Visiting ‘Dexter’s’ laboratory

On the verge of becoming a husband and father, after three intimate dances in which he revealed his innermost secrets to other people, the question Dexter introduced in the pilot lingers: Is Dexter capable of loving? Dexter confessed then that he has no feelings, but that if he were to love someone, it would be his sister, Deb (Jennifer Carpenter). Just before he killed Miguel this season, Dexter declared impassively, ‘I don’t get to have friends.’ Do we believe him? ‘I don’t know that Dexter is the most reliable narrator,’ Hall said by telephone. ‘I don’t know that he was at the beginning of the show, and I don’t know that he is now. I think he tries things on and plays at being a human being. I do think there’s an appetite for connection and revelation in Dexter that he doesn’t consciously acknowledge. But that motivates a lot of his behavior.’

The debate about Dexter’s capacity for emotion has existed since Showtime’s highest-rated series premiered in 2006. But it’s not just limited to viewers who find themselves relating to him, perhaps a little too much, and even rooting for him. Thirty-six episodes after the show premiered, the writers of the series can’t settle on an answer either. ‘In the writing room, we are constantly talking about, well, does Dexter feel that? Or is it learned behavior? Or is it camouflage?’ said show runner Clyde Phillips. ‘For instance, is his relationship with Rita a growing affection? Is it learning affection? Or does he need the relationship as a camouflage to present to the real world? In all honesty, we don’t entirely know. ‘I always think of Dexter as a bit of a French coffee press. You press down on it and those bubbles come up and those bubbles are unexpected emotions. And it could be anything from affection for his sister, a feeling for his baby that’s coming, friendship, whatever he was feeling for Lila last year. It could be hate, rage. I don’t know yet that he loves. But I believe he feels something, and he feels more and more as he dynamically lives his life and has gut-wrenching and soul-wrenching experiences.’ Hall, nominated for three Golden Globes and one Emmy for the role, is reluctant to be definitive about the inner life of the Miami blood spatter expert he portrays, partly because he wants to leave it up to the audience to interpret and partly because there’s usually more than one factor motivating Dexter’s actions. Phillips said that he and Hall ‘go round and round’ over Dexter’s capacity to feel anything, even after this season’s poignant episode in which Dexter helped a terminally ill family friend die. On the one hand, Hall believes that Dexter’s relationship with his brother set him on a journey of self-discovery in spite of himself. But on the other, Hall points out, Dexter could be playing us all. ‘I think the fundamental realization of his origins ... opened up something for him, opened a door that can’t quite be shut in spite of what he pragmatically knows to be,’ Hall said. ‘It’s like a wound that continues to bleed and one that he doesn’t consciously acknowledge. But you can turn that all around and say that Dexter has a sense that he might kill these people well before we discover that inevitability.’ Smits, who has drawn critical raves for his intimidating depiction of a Miami prosecutor who comes out of the homicidal closet through his friendship with Dexter, thinks that Dexter yearns for connection -- to a point. ‘I don’t think that’s ever going to be satisfied,’ Smits said. ‘You had the brother, then you had the female energy last year and this year, with Miguel, it’s almost like a combination of the two. There was an element of that relationship that was friendship, but then it went beyond that. I think Dexter, with his marriage and through becoming a father, is going to keep attempting this, but it’s never going to be completely fulfilled.’

The key to the show’s power is that Dexter is so curiously appealing -- and a big part of that appeal is thanks to the superb work of Michael C. Hall. Hall’s affectless, Mr. Spock-ish performance is the opposite of Ian McShane as Al Swearingen in ‘Deadwood’ or Denis Leary as Tommy Gavin in ‘Rescue Me,’ who deliver unedited rants with the volume turned up. Dexter is all interior self-scrutiny, but thanks to Hall, you never for a second feel like he’s merely a construct built to upend our moral balance. There’s something profoundly sympathetic about this guy as he works to seem ‘ordinary,’ like an awkward teen trying to fit in. He speaks to the nerd in all of us, that part of ourselves that is always wary of being seen as an outsider or a fraud. Every season, the writers -- including Jeff Lindsay, author of the books on which the show is based -- emphasize Dexter’s merits by throwing him in with someone who’s far more dangerous than he is. Within the tightly plotted seasonlong arcs, the writers distort the spectrum of good and evil. In Season 1, the heavy was the Ice Truck Killer, who turned out to be someone very close to Dexter. In Season 2, it was Dexter’s lover, Lila (the dynamic Jaime Murray), a borderline with a fire fixation. And this season, it has been blood-thirsty D.A. Miguel Prado, played with unexpected angst by the usually more heroic Jimmy Smits. None of these people operates with a code like Dexter’s, and, inevitably, he contrasts favorably to them. Also casting Dexter in a positive light is Deb, played by Carpenter with winning foul-mouthed emotionality. (For Deb, ‘dildo’ is a term of endearment.) She has been ridiculously sloppy in her romantic adventures: With the Ice Truck Killer, with her boss, and, this season, with an informant. She’s a dear mess. Sure, Dexter is terribly bottled up, but, well, Debra. She makes Dexter’s robotically deliberate approach to life seem rather creditable. Does all this make Dexter sound like a one-note morality play? Oh no, it’s not. It’s one of TV’s very best times. I’ve pushed it on many a friend looking for the next chapter in smart TV, and few have complained. There’s always the initial balk -- a show about a vigilante killer? -- but the reality of watching Dexter is much more dimensional, suspenseful, and comic than its premise might suggest. On top of everything, Dexter is a black comedy. ‘I’m sorry,’ Dexter said to the relative of a dead man earlier this season. ‘That I killed him,’ he adds in a voice-over. Dexter is also secretly a ham.