Dexter: Resurrection

SPOILER ALERT: This article contains major spoilers from the first two episodes of Dexter: Resurrection. If you haven’t watched them yet and want to go in clean, stop here. Seriously. You’ve been warned.

Dexter: Resurrection

The series picks up ten weeks after Dexter’s supposed death at the hands of his son Harrison at the end of New Blood. Turns out, that wasn’t the end. A botched shot, the frigid cold, and the kind of network logic we’ve come to expect brings Dexter back. Alive, broken, and in a hospital bed in upstate New York.

It’s a choice, but one that feels surprisingly honest. There’s no grandeur in his survival. Just a stitched up torso, a hollow stare, and a bunch of ghosts. Trinity. Doakes. Harry. Miguel Prado. They appear in his mind, while in a coma. Judging, mocking, haunting. It feels like a reminder that Dexter didn’t just disappear, he left a crater behind and the show wants you to revisit that before starting a new arc.

Harrison’s Descent Isn’t a Mystery, It’s a Mirror

While Dexter is stumbling back to life, Harrison is already spiraling. He’s in New York, working at a hotel, trying to pass for normal. He fails.

By the end of the first episode, Harrison’s killed a man. A rapist in an elevator and covered it up with enough skill that is reminiscent of Dexter’s kills, but not enough to be careful. It’s not justice. It’s instinct. And the cleanup? Not perfect. Sloppy enough to raise suspicion.

It’s Harrison’s act, not Dexter’s, that lights the fuse. NYPD detectives start unraveling the scene, tracking footage, piecing together something that doesn’t add up. That tension, watching Dexter realize that Harrison is becoming what he used to be, is where the show finds its pulse. The Dark Passenger isn’t haunting Dexter anymore. It’s driving Harrison.

Blood and Brutality Are Back, and Then Some

One of the most immediately noticeable shifts in Resurrection is its return to graphic violence, but with a new edge. The kills are more visceral, bloodier, and grimmer than most of the original run. Where earlier seasons sometimes flirted with camera precision, these scenes are raw, messy, and kind of just brutal. The show doesn’t shy away from the blood and there’s a weight to the gore that feels more grounded and less glamorized.

This ramped-up gore isn’t just for shock. It feels like a reflection of the emotional and psychological unraveling of both Dexter and Harrison. Violence isn’t a ritual or game here, it feels desperate, panicked, and chaotic. The imagery amplifies the sense that the characters are losing control, and I really liked that.

Angela Letting Dexter Off the Hook Feels Cheap

One of the more glaring missteps in my opinion, is in the first episode. How Resurrection tries to smooth over Dexter’s very obvious brush with the law. During the finale of New Blood, Dexter’s girlfriend and Police Chief of Iron Lake, Angela Bishop, put the pieces together and realized Dexter was the Bay Harbor Butcher. Even arresting him before he escaped and was subsequently shot by Harrison. But in the first episode of Resurrection, when Dexter wakes in his hospital bed, he receives a post card from Angela, stating that they are even. Insinuating that she doesn’t intend to follow through with her arrest and instead, will keep his secret. Her choice feels less like a believable character moment and more like a convenient plot shortcut, an easy way to keep Dexter one step ahead without earning it. In a show otherwise invested in consequences and reckoning, this undercuts the tension in a way that feels cheap. It leaves me wondering why the law always seems to bend whenever Dexter is involved.

Two Episodes In: Where Are We Headed?

Don’t expect a return to the old rhythm. There’s no “code,” no ritual, no kill-of-the-week. What Resurrection is building toward isn’t structure, it’s collapse. A father chasing a son not to stop him, but maybe to understand what he created. A boy mimicking patterns he doesn’t understand. A legacy Dexter never meant to leave, now taking shape in front of him.

Bottom Line:

As a long time fan of the original Dexter series, even I was skeptical of the revamp. He was dead. We were done, but this feels different. This isn’t a redemption arc. It’s aftermath. And it might be exactly what the story needs for its final ending. Or maybe just the end of Dexter, and the start of Harrison.