Things I've Enjoyed: Dexter Season 7

TV’s favourite serial killer has been stalling a bit of late. Dexter uniquely is a series with a conclusion all its viewers already know – that Dexter will be found out. How it happens is the source of much suspense and intrigue, but its postponement through six seasons has dragged the series into a pretty uninspiring direction.

After all, it’s a show with a fairly high concept, and one that lends itself easily to formula. Right from the off, It could so easily have been a police procedural with a dark edge, with Dexter pursuing a  new killer(s) each season, trying desperately to stay ahead of his police cohorts.

Early seasons seemed to rally against allowing the show to fall into this pattern: after Dexter’s parlay with the Ice Truck Killer in season 1, the following two seasons stayed mostly away from serial killing nemeses, pitting Dexter against more ordinary monsters, people so easily and willingly corrupted by the prospect of killing.

It wasn’t until the fourth season that Dexter found himself up against another serial murderer, that of the Trinity Killer, played by John Lithgow. It was a hard act to follow; it was the best season yet, and Lithgow was much and justly awarded for his performance.

Things have been much slower since then, the following seasons serving up new killer enemies who were less engaging and leading to less revelations and explorations of our hero’s character. Even with a complicated character like Dexter, there’s only so much you can say or do with them.

But now, finally, the cat is out of the bag. Deborah (Jennifer Carpenter), Dexter’s foul-mouthed sister, knows. It’s as if the writers have let out a sigh of relief, suddenly the show can move forward again, and it does so with gusto.

Deborah’s not the first to discover Dexter’s secret (another factor against the show’s credible longevity) but unlike others, she has no sympathy or empathy with Dexter dark doings.

We’ve always liked Dexter, no matter how much he’s stretched his moral code, we’ve always identified with him as an outcast who presents a false face to the world, despite his darkness. But for the first time, we get to really see him from someone else’s perspective, and it’s not a nice picture.

 

That’s how season 7 plays out; it’s asking one fundamental question: just what makes Dexter different from the people he kills? For him, it’s the code that targets his urges only towards the guilty. But for Deborah, seeing him with his mementos and dangerous compulsive urges, he could just be another psychopath making excuses for their actions.

So this time around, there’s no single over-arching plot. Instead, the show plays out a variety of scenarios which test their relationship, effectively playing out the argument for and against from episode to episode.

Two larger storylines run through:  the first pits Dexter against a mafia enforcer who doesn’t take kindly to Dexter disappearing one of his associates. Deborah’s horrified at how Dexter’s actions snowball into multiple killings, drawing others into the crossfire and compromising both their safety. But she also gets a chance to see Dexter as an avenger, someone who’ll do anything to protect her.

The other storyline, the more interesting of the two, sees Dexter become interested in another killer, apparently reformed. Hannah McKay (Yvonne Strahovski) was the kidnapped girlfriend of a serial killer, but escaped prosecution for being underage and claiming not to have been complicit in his crimes. But when Dexter finds out otherwise, and suspects further killings, he goes after her, only to become romantically entangled.

Unlike Deborah, Hannah accepts Dexter completely. She has killed to further her goals and accepts that Dexter also kills to meet his own needs. We’re left to feel ambivalent towards McKay, who, like Dexter, is attractive and pleasant on the outside but harbours secrets within. We get to see something of her painful past, see her with her guard down, but crucially, unlike Dexter, we’re never given access to her inner monologue.

 

She remains aloof, and is no doubt intended to give us the same impression that Dexter gives Deborah. Someone who is all surface, some one who habitually lies, and no matter how much we might like them, we know ultimately cannot be trusted. As the season progresses Dexter is forced to make a choice between the two women he loves, one who accepts him as he is and another who might not be able to live with who he is.

Dexter does, of course, have a supporting cast, though their less showy, but reliable performances gets them little notice. The writers are clearly fond of Desmond Harrington’s Joey Quinn, a character who puts on a good show of street-savvy smarts but is desperately short-sighted . He hits a new low this series; like watching a car crash slowly, we both can and can’t believe he’s so stupid.  Sadly, though, there’s still no good material for Masuka (C.S. Lee) or Batista (David Zayas).

One of the best things about Season 7 is that for the first in a long time, Dexter is starting to feel unexpected again. There’s a crucial moment at the series’ climax that honestly made me sit up straight and shout “f**k” – you really won’t see it coming.

That’s the power of taking the brakes off. In the last days anything and everything might or could happen. There are rumours that the show might go to a ninth series – let’s hope the writers don’t give in to studio pressure. The show has benefited so much from pressing ahead it would be a shame to spoil it by stalling again.

Things I've Enjoyed: Justified

It's always good to see a cop show which resists the standard shows formulas. A show that's not built around a gimmick or takes place somewhere where a cop show hasn't been set yet. One of the real pleasures of Justified is that it's not interested in be ing another procedural drama, and its writers seem keen to defy your expectations whenever possible.

On paper it could so easily be another "fish out of water" concept. Raylon Givens is an old school lawman whose habit of committing "justified" homicides gets him into trouble in LA. So they ship him off to the real frontier - the country sticks of Kentucky, where he rapidly gets into hot water with the local redneck mafia.

Fortunately, Justified is adapted from a story by acclaimed crime author Elmore Leonard (Get Shorty, LA Confidential). Givens isn't arriving in Kentucky, he's coming home. And his family are already part of the redneck mafia - and he's been in trouble with them for years.

His old school friend Boyd is now a white supremacist who blows up black churches with his army bazooka (he's less racist, more in to intimidating competition). His ex high school squeeze Ava has just shot her husband dead - he was Boyd's brother. And Givens' father used to work for Boyd's father, the local crime kingpin, and he owes him lots of money.

Justified is not so much about crime investigation and more focused on the nature justice, which in these poor rural counties is something of a rarity. Crime isn't just a way of life, it's a steady form of employment. To grow pot is to be part of a family business. The wives of dealers and thugs look at their husbands as working men, not as dealers and thugs. They're poor - you never see a school or a thriving local business (not a legal one anyway), no one gets out of this world, even Raylon got sent back.

The fact that most of the redneck thugs aren’t too bright adds an extra touch of bitter amusement, although it doesn't make them any less dangerous. What they lack in book smarts, they make up with violence and animal cunning. Boyd may have barely finished high school, but that doesn’t make him any less dangerous or ruthless. Or at least until Raylon shoots him - then he supposedly reforms, but you never really know what game he's playing.



Timothy Olyphant plays Marshall Givens, having already showed that he can play an angry lawman in Deadwood. But unlike the barely suppressed rage of Sheriff Bullock, Givens’ anger is much more repressed. His demeanour is always calm, even when he’s a split second away from putting a bullet in your chest. He’s handsome and he knows it, using his looks to charm his way around enemies and friends alike, something that rubs at least one of his colleagues up the wrong way.

And that's another enjoyable aspect to Justified - there's no taking turns between characters for the weekly storyline. Supporting character stories might rub up against Givens' arc, but in the way that other people’s problems might brush up against your own life. You may get involved, pulled in even, but you've got your own problems to worry about.

Justified is a pleasing case of serial storytelling, rather than a "this week's case" type of procedural, made more for casual viewers than weekly viewers. There are weekly plots, but they're usually played as they are, as an inconvenience to the main characters, something that distracts them from the things they'd much rather be doing. Rather than the other way round.

And the storylines are usually very good. Stories are written deliberately to defy your expectations, when you think you know what's going on, something almost always takes you by surprise. And elements of stories that seem incidental or irrelevant come back to mean something later; things connect up in ways you don't expect. One week a character may be incidental to the plot, then suddenly they're corrupt and have being up to something completely different all along. It's these little twists and turns and details that make this world real, but are largely missing from "case of the week" serials.

That's not to say that the show is perfect. A recurring plot during the first season which sees Raylon pursued by assassins sent by an LA drug lord never convinces and perhaps in recognition of its faults is later swept rapidly under the carpet. There's at least one lame character - Raylon's ex-wife's husband - who's the typical slimy second husband type, and it's even harder in this case to believe he wrestled the wife of Timothy Olyphant away.

Not that Raylon is perfect; he's not one of those TV detectives who carries his pain on the rasp of his voice. But he's determined to impose justice on a world, and a past of injustice. And he's not all that bothered about whether the law is on his side or not.

Like the other town's folk, he works on instinct. Sometimes we like seeing him put the villains down, other times his judgement is clearly off. He spares little time jumping into bed with Ava, despite her being a witness (though not difficult to see why). His rule breaking forever digs him into deeper holes, to the point where even his friends desert him. He's devoted to justice but has little respect for the law.

He also gets his ass handed to him a couple of time. It’s not many shows that let their main character get a sound beating; they’re only allowed to be weak in times of crisis, not just when they make a daily misjudgement.

Justified has completed its second series and is geared up for a third. How long it can keep up its talent for surprises while trying to find new redneck mafiosa for our hero to deal with is hard to say. At the moment, however, you'll struggle to find more entertaining morality play on TV.

Things I've Enjoyed: Boardwalk Empire

When it was revealed that HBO were to begin producing a new period gangster drama, written by some of the people behind the Sopranos, starring Steve Buscemi and with the first episode directed by Martin Scorsese, TV critics across the globe had a collective orgasm. Once the series had aired, they were no less gushing in their praise.

Yet Boardwalk Empire is not quite the home run that all have called it. That’s not to say that’s it isn’t a great series – it is, but it does have its flaws. It would be truer to say that it becomes a great series, its beginning are a little... crowded.

Boardwalk Empire is the story of prohibition era America. Steve Buscemi is Nucky Thompson, the New Jersey county treasurer and, essentially, the city’s mob boss. The man who pulls the strings in the street and in the halls of power. When the ban on alcohol comes in, he quite jovially announces to his cohorts, including the major and the sheriff (his brother) that they’re going to make a fortune. New business brings new enemies, however, and his unwillingness to bend to the will of a New York gangster causes trouble, as does a zealous prohibition agent. But Nucky prefers politics to the violence of mob business, which gradually begins to undermine his position.

Sopranos comparisons are easy, and not just because of the writers. And the New Jersey location. There’s the young mobster who threatens the boss’ authority, the old gangster who jealous of his success, the powerful New York crowd trying to muscle in, and the women he loves, who struggles to reconcile her love for the boss with the criminal life he leads.

But then again, Tony Soprano was not involved in politics, and was not a subtle character. Steve Buscemi plays a character who holds his card much closer to his chest, and all times appears respectable. He’s a harder character to get an angle on. He has no psychiatrist to spill his inner thoughts to.

This is nub of the problem. Boardwalk Empire plunges head first into the action, before we ever get to know our characters. They’re all immersed in sub-plots. Plot driven action is always welcome, but most series let you get to know the territory first. One of the story techniques adhered to throughout the Sopranos run was that each episode should stand alone, and could be watched as an individual story. After the pilot, it’s quite a few episodes in before there’s anything resembling an A story begun and resolved in one episode.


All these ongoing plots leave character
development in the dark and loose ends dangling from one episode to the next. There’s one sub-plot, featuring a dumb gangster out of favour, with debtors on his back, that inspires hardly any interest at all. Eventually it comes in to contact with another sub-plot, and starts to add to something more, but only eventually.

So why all the praise then? Well it’s HBO, and as such it has all the resources the HBO can throw at it. The production values are superb, and the cast, you really couldn’t ask for a butter bench of actors.

Though the crowded plot causes issues, the writing is otherwise excellent. The show is packed with interesting and colourful characters, from the savvy boss of the negro mob to the gangster’s moll who’s true love is another women. By far the most fascinating, and disturbing, is FBI Agent Van Alden, a Christian zealot with a fiery temper, who struggles to suppress his rage at the abundant moral corruption that surrounds him. And is also gradually corrupted by it. It’s an interesting contrast to have the supposed voice of justice and right to be more dangerous than then those who shirk the laws of the land.

The other major point of interest is how the series brushes up against history. How historically accurate it is is one for the academics; it certainly gives pause to reconsider the history of American government and how criminality and corruption may have formed its policies and laws. And how criminality and corruption have contributed to the creation of society today.

In that respect it’s almost the thematic child of Deadwood – which for unfathomable reasons is not hailed as HBO’s true masterpiece – which showed how society is created and ascends from mobs and lawlessness. You could also link it to the Sopranos, the three shows showing the history of organised crime from the 19th to the 21st Century – moving from an accepted part of the governmental institutions towards the fringes of society, though never quite absent from the echelons of power

While the prolific sub-plots do create a certain unfulfillment as each episode closes, it’s never less than a pleasure to watch all the talent, behind and in front of the camera, at work. And as the series progresses, the plot strands do come together and we can really see where the story is heading.

The series certainly does get one thing absolutely right, and that’s that it leaves you thirsting for more. By the close we see Nucky opening up, becoming more vulnerable and closer to his mistress, the plain but smart Kelly McDonald (of Trainspotting fame). This, alas, may contribute to his undoing, as his friends are now moving against him, having judged him to not be the leader they want. Showing those first signs of mob and politics separating.

Boardwalk Empire is not a complete masterpiece, but it sure as hell seems like it may well become one.