Dexter 5x03

Dexter is dealing with an immense sense of grief and guilt over the loss of Rita. But there is more important business at hand. Dex and Deb are drilling candidates for a nanny position to look after Prince Harry (baby Harrison). Obviously they are going for the Irish woman, Sonya, with a nursing degree (Maria Doyle Kennedy). Dex’ crisis counselor tells him that Harrison will be fine – he’s too young to have processed what happened to Rita – and advices Dex to release his energy by doing something for himself. So he chats up Boyd Fowler, the sick serial killer he happened to stumble upon, introducing himself as “Daryl Tucker.” Before you know it Boyd offers him to ride along on his “dead animal pickup” job. He already prepares his kill-room. But, yikes, when Dexter wants to take Boyd out with his usual injection, Boyd accidentally shoots him with his tranquilizer gun before falling to the ground. They both come to in an ambulance and pretend it was an accident – only to get out of the hospital as fast as they can. Now they are after one another! Dex is ahead of the game and has already prepared a make-shift kill room in Boyd’s basement. But after he performs his ritual, he discovers a feral looking woman (Julia Stiles) trapped in the basement, who saw it all!

There is much tension at Miami Homicide. Det. Quinn received composite sketches of “Kyle Butler” which the Mitchells provided the FBI. None of the drawings looks the same, but Quinn’s smart enough to piece elements together. In one of his tries puzzling facial features together from different drawings, Vince Mazuka quips it looks like Justin Bieber. Quinn calls the FBI requesting a meeting with the Mitchells. He tells them he has a hunch, but it may cost him his job if he’s wrong. For his part, Quinn is also still unsure how to handle Deb after their “little indiscretion” on the kitchen floor in Dexter’s old home. Even though she is crashing on his couch to give Dex some space, Deb brushes him off with her usual impatience. Sgt. Batista is under investigation for assaulting a fellow officer who bad-mouthed his wife Lt. LaGuerta. Meanwhile Miami Homicide is looking into the Santa Muerte machete murder. Quinn just opts for the easy solution: husband killed wife, then shot himself. Deb believes there is more to it, especially because of all the religious attributes. Her Spanish is so poor, she pronounces it “Santa Mierda.” Reluctantly she teams up with Cira, the local Hispanic police officer who lived all her life in the Venezuelan neighborhood where the woman’s decapitated head was found. She brings in a clue from a man selling Santa Muerta objects. But when they check back up on him, they find him lying dead on the ground, his head decapitated, with the eyes and tongue cut out and the mouth cut open, just like the woman’s head.

Clearly, the audience was thrown off purposefully several times already – and it’s only the third episode of the season! Angel Batista’s bar fight became much more significant after the assaulted officer suffers internal bleeding and files for an internal investigation. Cira is clearly going to be an important asset solving the machete murders. (Incidentally, the actress April Hernández went to Hunter College.) Here we were thinking the Boyd Fowler plot was going to last several episodes – and now he’s dead already. As a pay off, Dex is faced with Boyd’s last would-be victim – and since it’s Julia Stiles, that’s sure to become an interesting story arc. And what to make of the “practically perfect” nanny Sonya? Is she too good to be true? Then we have Quinn, is he going to become the next Sgt. Doakes trying to out Dexter? The heat is definitely on!