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seriousficThis is one of those cases, a bit like Jaws, where the media adaptation is clearly better than the book. Don't get me wrong, the book does have a very clever voice for Dexter, so it's very easy to see why someone thought it would make a good TV series, but the show... in addition to the standard perks of having actual humans performing the parts, cinematography, and other such advantages movies have on books (sorry, books, it's true. But hey, at least books can't have Paris Hilton star in them), the TV series has more time to unpack the plot, which DDD rushes through at a somewhat unbelievable pace. There's a lot of cases of Dexter "just knowing" things, while in the series, this is the result of an ongoing dialogue between Dexter and the Ice Truck Killer.
As I was watching the show Dexter, and coming to the final plot twist, I thought "on paper, this is completely stupid, but they're pulling it off!" Well, as it turns out, on actual paper... it is completely stupid.
To wit, in both versions, Dexter is adopted by Harry Morgan, separating him from his older brother. Both of them witness their mother being killed, which turns them both into serial killers (see what I mean?). In the TV show, Rudy tracks down Dexter and begins toying with him in an effort to awaken his memories, to the point of seducing Dexter's sister before kidnapping her. In the book, it's sort of the same thing, but without Rudy and Dexter getting to know each other before the reveal. So Dexter's long-lost evil twin (okay, the book says they're "Irish twins," born a year apart, but Book!Rudy looks almost identical to Dexter, so I'm calling it) just comes out of nowhere. Pulling on that plot thread was just about the smartest thing the showrunners could've done, as the last few episodes of Deb in danger, coupled with Dexter uncovering his past, made for some of the most legitimately gripping TV I've ever seen. You know, "screw work in the morning, give me more Dexter, streaming Netflix website!"
There's some other little things. In the book, both of Dexter's kills are pedophiles, while in the pilot, one of them is a pedophile and the other is a rapist. I guess they didn't want to give the impression that the show would be all child rape, all the time, although the book's climax of Dexter remembering his own traumatic childhood does give it a thematic resonance. No wonder Dexter is so protective of kids...
Also, in both versions LaGuerta is more of a politician than a detective, but Book!LaGuerta is much more of a dumbass and, uh, also kind of a tramp? She also gets Doakes' "surprise, motherfucker!" confrontation with Dex in the season finale and actually gets killed in a confrontation with Dexter and Rudy (Brian in the book). Deb is also conscious during that confrontation to hear Dexter and Rudy argue about serial killing, which is tidied up with Dexter being "sure Deb will forgive him" and then plotting to kill a suspicious Doakes, or at least defend himself lethally. Brian also gets away at the end, which might've worked on TV, but probably would've led to him being the kind of ridiculously overexposed threat that Sylar has become on Heroes.
Of course, the TV guys did invent some plots wholesale, such as Sam Witwer showing up and then turning out to be a serial killer wannabe, which is endlessly lolarious. New rule: Any character Sam Witwer plays is secretly a serial killer. Also, the plot where Rita's abusive rapist husband gets out of jail wasn't in the book. I can understand that... it's really too dramatic territory to just let it lie as backstory... but that plot ended up being so tiresome that I can't believe they basically expanded it into the season two Big Bad. While Dexter being a willing cop-killer as in the book (?) would definitely make him too sympathetic, the flipside that Harry's Code (that is to say, the code a vigilante cop came up with) would say you can only go after murderers, but have to wring your hands if it's just a pedophile or a wife-beater, doesn't ring true to me or the characters. In its own way, it's just as ridiculously arbitrary as Batman's no-kill rule (which sounds like a good idea, until you get to things like Joker getting shot by the father of the four kids he murdered and Batman giving him mouth-to-mouth).
And the show never really explains why Dexter can't just kill Paul until the last episode of the arc, leading to lots of "dude, come on!" and annoying scenes where Paul and the woman he raped and beat have lots of chats alone, in private, with Rita saying things seemingly designed to make Paul fly into a rage. Yeah, that's smart. Trust the self-control of the wifebeater. Don't talk to him over the phone or in a public place, be alone with the rapist.
It's the one real failure of the first season, to me, and comes off like they just tossed it in without any real thought, just "hey, wouldn't it be interesting if we..." I can see why they would want to give Rita her own storyline, since she was almost a non-entity in the book, but since the whole thing ends up with Dexter swooping in and saving the day anyway, you wonder why they bothered. They could've at least mixed it up and had Deb step in.
The series does make a very interesting choice early on, no doubt helped by it being twelve episodes long instead of the traditional twenty-one, which is that instead of being a procedural with a victim-of-the-week for Dexter to slash (something that would quickly grow old-hat due to Dexter's ritualistic, though dialogue-heavy, killing), it's more of a dark comedy focusing on the contrast between Dexter's charisma and his sociopathy. Sometimes the balance works, sometimes it doesn't, but I find that the more the show plays with concepts that could only happen to a serial killer (or forcing a serial killer into day-to-day life and then letting us hear his thoughts on the matter), the better it works. Also, since the entire season is one long meta-arc, you have to judge it almost based on the destination rather than the journey. Unfortunately, the second season pretty much craps out on both fronts, with an annoying build-up to a trite and lame pay-off. But I'll get to that later...
As I was watching the show Dexter, and coming to the final plot twist, I thought "on paper, this is completely stupid, but they're pulling it off!" Well, as it turns out, on actual paper... it is completely stupid.
To wit, in both versions, Dexter is adopted by Harry Morgan, separating him from his older brother. Both of them witness their mother being killed, which turns them both into serial killers (see what I mean?). In the TV show, Rudy tracks down Dexter and begins toying with him in an effort to awaken his memories, to the point of seducing Dexter's sister before kidnapping her. In the book, it's sort of the same thing, but without Rudy and Dexter getting to know each other before the reveal. So Dexter's long-lost evil twin (okay, the book says they're "Irish twins," born a year apart, but Book!Rudy looks almost identical to Dexter, so I'm calling it) just comes out of nowhere. Pulling on that plot thread was just about the smartest thing the showrunners could've done, as the last few episodes of Deb in danger, coupled with Dexter uncovering his past, made for some of the most legitimately gripping TV I've ever seen. You know, "screw work in the morning, give me more Dexter, streaming Netflix website!"
There's some other little things. In the book, both of Dexter's kills are pedophiles, while in the pilot, one of them is a pedophile and the other is a rapist. I guess they didn't want to give the impression that the show would be all child rape, all the time, although the book's climax of Dexter remembering his own traumatic childhood does give it a thematic resonance. No wonder Dexter is so protective of kids...
Also, in both versions LaGuerta is more of a politician than a detective, but Book!LaGuerta is much more of a dumbass and, uh, also kind of a tramp? She also gets Doakes' "surprise, motherfucker!" confrontation with Dex in the season finale and actually gets killed in a confrontation with Dexter and Rudy (Brian in the book). Deb is also conscious during that confrontation to hear Dexter and Rudy argue about serial killing, which is tidied up with Dexter being "sure Deb will forgive him" and then plotting to kill a suspicious Doakes, or at least defend himself lethally. Brian also gets away at the end, which might've worked on TV, but probably would've led to him being the kind of ridiculously overexposed threat that Sylar has become on Heroes.
Of course, the TV guys did invent some plots wholesale, such as Sam Witwer showing up and then turning out to be a serial killer wannabe, which is endlessly lolarious. New rule: Any character Sam Witwer plays is secretly a serial killer. Also, the plot where Rita's abusive rapist husband gets out of jail wasn't in the book. I can understand that... it's really too dramatic territory to just let it lie as backstory... but that plot ended up being so tiresome that I can't believe they basically expanded it into the season two Big Bad. While Dexter being a willing cop-killer as in the book (?) would definitely make him too sympathetic, the flipside that Harry's Code (that is to say, the code a vigilante cop came up with) would say you can only go after murderers, but have to wring your hands if it's just a pedophile or a wife-beater, doesn't ring true to me or the characters. In its own way, it's just as ridiculously arbitrary as Batman's no-kill rule (which sounds like a good idea, until you get to things like Joker getting shot by the father of the four kids he murdered and Batman giving him mouth-to-mouth).
And the show never really explains why Dexter can't just kill Paul until the last episode of the arc, leading to lots of "dude, come on!" and annoying scenes where Paul and the woman he raped and beat have lots of chats alone, in private, with Rita saying things seemingly designed to make Paul fly into a rage. Yeah, that's smart. Trust the self-control of the wifebeater. Don't talk to him over the phone or in a public place, be alone with the rapist.
It's the one real failure of the first season, to me, and comes off like they just tossed it in without any real thought, just "hey, wouldn't it be interesting if we..." I can see why they would want to give Rita her own storyline, since she was almost a non-entity in the book, but since the whole thing ends up with Dexter swooping in and saving the day anyway, you wonder why they bothered. They could've at least mixed it up and had Deb step in.
The series does make a very interesting choice early on, no doubt helped by it being twelve episodes long instead of the traditional twenty-one, which is that instead of being a procedural with a victim-of-the-week for Dexter to slash (something that would quickly grow old-hat due to Dexter's ritualistic, though dialogue-heavy, killing), it's more of a dark comedy focusing on the contrast between Dexter's charisma and his sociopathy. Sometimes the balance works, sometimes it doesn't, but I find that the more the show plays with concepts that could only happen to a serial killer (or forcing a serial killer into day-to-day life and then letting us hear his thoughts on the matter), the better it works. Also, since the entire season is one long meta-arc, you have to judge it almost based on the destination rather than the journey. Unfortunately, the second season pretty much craps out on both fronts, with an annoying build-up to a trite and lame pay-off. But I'll get to that later...
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Dexter Review
Date: 2009-11-02 09:03 am (UTC)Just checking in. BTW I like your site/fanficky stuff (I say as I sip whiskey). Anyway I was interested in your take on DDD/Dexter Season One (Having seen all three seasons...waiting for the fourth to come on DVD next year. Love you, John Lithgow!).
A point of clarification: In the book/series, Rudy is Brian Moser's "cover" (for lack of a term). But I find it interesting that you think Jeff Lindsay shouldn't done more w/ background (Both Brian's and Rita's). It probably has to do with book length--the agency or his publisher or whatever probably told him he had to write a certain amount of pages, and only a certain amount. The big thing now is slim, glib books now--for summer vacays and the like. The days of the 500+ book are over, which suggests to me either us Real Americans have gotten dumber or the industry is cynical and thinks we can't read more than See Spot Run. But anyway...
As far as Rita/Paul, I think the book is probably more realistic about that point than the show. Really, a battered/sexually abused wife is all of a sudden going to trust some Strange New Guy over the devil she already knows? I think that's where the show probably errs (that and the Miyagi character in Season 3, but if I were to go any further I'd be giving you spoilers).
I think you'll like Season 2 (and the other Lindsay novels) better. Also, Deb is not as much of a Damsel in Distress as you might think.
Well, enough of my soapbox. Keep on writing! And never meet a stranger (unless he has a weird prosthetic fetish...)
The Emperor's Assistant/Slave