Review: Dexter: Resurrection, "Backseat Driver" | Season 1, Episode 3

I’ve been thinking a lot about why this reboot of Dexter is succeeding in ways that New Blood could never quite nail (and Original Sin couldn’t even get close to). Obviously, yes, having Michael C. Hall back in action as Dexter, not having to hide his identity or pretend to be someone else, is helping quite a bit. But I genuinely think the throat-clearing of the first episode, with a little more hindsight, is turning out to be the best thing the show could’ve done. A little confrontation with his demons—and then the exorcising of his guilt—was just the creative reset this series required to shake off the burdens of its past, and instead embrace the lighter tendencies of the character and lore.

Because this show is having fun. It’s not weighing itself down with morose reflections on his past (New Blood’s biggest achilles heel) or getting tangled up in burdensome backstory. Dexter shook off his cobwebs, traveled to New York to help Harrison, and immediately realized he could have some laughs taking down bad people in the big city. His sense of élan transfers well to the audience, who—if they’re anything like me—are relieved to be free of downbeat plotlines and attempts to service the past. And it has remembered the season-long structures that the previous version benefited so well from embracing: A fairly lighthearted Dexter in the early going, bumping off baddies and trying to protect his family, before a larger mystery/threat takes over and drives the rest of the season with increasing freneticism and tension. It remains to be seen if the “dinner party for serial killers” plot introduced in “Backseat Driver” can pull off the back half, but it’s certainly crushing the early going.