Dexter - The Complete Fourth Season

Plot Details: This opinion reveals minor details about the movie's plot.

Dexter: The Complete Fourth Season keeps the tradition alive of continuing the motions of providing excellent television to Showtime subscribers (and DVD/Blu-ray absorbers), but also reaching new heights with every new year. I thought that Season Three was my favorite…and then Season Four had to impress me and blow me away with how every single stinking episode had me shaking in my Birkenstocks.

Dexter is good kind of serial killer, if there was such a thing. He’s a forensic guy working in Miami’s homicide department, where he keeps tabs on investigations and assists in disposing of his city’s large amount of waste that will never see justice through judicial means. He kills bad people he has proof have done wrong and to quench his thirst as a sociopath. Two negatives equal a positive, right?

If you have not watched the show or have not reached this point in the series, you will see some unavoidable SPOILER talk. Be warned.

After last season’s craziness what with his girlfriend, Rita, getting pregnant and subsequently the ensuing marriage around Dexter’s team-up with Miami’s District Attorney who just so happened to be a crazy dude in his own right, Dexter has become a family man. He’s moved in with Rita and his son Harrison is a beautiful baby boy, but Dex is finding it harder to escape for his own needs—especially when a neighborhood watch program is started after some vandal activities.

What’s worse is that a new killer is on the loose. Coined the Trinity Killer, his pattern involves three killings per cycle all done in different ways—a young woman bled out in a bathtub, a mother falling to her death, and a father beaten to death. Frank Lundy returns to Miami of his own accord hoping to finally solve this case, which he has been working on for years, and hoping to rekindle his relationship with Dex’s sister, Deb, who’s currently with Anton from last season.

The real bulk of the show is Dexter finding out who the Trinity Killer is outside of his police department, and seeking him out to kill him like he does best, but after a major plot point is revealed he decides to get to know him and learn from him under an alias. Nothing is so easy, however, and he becomes embroiled in a major conflict.

I genuinely enjoyed the heights the writing staff embraced this season such as Dexter’s new life as a father and husband, and him getting to grips with these responsibilities and feelings. In particular, the fourth episode entitled “Dex Takes a Holiday” is one of the best offerings of the entire series—perhaps one of the best hours of television. Dex is tracking down a police officer who may or may not have killed her entire family to escape them, and with his own family out of town, he has free reign to do what he needs to do. This episode was gripping, perfectly written, intense, and featured something crazy happening to most of the central cast.

A lot of the other characters are left out to breathe in the wind, which I really enjoyed. Quinn, who is Deb’s partner, has a relationship with a reporter who keeps spilling details he’s given to her in private, and who may cost him his job. Deb is still pursuing her father’s old mistresses after her conversation with Dex last season, and this is a major plot point that will be a huge deal in Season Five it looks like.

The only real thing I didn’t like about this season was how (again SPOILER ALERT) Batista and LaGuerta were together. It created a minor distraction from the main plot to have Dex’s superiors entangled in a romance that threatened their careers, but it was not realistic whatsoever. Both actors have great chemistry, but they ditched Batista’s love interest from last season with little regard, and forced these two together with bad results.

As awesome as this season is, I would have to say it all falls on the shoulders of John Lithgow who plays the Trinity Killer. Going in I was not too excited because Lithgow has never really been in anything I’ve been impressed by, but he absolutely blew me away her. He’s not just creepy, he’s terrifying. I can’t even begin to tell you what heights he meets here. He’s calculating, he’s erratic, and he’s volatile. Everything about his performance is subtle, and these little things make him powerful as a menace to mirror Dexter.

I was addicted to this season. All four discs went by quick because my girlfriend and I were unanimous with the Uno Mas rule—our self-described way to watch just one more and then we’ll do something else. Well, we watched this all in a day. Each episode ends with a reason for you to continue. I have no idea how folks watched this weekly—it’s too good of a show. The special features of this season are weak, as to be expected, with more Showtime fan service with a few episodes of Californication and The United States of Tara, which is disappointing, but good thing the show is strong on its own and warrants the purchase.

Anyone who has enjoyed the show from the beginning will really dig the callbacks to previous seasons here as well as the gravity of the situations that are introduced here. Some disturbing stuff is hard to shake off even after I have completed the season and that’s evidence of a good show. Dexter: The Complete Fourth Season is a swell time.

© Jason Haskins, 2013



Dexter: The Complete First Season
Dexter: The Complete Second Season
Dexter: The Complete Third Season

Recommend this product? Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening