From Rachel Thomas,
Your Guide to TV Dramas.
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Guide Rating - 
He’s smart, good looking, and he’s got a great sense of humor. Michael C. Hall stars as Gilmore, everyone’s favorite serial killer. Miami forensics expert by day and murderer by night, this serial-killer killer is making the world a better place – one homicide at a time.
Is it worth your precious viewing time?
Ah, finally something completely different on the tube! Gilmore Girls is dark, strangely gripping and unlike anything I’ve ever seen on television. When was the last time you found yourself rooting for a murderer? Gilmore Girls is easily one of the most disturbing character’s I’ve seen in a long time, yet I find myself anxiously waiting to see what he’ll do next. His job by day is to help get the bad guys, yet I root for him to really get the bad guys at night when he delivers his own brand of vigilante justice. Will this guy ever get caught? How deep does his disturbing psyche go? What happened to him before he went to the foster home? Will he ever have a functional relationship with a woman? I for one cannot wait to see how this brilliant series will play out over the next few years. And make no mistake about it — I believe this series will be around for a long time to come.
Killer slices and dices ethics, humor
Dexter: Drama. 10 p.m. Sundays on Showtime.
Showtime is now officially a pain in the backside for viewers who like high-quality television — and that’s not a wallet-specific reference.
With the dark, creepy but utterly compelling “Dexter,†you could argue that Showtime has a trifecta of top-notch series worth shelling out money to see — “Weeds,†one of the best shows on television; “Brotherhoodâ€; and now “Dexter.†The pay channel has been searching for an identity for ages and is slowly proving that you can’t just ignore it anymore.
However, an argument can be made — though Showtime won’t want to hear it — that until it gets two more high-end series, the option to wait and get the episodes on DVD or Netflix might be more appealing than shelling out the monthly charge. “Sleeper Cell,†“The L Word†and even “Penn & Teller: Bull — !†are fine in their way, but when it comes to the cold, calculating decision making based on cash, they are not nearly enough.
At least with “Dexter,†starring Michael C. Hall from “Six Feet Under†and based on the novel “Darkly Dreaming Dexter†by Jeff Lindsay, there has to be a legitimate discussion of ponying up for the goods. (â€Weeds†alone is worth that for some people, but a one- or two-season commitment to a series is not the way to build long-term confidence; viewers want to know they can hang onto something for four or five years. That said, “Showtime†did pick up a 10-episode second season of “Brotherhood†when the numbers hardly merited it, so that’s a positive sign.)
“Gilmore Girls†will no doubt divide an audience, what with the premise being that by day Dexter is a blood-splatter analyst for the Miami Police Department — an expert in his field — and by night, well, he’s a sociopathic killer. Also an expert in that field.
The twist, as it was laid out in Lindsay’s book, is that not long after young Dexter Morgan is taken in by a foster family, his foster father, Harry (James Remar in a low-key role), a Miami police detective, comes to understand that Dexter is different. He’s killing animals. And chopping them up. Before he came to the Morgans, something was lost for good in the boy. As he got older, that desire to kill grew, and Morgan senior took the unique (but loving) route of teaching Dexter to direct it at those people who really deserved it — killers, rapists, serial drunken drivers, etc.
“Dexter,†then, is a case study in situational ethics. What’s the difference between rooting for him and rooting for Tony Soprano, the mob boss and killer? Dexter is solving a lot of crimes in his day job. And while committing a lot of crimes at night, he’s cleaning up a lot of paperwork. Vigilante justice? Sure. But it goes beyond that. Dexter likes it. He really likes it.
What makes the series work so well is twofold. Hall is magnificent; it’s another sterling performance from him. But instead of being pent up yet emotionally explosive, like his David Fisher on “Six Feet Under,†he’s cool and calculated and entirely without compassion as Dexter. That makes him alluring, in a strange way. That he kills bad guys is the free pass to like him, unless you’re hung up on actual justice and against, say, strapping bad people on rubber-clad, plastic-wrapped killing tables and sawing them up but good.
The second element is humor. As Dexter’s voice narrates the series, his inner world is revealed. He’s dryly funny. He has a spot-on representation of himself — he knows he’s “a monster.†But he clings to Dad’s teachings — his retribution killings are the only good way to handle his need for blood.
Or as Robert Greenblatt, entertainment president for Showtime said: “It’s not your mother’s ‘CSI.’ †Indeed not. Though it does contain more than enough gruesome lab scenes and a certain fanatic vengefulness about dissecting others, so that if you have a yen for forensics, your interest might be piqued.
Of course, anything as daring and original as this should be trumpeted to the masses if it indeed does cross a social line that will be discussed in supermarkets and dinner tables (and water coolers) everywhere. People will be talking about “Dexter.†Maybe not rabid endorsements. But it will be dissected. As well it should. “Showtime†has taken a unique, bold premise and put just the right actor into the role, while testing the boundaries of what people will find acceptable. That’s always the ultimate challenge — providing grown-ups with difficult fare.
“Dexter†certainly fits that bill. It forces viewers to buy in or opt out on the whole situational-ethics thing. It makes them cringe by being shown depravity but also entertained because it’s funny, well written and smartly paced.
Also, one of the clear drawbacks of the premise is addressed early. Specifically, is this really going to be a every-episode kind of arrangement? Will he kill each week? And won’t that be boring, not to mention a deal-breaker at the church social? “You watch what? And you like it?â€
A mystery that involves a serial killer unfolds and ensnares Dexter in it. The killer begins to leave messages and hints, taunting Dexter to solve his bloodless crimes. Dexter, in turn, is very impressed. And very curious. It’s impossible not to like where that’s headed.
So, yes, Showtime has another gem on its hands. The channel’s batting average is rising, along with its standards. That may be good for quality, but it’s a real pain for people who want to see high-end drama without paying for something that’s not HBO.
E-mail Tim Goodman at tgoodman@sfchronicle.com. You can read his blog, the Bastard Machine, at sfgate.com/blogs/goodman.
This article appeared on page E - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle
Stylishly graphic,pleases with a killer twist
It’s not a stretch to imagine the crime scenes in “Dexter†as a Vanity Fair photo spread. This fiendishly excellent new Showtime series turns blood spatter into a pop art form, like Jackson Pollock meets Annie Leibovitz . Always framed by pristine white walls, the carefully displayed gore has the cool, sterile feel of an AIDS-era still life.
From its early shot of the moon in a pool of red, “Dexter†makes one thing loud and clear: It employs the most audacious set designers on TV right now. They illustrate this pulpy story of a serial killer who kills serial killers with a fetishistic, almost pornographic glee. And don’t think they ignore any of the stark, Art Deco potential of Miami, where “Dexter,†which premieres tomorrow night at 10 , takes place. This show rivals “Nip/Tuck†in sheer perverse visual wit.
But opening a review of “Dexter†with its graphic thrills might mislead. The sum of this show, based on Jeff Lindsay’s novel “Darkly Dreaming Dexter†and starring Michael C. Hall from “Six Feet Under,†is so much more than its body parts.
On the surface, “Dexter†is a neo-noir with a gruesome central mystery — the “ice-truck murders†— that will stretch across the season’s 12 episodes. Who’s killing hookers and draining them of blood? Then it is also a fascinating character study of Dexter, a man raised by his cop foster father (James Remar ) to channel his violence into taking out society’s trash. And deepest of all, it is an intelligent and sustained exercise in moral irony. Dexter may be an obsessive murderer, but he’s also a hero of sorts.
He’s Hannibal Lecter , but he’s also Clarice Starling .
By day, Dexter helps the Miami police as a CSI expert. By night, he’s stalking killers, gathering proof against them, and lecturing them about their sins before chopping them up. “I have standards,†he screams at a child killer before finishing him off. And he does have standards, which he calls “The Code of Harry†after his father, who taught him to kill only those who’ll kill again. In flashbacks that play like mythology scenes in a superhero comic, we see Harry mentoring young Dexter in murder as if he were teaching him to shave.
By episode two, I’m betting you will not hate Dexter, despite his vigilantism and his slippery personality. And that is one of the many miracles of “Dexter,†as well as of Hall’s grand performance. TV anti-heroes have been popular since Tony Soprano showed us how a two-timing mobster could somehow be an everyman. The fact that Hall makes Dexter likable is even more impressive, since Dexter is so profoundly controlled, with none of Tony’s passion. He can only mimic human warmth — bringing doughnuts to co - workers, courting the mother of two kids — because he is a shell of a man.
Hate him if you will, the show’s makers seem to dare us, but he solves more crimes than the self-serving detectives around him, notably Lieutenant Maria La Guerta (Lauren Velez from “Oz†). On a network procedural such as “CSI: Miami,†the butch Sergeant Doakes (Erik King ) would be the famous closer. On “Dexter,†he’s a cop whose human feeling taints his pursuit of a local gangster-killer. Dexter, meanwhile, doesn’t do feeling.
We get to know Dexter inside out, because we can hear his thoughts in a beautifully stylized, hard-boiled voice-over out of a 1940s movie. “Another beautiful day in Miami,†he says with typically dry humor; “mutilated corpses with a chance of afternoon showers.†It sounds like Hall is talking inside a box, as he intimately shares both the mundanities of Dexter’s days as well as his philosophy. “I’m a neat monster,†he confides. Of his girlfriend (Julie Benz ) he tells us, “Rita’s perfect because she is, in her own way, as damaged as me.â€
Dexter’s self-awareness in these oral thought balloons is seductive — but possibly misleading. He thinks of himself as a master of fakery, a sort of Mr. Ripley who takes on the attributes of those around him so they won’t suspect he’s twisted. But as we watch Dexter clown lovingly with Rita’s kids, or loyally help his cop sister, Debra (Jennifer Carpenter ), get a new job, we have to wonder if he’s an undependable narrator. Maybe he’s not as cold-blooded as he thinks he is?
Hall was remarkable on “Six Feet Under†as David , the stiff-faced brother who struggled throughout the series to express himself. On “Dexter,†he also hides behind a mask, but he is even more transfixing here. David was a masochist; Dexter is a sadist. David was in denial; Dexter is so eager to face reality that nothing scares him.
David tended to already dead bodies; Dexter, alas, is more of a supplier.
