Guest Starring:
Tasia Sherel as Francis
Maria Doyle Kennedy as Sonya
April Lee Hernandez as Officer Cira Manzon
with
Peter Weller as Stan Liddy
with
Peter Weller as Stan Liddy
and
Julia Stiles as Lumen Pierce
After four relatively slow weeks, the newest episode of Dexter took the action and suspense up a notch this week. After gaining Lumen's trust in 5.4, Dexter spent a majority of this episode attempting to convince Lumen to do what he couldn't - move on. But will she be able to just leave Miami after all the terrible things that happened to her?
I'll get back to that in just a moment.
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Dexter attempting to convince Lumen to go home. Image copyright of Showtime. |
Looking at the episode as a whole, four significant plot points were developed over the fifty minute run. First off the bat, i'd like to address Debra and Cira's story arc. The two of them made a grisly discovery during the episode when they went to visit the home of two suspected Santa Muerte victims, after visiting the injured man from the previous episode. Instead of being greeted by an elderly couple, they were instead greeted with two grotesquely deceased corpses, filled with maggots. Unfortunately, aside from forensics looking at the bodies and investigating the house for clues (which also cued Dexter's return to work), not much else took place in this particular story arc, save for Debra discovering that the suspected Santa Muerte tattoo was in fact a nightclub stamp for a local club in the neighbourhood. Hopefully next week's episode will elaborate more on the cult killer storyline, as it was just starting to get interesting.
Secondly, Batista and LaGuerta's storyline improved slightly from the last few weeks, namely with Batista's subtle investigation into LaGuerta's 'activities' with Internal Affairs. After finding out about LaGuerta and the IA agent's meeting place, Batista promptly busts up the party by bursting through the door, ready to punch out the IA agent, before LaGuerta promptly stops him. Turns out, that LaGuerta had been assisting the IA agent in an undercover sting - a sting which ended up costing a narcotics officer his job. Unfortunately, that was the brunt of the story arc for them - a decent, but still unimpressive storyline for the characters.
Speaking of brief storylines, Quinn's was even more brief - the only significant scene Quinn was in was when he was having drinks with the same narcotics officer who had been fired in the undercover sting earlier. Quinn asked the man if he was interested in making some money in exchange for investigating a certain individual - Dexter Morgan. The officer promptly agreed and that was that. Seems like Dexter better watch his back.
Now, onto the main story arc of the episode.
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Lumen disguises herself as she prepares to shoot one of the men who raped her. Image copyright of Showtime. |
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Dexter takes Lumen to the airport and tells her to try and move on. Image copyright of Showtime. |
Looks like Lumen is here to stay .... for now.
Overall, my marks for the episode are:
- Potency of the theme(s) identified in the episode: *******
- Editing & Scenes of Relevance: *********
- Main characters connection with audience/actors effectiveness in role: *******
- Secondary characters connection with audience/actors effectiveness in role: ******
- Music & Visual Effects: *********
- Originality and appeal of the episode's narrative: *******
- Integration and effectiveness of multiple story arcs and character relationships: ******
Overall marks: 51 / 70
Grade Percentage: 73%
All in all, this week's episode of Dexter was good. However, due to the major focus on Dexter and Lumen's relationship and respective storylines, the secondary character's unfortunately suffered due to lack of screen time/poorly developed story arcs. This is particularly true for both Quinn and Batista/LaGuerta's storylines, and even with the Santa Muerte case to a certain extent. Hopefully next week's episode will provide some more focus on secondary storylines as well as the main storyline.
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