SPOILER ALERT: This story includes details from the end of Showtime. Dexter: new blood.
It’s truly the end of an era, as Dexter Morgan’s (Michael C. Hall) fate has been sealed in the final episode of Showtime. Dexter: new blood. And whether or not the fans like the ending this time around, there’s no going back.
Seacia Paul / SHOWTIME
“Dexter Morgan is dead,” series showrunner Clyde Phillips confirmed to Deadline in a conversation immediately following this recap.
Nearly a decade after America’s favorite fictional serial killer disappeared in a Miami hurricane in the original series finale, in New blood It is revealed that Dexter was alive and well living in Iron Lake, NY under the alias Jim Lindsay.
He had completely changed his life and left every part of his old life behind, until just the moment someone from his past found him. His cunning son Harrison (Jack Alcott), whom he left in the care of his former serial killer girlfriend Hannah McKay (Yvonne Strahovski) in the original ending, went looking for his last surviving father after Hannah died of cancer.
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After a rocky start, the pair moved closer towards the end of New blood when Dexter told his son the one secret he couldn’t share with anyone: he murders serial killers like some kind of good vigilante. But Dexter comes to understand at the end of New blood that he had become the evil from which he promised to deliver the world.
And the only person who could save him from himself is Harrison, who had also inherited layers of darkness from Dexter. They were both born of blood.
The ending, titled “Sins of the Father”, begins with a worried Angela Bishop (Julia Jones), the police chief and Dexter’s girlfriend, arriving at Dexter’s house, at least which was his house before Kurt Caldwell (Clancy Brown) will set it on fire. in Episode 8. She asks for an APB to be published about the lost podcaster Molly Park (Jamie Chung), having no idea that Molly had already become Kurt’s final trophy after he murdered her.
As Dexter reflects on all the good people he met at Iron Lake, his angry girlfriend reveals that there is a high probability that their house was intentionally set on fire and the ashen remains are now part of an active crime scene.
Seacia Paul / SHOWTIME.
Dexter is already making plans with Harrison to move to a new city where they can start a new life away from Iron Lake and all the new friends young Morgan had made. So it was going to be necessary to convince him.
Harrison is also not convinced of what his new beginning would look like. Would they continue in this quest to stop the bad guys?
As the couple make plans, Angela has discovered something in the ashes that sets off a series of events that lead to the disappearance of beloved old Dex. She patiently sends Harrison and Audrey (Johnny Sequoyah) to the store before cornering Dexter at his house with her gun pointed directly at him and Logan (Alano Miller) not far behind providing backup. The jig is over.
“Dexter Morgan, you are under arrest for the murder of Matthew Caldwell [Steve M. Robertson]Angela tells Dexter, who pretends not to know that Matt is dead.
Radiohead’s “A Wolf at the Door” plays in the background as Dexter is transported to jail for questioning, with the lyrics revealing a glimpse of the thoughts running through his mind.
Let me go back Let me go back I promise to be good /
Don’t look in the mirror at the face you don’t recognize /
Help me, call the doctor, put me inside /
Put me inside.
Seacia Paul / SHOWTIME
In true Dexter fashion, he has a logical explanation for everything. Although Angela isn’t sure what to believe, she’s sure her boyfriend is guilty of many things, and whether or not he was behind Matt’s murder is irrelevant.
Angela is doubting herself, so she gets in touch with Angel Batista (David Zayas), digging into Dexter’s past, specifically the case of Bay Harbor Butcher, who confirms that her instincts are right.
“Mother of God!” Batista exclaims when he sees photographic proof that Dexter is still alive and that LaGuerta’s (Luna Lauren Vélez) suspicions about him were correct. Angela’s Miami subway connection heads to Iron Lake with all her old files in hand to ensure that justice is served for the victims.
When Dexter comes face to face with Angela again, she reveals all the evidence she has against him and that Batista is on his way. There’s no way out of this, until Dexter goes down the Ave Maria. He gives Angela information about all of Kurt’s crimes and the place where the elder Caldwell has hidden the bodies of countless women he has murdered.
He rushes to the place and finds everything Dexter said he would do and more. Meanwhile, Dexter kills Logan (collateral damage) to gain access to the keys that would eventually free him from his cage.
Use a different key to access his escape vehicle, Logan’s police car, in a mad dash to get to Harrison. Dexter convinces Harrison that they should run away and never look back, that is, until Harrison realizes that his father killed his trainer, Logan. None of this made sense to him: killing a good man is not part of this code that Dexter lives by.
Right there in the freezing cold surrounded by fresh snow, Dexter realizes that he has become the kind of man he has belittled like mad dogs. Your son, with all his shades of light and dark, is a better man.
“I’m sorry for everything I’ve done to you. You deserve better, a better life, a better father, ”Dexter tells Harrison, who now holds his gun closed and loaded and points it at his father, with whom he has longed to be in a relationship for so long.
With tears in her eyes, she continues: “You have to take your insurance off, just like I showed you. This is the only way out. “
Harrison adds: “For both of us.”
Just before Dexter takes a bullet to the chest, a voiceover says, “I’ve never felt real love until now.” And right after the take, add, “You did well.”
Dexter lies dead in the snow as Angela arrives to find a new crime scene. Harrison offers him his dolls to be taken to jail in peace, but Angela lets him go and sends him out on the road and tells him never to come back. Then call to report a shooting involving an officer. The sheriff will take the blame for shooting Dexter in self-defense, with no witnesses to the contrary.
In the truck, Harrison finds a letter that Dexter wrote to Hannah expressing his love for Harrison and why he kept him away for all those years. Dexter not only adored his only son, but let him go to give him a better life.
“I want what every parent wants: for their child to be happy, to live and love without fear, to share their gifts with the world,” the letter reads as The National’s “I Should Live in Salt” plays. “But we both know that a normal life for Harrison will not be possible with me around him. This is not an easy decision. Sometimes I wish the hurricane had carried me away, released me from the burden of my own impulses. Instead, it showed me that I have to endure them alone. “
It is unknown what Harrison’s life will be like after all this tragedy. But Phillips scoffs that he’s been thinking a lot about what’s next and that he wouldn’t say no if Showtime wanted to continue afterward. New blood.
To read our interview with Phillips, click here.