Dexter’s rushed penultimate season has its good and bad

First of all, I’m definitely all in favor of Dexter’s sister Deb finally learning of his little secret; there’s no question it was time for that kind of a shake-up to happen in the Dexter-verse. I was very happy to see that Dexter was not only unable to provide a suitable excuse for what Deb witnessed, but he simply came right out and admitted what he is. It’s showing more of how he’s defying what “values” Harry bestowed upon him in his youth, in opening up to his sister when Harry made it perfectly clear it was a bad idea. It makes for a rather unpredictable remainder to the rest of the series.

What I’m not all that keen on, however, is the pace at which Deb is getting over what she’s learned. I don’t believe I’m alone in having thought, once upon a time, that if Deb ever found out about Dexter, she’d either shoot him dead, arrest him, go completely padded-room bonkers, or all of the above and not necessarily in that order. What we got was an almost comical intervention-like reaction from Deb, with her deciding her brother can get over being a serial killer like it’s a bad habit. We certainly got moments of her being completely creeped out, but … it doesn’t seem like it’s enough. There’s even a scene in one of the first three episodes where Deb giddily runs to go get some ice cream while hanging out with Dexter at a job — it feels so wrong that she can seemingly think everything’s OK, and it doesn’t come across as an odd form of denial. Like I said, it feels almost comical.

The strange thing about Deb’s getting over what she’s learned so quickly is that I don’t believe the viewers would necessarily want to deal with watching Deb sitting balled up in the corner of a room for half-a-season or more. So, really, the writers were faced with quite the predicament: inject more reality into the situation, or get this ship moving along to get to a more thrilling finish. There could have been more balance toward reality, though, had the finish line not been painted at the end of the eighth season.

There’s another major storyline within the first three episodes that takes a turn that I simply do not like, and that has to do with Lewis, Masuka’s intern. It has a tiny bit to do with the pet theory I threw out there last season, but not because it doesn’t fulfill it. It does, however, have everything to do with, well, anything you might think about Lewis. It’s pretty much utter disappointment all around with the Lewis storyline, and I unfortunately can’t get into it any more than that without getting into major spoiler territory. I will tell you that you’ll find out in the third episode, though.

Besides Deb finding out about Dexter — and the theories we can all have about where that will ultimately lead — the best part of the season points at what should be Dexter’s most formidable opponent yet: the Russian mob. Mob, as in more than one … many more than one. And I’ll make a quick prediction here: Quinn is going to find out about the Russian mob targeting Dexter, and why. And when that happens, having Quinn target Dexter again might just cause him more trouble than the Russians will. However, with Dexter’s sister becoming more accepting of her brother’s extracurricular activities, there’s no telling what she’ll do now to protect him. All that mixed together makes for some great possibilities for the remainder of the season … and series.