TV Review: DEXTER 6.5, "The Angel of Death"
This latest episode of Dexter is one that collectively took two steps forward while taking one step back.
rating: 3
This episode of Dexter is one that collectively took two steps forward while taking one step back. The Angel of Death brought us slightly closer to the Doomsday Killers without actually learning that much more about them, Deb and Mike continue to tow that line between barely professional and nauseatingly flirty (at least by Debs standards) while the rest of the precincts key players scrambled to clean up their own messes, and Dexter continued his course work in Spirituality 101. As much as I enjoyed the episode, as I do most episodes of this show, I cant help but feel it has reached a crucial moment for the season (and potentially the series) and failed to truly knock it out of the park, instead demonstrating a desire to keep an even keel rather than genuinely wow the audience. A specific problem that kept me from more fully enjoying the episode is that I dont understand how Travis was present at last episodes crime scene. Granted the garden may have been a public space, surely when dozens of police personnel are present they dont let just anyone wander through gruesome murder scenes, right? Despite an inexplicable initial lead, it was good to see Dexter finally proactively pursuing the Doomsday Killers. The best seasons of Dexter shine so brightly in large part due to his immediate attachment to the Big Bads and so the longer Dexter refrained from being directly involved with the Doomsday Killers, the more the season was to suffer. While Dexter is hot on their trail, we got to see plenty more examples of how Travis is the misguided youth with good intentions and Gellar is the truly evil master manipulator. The problem here is that the audience pretty much picked up on that already when we saw Travis with his sister and the waitress he picked up last week, among other instances. The writers clearly seemed to reiterate this characterization presumably for how the season will end up playing out, but also to justify the fact that Dexter actually let Travis go when he had him choking for breath under his wire in Travis car (the second call back Ive noticed this season to the series first season).
Hopefully, as Dexter states, Travis will lead him to Gellar, however, even if Travis isnt the primary perpetrator of these grisly homicides, hes clearly instrumental in their success and I dont care how much Dexter and Brother Sam discuss good and evil, Im pretty sure Travis is still a dangerous psychopath and satisfies Dexters code. Last time Dexter didnt take care of a known code breaker, it got his sister shot and his wife murdered. So the way I see it, there are two ways this could play out: Dexter finds God in being merciful, which would be an extremely ambitious task to pull off, or it will come back to bite Dex in the ass. Again, time will ultimately tell, and as sympathetic as I may be toward Travis, I will be sorely disappointed if Dexter doesnt dispose of both Doomsday Killers because that would demonstrate an inconsistency of Dexters character to the point of being virtual sacrilege. On the other side of the hunt, Batista and Quinn create a huge mess when they find Professor Gellars former assistant, Professor Porter. Apparently this new character actually had a serious romantic relationship with Gellar during which they lived together. Even if Porter was one in a long line of women Gellar had relationships with, she clearly has an affinity for him and his work which is why I hope we better get to know her and thereby better understand the main antagonist which we know so little about. Thus far, Gellar has served as a pretty one dimensional representation of the darker side religion represents. Im not saying a brutal killer such as Gellar should be given the opportunity to defend his atrocious behavior, but this is a show in which the protagonist is a serial killer after all and what draws so many fans to Dexter is the series ability to let audiences have a glimpse into the fascinating machinations of a seemingly normal human whom performs inhuman acts so if the writers dont want to let the Doomsday Killers become a poor mans John Doe from Seven, we need to learn not only what motivates Gellar, but the context which has borne whatever crazy philosophy he uses to rationalize his crimes in a manner which successfully acts as a dark reflection of Brother Sams message of light, love, faith, and redemption. It looks like we will become more familiar with Porter but of course, as Batista so meekly warned Quinn, having one night stands with key members of a criminal investigation is none too wise and so it looks like there may be yet another road block keeping us from getting to the bottom of what drives Gellar. In what may or may not become another disappointing subplot (again, this episode didnt provide much for the audience to work with), Masuka fired Ryan, the intern whom stole the Ice Truck Killer evidence (the other call back to the first season I noticed a couple episodes back) and sold it online, but couldnt trace who the buyer was. Im still holding out that this will develop into something meaningful that reflects one of this seasons over-arching themes or at least further develops a character to a degree which will have lasting consequences, but this episode makes me afraid it will end up being just another unnecessary distraction which goes nowhere. The Angel of Death also took a significant amount of time focusing on Deb and her acclimation to being LaGuertas replacement (a character I didnt mind not seeing once the entire episode). This felt unnecessary and repetitive as the audience has already watched Deb move out of Dexters home and get a new place to compensate for whatever drama shes handling in the past. And although it was fairly reserved in the conventional sense, it clearly seems like Deb and new addition Mike Anderson have significant sexual tension, as demonstrated when he accompanied her to haggle over an apartment and when Deb let slide Mikes comment that she is like Masuka in that theyre both fucked up, but get the job done. It would be nice to have some fresh blood and see Deb stand on her own two feet without relying on tying the two characters romantically. This has been done with LaGuerta and Batista as well as with Deb and Quinn and does not need to be repeated. The one scene I did really like was Dexters conversation with Brother Sam, played immaculately by Yasim Bey (the artist formerly known as Mos Def), who threatens to outperform almost everyone else on the show. Brother Sam may be the most humanizing character Dexter has ever been paired with because Sam, unlike Rita, shares Dexters darkness which, unlike Lumens, is ever present and still he manages to convince a murdering scientist of the divine light humanity is capable of producing. Such a threat may be neutralized (though I doubt it) as the episode closed with Sam getting shot, setting Dexter up for a revenge kill. Although this episode basically just treaded water, I do prefer to view episodes of any series as I do songs by a band in that its best to reserve final judgment until the album, or season, is over. Maybe the show will really kick things into high gear and go for broke next episode thereby silencing my biggest problem with The Angel of Death, but instead of speculating on the future, for the moment I have to say that this week felt like it treaded familiar ground without much advancement.