista. We’re sure that his body will be found eventually, though, and this could cause trouble for Dexter if there is any blood left on his boat.

We’ll close with something a little stronger in the execution: the arrival of Yvonne Strahovski’s Hannah McKay. While some of the dialogue between her and Dexter was a little blocky, their first scene was still effective in setting off some cues that there is an attraction here, but there is also something that Hannah is hiding.

Even with our Louis complaint, there is no denying that this is the best season of “Dexter” so far since Trinity, and is right up there, as well, with the excellence from seasons 2 and 3.