The ‘Dexter’ revival is pointless and silly

8 many years soon after Showtime’s serial-killer hit “Dexter” ended with a notoriously horrible finale, the exhibit is back again with a revival which is attempting to easy over its doubtful legacy. 

Premiering Sunday (Nov. 7) at 9 p.m. on Showtime, “Dexter: New Blood” is a restricted collection pursuing Dexter (Michael C. Hall) a 10 years immediately after the situations of the sequence. He’s now dwelling in the compact city of Iron Lake, NY, below the assumed identify of “Jim Lindsay,” ice-fishing from his log cabin, abstaining from murder, exchanging pleasantries about pie with the regional pastor, doing the job in a fish and game store — and courting cop Angela Bishop (Julia Jones), who will get identified as in to deal with crimes which includes escaped sheep. 

The unique collection, which aired for eight seasons (2008-2013) on Showtime adopted Dexter Morgan, a blood-spatter qualified doing the job for the Miami police section who moonlighted as a serial killer focusing on other killers as his victims (typically folks who caught his consideration through his working day task but who slipped via the cracks of the justice system). 

The clearly show was a strike (drawing 6 million weekly viewers, substantial for high quality cable) mainly because it mixed the responsible beats of a procedural with the generation good quality, bloody thrills and ethical ambiguity of status drama — and involved unforgettable turns from visitor stars these kinds of as John Lithgow, who received an Emmy and a Golden Globe as one particular of Dexter’s adversaries. The show’s lethal flaw was that it could under no circumstances pick regardless of whether it desired to have Dexter encounter outcomes or get away scot-no cost, and this indecisive storytelling manifested in a nonsensical finale in which Dexter threw his sister’s useless body into the ocean, abandoned his toddler son and became a lumberjack — a convert that came out of the blue and was insulting to viewers’ intelligence.

“Dexter: New Blood” does give viewers some credit when the plot kicks in to interrupt Dexter’s peaceful life, it passes that very low bar of “making perception.” 

His son Harrison (Jack Alcott), now a sullen teenager, has tracked him down. To make issues a lot more intricate, Dexter falls off the wagon of his murder-totally free life and kills Matt Caldwell (Steve Robertson), a jerk buyer in his shop who’s the son of Kurt Caldwell (Clancy Brown), a large fish in Iron Lake, prompting a manhunt for his lacking son. Women from a close by Seneca Nation reservation are also vanishing, suggesting that there’s a different serial killer afoot. In the authentic sequence, Dexter hallucinated his lifeless father, Harry (James Remar), to provide as his conscience listed here, that role is occupied by his dead sister, Deb (Jennifer Carpenter).

There’s a ton going on, and Harrison even gets his very own storyline in high school, which serves as the expected “Dexter” subplot that has minor to do with the rest of the story. (In previous seasons, this honor was often carried by Dexter’s Miami P.D. colleagues.)

In spite of the reality that “Dexter: New Blood” is not as bad as “Dexter” was at its worst, it also does not method the heights of the original — this ten-episode sequence isn’t terrible, but it is also pointless.

This brings us to the large situation: who is “New Blood” supposed for? Audiences who caught it out by eight seasons of “Dexter” weren’t clamoring for its return — and this revival will not make a great deal sense to new viewers who skipped the unique. 

In the end, “Dexter: New Blood” feels like a vainness challenge so that the creative staff can redeem on their own just after the original’s lumberjack ending — and hope that “Dexter” will not sit together with “Game of Thrones” and “Lost” in the pantheon of notoriously terrible Television finales.

Great check out. This has all the power of a toddler covering its eyes and assuming the outside the house environment can not see them.