Dexter Review: “Monkey in a Box”

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Last week, my review of Dexter was more or less a really long rant about how idiotic this season has been, and how far downhill the show has plunged since the greatness of the first few seasons. It ended with simple resignation that this is not going to end well. I don’t just mean a beloved character or two will die, I mean the quality of the ending of this show is simply going to be abhorrent, as there’s really no saving it now.

No, this week we didn’t get any horrifically terrible moments like Harrison’s treadmill fall, but what we did get was a rather slow episode that in no way felt like a penultimate offering of a series that used to be so epic. Yes, “shit happened” in the last five minutes, but before that the night was just a lazy drift on the river of stupidity the way most of this season has been.

The show is still pretending like Dexter and Hannah have any chance in hell of leaving to go to Argentina for a happy ending, even after Vogel’s death. I figured that if Federal Marshall Dudebro had evidence of Hannah at a hospital with Dexter’s son, they’d be kicking in Deb’s door before Dexter even got home from Vogel’s, but not so. And don’t they have cameras like…everywhere at hospitals? There’s seriously no footage they can check? I find that hard to believe. Though saying “I find that hard to believe” this season is a tremendous waste of breath.

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Officially sad that great “Matthews knows everything” fan theory will never pan out.

Meanwhile, Dexter and Saxon compete for who has the world’s dumbest plan to get the other’s goat. I thought Saxon might turn out to actually be smarter than Dexter, being as bold as he is showing up to work and Dexter’s apartment, but that wasn’t the case at all. Saxon’s first mistake was clearing his apartment out, instantly making him a suspect in Cassie’s case when he was planning to stick around Miami. Second, he came into Miami Metro…why exactly? To unnerve Dexter, but give away his DNA in the process? Again, I thought this was part of some master plan, but the DNA instantly linked him to Vogel’s death. Did he…not understand this would happen?

Dexter’s plan to get at Saxon was just as stupid. Not content letting him be a suspect in two murders, Dexter goes and releases his secret kill cam tapes to the local news, “turning up the heat” on him. This is a man who just threatened to kill everyone you love, and you’re going to piss him off and give him nothing to lose? Obviously if Saxon wanted to really hurt Dexter, he knows that going after Hannah, Deb or his kids would be the best way to get to him. You know, when Dexter is sitting in his house by himself, not in a position to protect any of his loved ones. When Dexter was trying to send Deb away, I was practically screaming at the TV, “He’s probably right f***ing outside waiting to slit her throat!”

But alas, Saxon was EXACTLY as stupid as Dexter needed him to be, and he walked right into the most obvious trap on earth. Turns out there was no plan, he’s really just an idiot who purposefully gave himself away to the public as a murderer, and was outsmarted by Dexter, who has been the world’s dumbest human being this season. Is this guy really going to be Dexter’s final Big Bad?

The idiocy doesn’t end there. Dexter captures Oliver in his kill room, then decides that now is the time get the dark passenger monkey off his back. That’s all well and good and very nice character progression, but Saxon could tell the authorities absolutely everything about him. Granted, that isn’t what happens, as Saxon escapes because Dex and Deb want to say a private goodbye. Seriously, even if Marshall Dudebro HADN’T showed up, you would NEVER leave a guy like that unattended for ANY reason.

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“As my final goodbye gift, I leave you with an unattended serial killer, who surely won’t escape as we’re talking.”

We end the episode with Deb shot in the abdomen, meaning she won’t die, and Elway breathing down Hannah’s neck at the airport where surprise, she still hasn’t bothered to assemble anything remotely like a disguise, because who looks for a wanted fugitive at the airport?

Almost no moments on this show aren’t stupid now. It’s official that Quinn, Masuka, Batista and Matthews are all nothing more than scenery and won’t contribute to the central plot in a meaningful way for about the fourth season in a row. The Deb/Dexter love story evaporated (which never should have happen, but you can’t just forget about it). And lastly, Dexter finally learned that he’s actually a human being who loves people, which we all figured out about four seasons ago.

God, what a horrible end to this series. Dexter kept surprising me all the way through season five (yes, I liked Lumen and Jordan Chase) by delivering such a high quality show year after year. The last three seasons have simply been abysmal, and I find myself dreading this final episode which will be the final nail in the coffin of the show’s decline. I’ve never seen a show flip a quality switch like this. It’s literally day and night. And I just want this night to end.

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5 Comments

  1. Damn Bro, I thought my comments on this show was depressing but I feel like you need a hug after reading this. I’m comforting myself that my DEXTER-ity review and the podcast we’ll hopefully do once this travesty is over will give us some much needed closure as we put the rabid dog that is Dexter to sleep. And in the end, we can still say AT LEAST WE HAVE “HANNIBAL”!

  2. Its just a shame that what once was a great show goes out like this. Very few shows go out on top though. Having Breaking Bad on the same night delivering amazing television doesnt help either.

  3. Its sad really. It almost seems like they don’t give a sh!t for this last season and just wrote the whole cr@ppy plot in one day.

    Hanna not changing her appearance is just sloppy and stupid. Get a tan, cut and dye your hair and you’ll look totally different! UG!

    Terrible casting on the federal marshal (seriously, I love you’re “Dudebro” description of him – perfect)… And I’ve always felt they have done a good job of casting people who are believable as cops.

    Adding in Masuka’s daughter adds nothing except some nice boobs once.

    Uggggggg… Such a sad way to end the show (and this is coming from someone who actually enjoyed last season!).

  4. I’m sad that the show has devolved into this. To think that there was so much potential for it to go out with a bang.

    I might just stop watching. I don’t care how it ends anymore. Such a waste.

  5. Dexter who barely kills anymore, (right? can’t really remember. probably because it’s the now standard quick knife and out) because he has all those feelings and he’s so human and this and that, just couldn’t leave Miami with Hannah.

    No, he kept telling over and over that he HAS to kill Saxon. And when he finally gets him (btw before Vogel died he told us that the only way he could find him was through Vogel thus setting that meeting which led to her death. Now that Vogel was no more he magically found him through a little digging on his computer… are you kidding us?) THEN he just let’s him go.

    It’s like all those killers are his fn psychiatrists and only then in the kill room he is able to think about how he feels. The F?

    So all this mess can be traced back to Clyde Phillips leaving the show? It did went downhill after season 4 when he left. Couldn’t just skype with the guy or something.. anything to save what they could..

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