To polish a turd- Dexter Season 8

I'm going to start by actually explaining what this series of posts will be, seeing a the title doesn't give lots away. It's a series where I will suggest some ways in which awful things (generally that could of or should have been good) could have been improved. In this case, it's the final series of Dexter. Also, this series will be full spoilers. That's FULL SPOILERS. Right, let's get on. Just to clarify, we're now talking FULL SPOILERS for all of Dexter, not just season 8.

And I do want to clarify one thing. I'm not tearing this show a new arsehole because it's bad. I'm doing it because I loved it and it deserved a better end. I'm tearing it a new arsehole because it's consipated, not because it brings me joy to. I'm helping.

I'm going to start off with a problem that was there through the whole show. Don't get me wrong, I loved most of it but there was one problem that was always there: poorly written female characters. What I mean by this isn't that the female characters were bad. Hell, ask any fan of the show, they will say that Rita's death is one of the saddest in all of tv. What I mean is that they will fall into one of two (or three if you feel generous) categories: the maternal figure and the sexual character. Some times they will fall into both but all (or at least, all the main and memorable) female characters will fall into these categories. Example: Laila. She was the sexual character. She would frequently be having sex with Dexter and even more regularly be having her tits out! Way to empower women. In the maternal corner, we have Dr Vogel. She is essentially the mother of Dexter as we know him and his dark passenger (as well as Oliver Saxon). We can also put her in the maternal category because the whole goddamn season, there was a theme of family running through it that was as subtle as the fact Dexter may be a serial killer. Falling into the category between categories is almost every other character. Rita, literal mother and wife to Dexter. Deb, who looked after Harrison so much she may as well be his mum and who slept with soooo many men throughout the whole series. Hannah, who was at first a bird Dexter was shagging 24/7 and eventually Harrison's actual proper guardian. The list goes on: Jamie, Maria LaGuerta, even Dexter's biological mother! Basically, if we ever come back to the world of Dexter, write female characters so they can't be easily categorised and can stand on their own. Because if a teenager who doesn't spend his time constantly fighting for female empowerment is saying your female characters are a bit naff, you're doing something wrong.

Little nag here. I don't know if it was there in other seasons but the CG in this final season was not good. Whether it was just a car drive or Dexter's final journey into the storm, it was both noticeable and bad. Which, in case you didn't realise, is a very bad combination. And what's worse is that there was an alleged increase in the CG budget. I imagine it all went to making Dexter's stubble look hunky with a hint of "I've lost everything including the respect of the fans". Like I say, don't know if it was only bad this season but it was especially notable here and the series suffered for it.

One of my big problems this season was how much of an insufferable, unlikeable and slightly bi-polar person Deborah became. I understand she's been through some shit and that that changes people. Hell anyone who dated a serial killer, discovered their brother was a serial killer and then had to kill their boss to save their lying, murderous brother who was responsible for the death of your Dad, would be pretty messed up. But you don't have to make them unlikeable. Especially if you're going to kill them off. It's what made Rita's death so crippling. She was a character who we were rarely given reason to hate (and never strong reasons) and whose relationship with Dexter only became more real as her journey neared the end. Her death was effective because we still loved her and felt she had more to give, both to Dexter and as a character. Deb didn't. What with her rejections of Dexter and murder attempt in the car (which was ridiculous and out of the blue), we stopped caring. What was embarrassing was that the same day, I went to see Guardians of the Galaxy. The death of Starlord's mother (no more than 5 minutes into the film) was sadder and more powerful than Deb's death. Just to clear this up, a character we have known for about 5 minutes had a sadder death than a character who over 8 seasons we'd come to know, love, like, tolerate and then wish for the death of. In that precise order. To be honest, something good could have come out of the whole "Deb be a crazy biatch now" thing. I would have liked to see a ending where Deb finishes the job she should have done in that shipping container and kills Dex, like how the poster hinted. But no. Deb gets shot by a villain (who didn't deserve to be the final nail in the tough coffin that was Deb) and has to have the plug pulled because she had a fit and would be nothing but an empty body. I get that this is tragic but Deb deserved something, not tragic like the rest of her life, but something spectacular. Be it Dexter killing her because she became too much of a risk, her actually dying on the scene being shot or that car shit was in the finale and they died together at Deb's hand. Basically, Deb deserved more than to be poorly written and to just have the plug pulled. Also, that poster I was talking about: here it is. Does that not imply some tense final stand in anyway at all? Come on!

Quick one. Angel had a nice story conclusion at the end of season 7. He had become the owner of a bar, something he'd always wanted. But he was brought back for season 8 anyway. I can understand bringing him back because Angel is a beloved character and one who stayed brilliant through the whole show (excluding the LaGuerta love story arc). But to have undone the work you did to give Angel a happy ending and being him back in? Angel is a character who deserves a happy ending. Hell, he could still have appeared as the restaurant owner where they would occasionally go after work and chew the cud with him. That would be cool. But no. Angel is a cop and never even really gets an ending. Stick to your guns!

Right. This is the big one, that every fan hated, no matter how critical they were of the show. I'm talking about the last minute. Where Dexter is a lumberjack. Yup. A lumberjack. Something that was never slightly mentioned in the show. We just see him doing some lumberjack type work and then sit at home. Here, he looks at the camera and credits roll. What. The. Fuck? I really have no idea what went on here. Now, I did some research and read some interviews with the writers and they seemed pleased with the finale. Apparently after "killing" Deb, he would have to banish himself into solitude. He loses everything for what he's done, including his interior narration and that's why he can't give us a dramatic final monologue. Bullshit. I've gone over this. Doing some awful shit and making some bad mistakes will mess someone up but it won't make them abandon everything they were, everything they stood for. The writers also said that Dexter had to leave Hannah and Harrison for their safety. 1. That didn't stop him before. 2. Is it not safer in Argentina? 3. With the combined force of Dexter and Hannah, could they not together look after Harrison? I feel (and know other fans who would agree) that if you cut off the last minute, the finale becomes only bad, not depressing and soul-destroying like it was. Because let's face it. The final episode was bad but it would have improved dramatically if Dexter had just died and not become a bloody lumberjack (pardon the pun). Even Micheal C Hall has said he sometimes wished Dexter had just died. If your actor wishes the character they played would just die, something is going wrong.

Okay, time for a quick fire round of gripes. 3, 2, 1, GO: People in Miami don't notice anything, Dr Vogel shouldn't have been as central a character a she was, Oliver Saxon was a fairly uninteresting villain and his interesting bits were left out, if you're going to give Msuka a story arc then let's finish it, we don't need the one sassy black cop who drops one-liners and does no work, SHUT UP ABOUT ARGENTINA and finally don't try and make a season good by just referencing the better ones. That gripe is also addressed to season 7, who never finished the arc about Isaak Serkov and his group of thugs but I guess that doesn't matter. Oh, one more thing. Why did you not include this image at all? Look how cool it looks!

All in all, it was a season that paled in comparison to some of the, frankly, master classes that others were. I'd say that were I to suggest one thing to fix it I would suggest this. Forget season 8 and do one final episode off the end of season 7. At the end of season 7, I felt like we needed a little bit more and then would be done. Instead we got 12 episodes. Season 8 felt like it was trying to end from the midpoint onwards but just had to keep tripping itself up to make some more episodes. Honestly, if we had one more episode where Deb went totally off the rails, killed Dexter and got some resolution for characters like Angel, Msuka and Quinn, I would have been delighted along with many other fans. Basically, you could have done something so great, but you left us hating you. Take some note from Breaking Bad; if you quit while you're ahead, you will be remembered as one of the greats, instead of fizzling out and dying with a wet fart. May this be a warning to other tv shows. You aren't safe. Give us satisfying closure or hell will pour down on you and you will be forgotten.