Dexter Season 8 Showrunner Talks Original Ending and Plans for Spin-Off

This article contains spoilers for Showtime’s Dexter and Dexter: New Blood.Showtime’s crime drama Dexter ran for eight seasons from 2006 to 2013, receiving critical acclaim and becoming one of the most popular shows of the decade. However, the later seasons somewhat diminished in quality, leading to a finale that is widely regarded as one of the worst ever.

Dexter revolves around a blood spatter analyst, Dexter Morgan, who lives a mundane life on the surface, but in reality, is a vigilante serial killer with a strict moral code. Michael C. Hall played the titular anti-hero in the show’s original run and recently reprised his role in the revival miniseries Dexter: New Blood. The reason for the continuation of Dexter a decade after it concluded was the controversial finale that left fans seething.

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Dexter’s final season ended on an ambiguous note without a proper resolution. The final episode of the show, “Remember the Monsters,” saw Dexter leave his family behind and disappear in a hurricane (although he was later revealed to be alive and working as a lumberjack). Scott Buck, who served as the showrunner for the last three seasons of Dexter, recently revealed the reason for the open-ended finale, blaming it on Showtime. Talking to Bloody Disgusting, Buck said:

“The one thing I was told I could not do is kill Dexter, because [Showtime] wanted to bring him back. So that meant, at least to me, that I also couldn’t have Dexter get captured. Because if he is, that makes him the most notorious serial killer in the world, and you can’t really do any more future episodes because he’s going to walk down the street and everyone he sees is going to recognize him. So that’s what sort of led to the way the show ended.”

Apparently, Showtime wanted a follow-up where Dexter becomes a doctor. “We ended the show specifically in a way that it could come back, because that had always been the intention. And it was actually the network who pitched to me that Dexter be a doctor,” Buck added.

While Buck agrees that this idea was quite far-fetched, he was on board but wanted Dexter to be a paramedic instead, as that felt more logical, “If killing was his heroin, then holding lives in the balance [as a paramedic] would sort of be his methadone.” While this all sounds intriguing, the reason why a potential Dexter season 9 or spin-off never came to fruition is due to Hall’s adamance about never playing the character again.

“Michael was absolutely done with the show. Part of it, I would have to say, was my inexperience as a showrunner, that I didn’t have lengthy discussions with Michael. If I’d had a better sense of how much he did not want to do Dexter anymore, that would have also informed the ending in a way.”

Dexter: New Blood Marks The End Of Dexter’s Journey

Showtime announced a 10-episode miniseries titled Dexter: New Blood in 2020 with Michael C. Hall and showrunner Clyde Phillips. It continues 10 years after the original finale and sees Dexter’s peaceful exile turned upside down after the arrival of his son Harrison. New Blood premiered last November on Showtime and quickly became the network’s most streamed show ever. The series has received immense praise from fans (at least till the final moments) for the new snowy setting and Hall’s terrific performance.

Unfortunately, New Blood’s climax seems to have again left fans unsatisfied. The final episode ends with Dexter being outed as a serial killer and dying at the hands of his son, who then drives off into the sunset. Most fans say New Blood brought back fan-favorite characters for no reason and introduced sub-plots that went nowhere. Will we get a Harrison spin-off? Or will another revival be necessary to retcon the events of New Blood? Only time will tell.

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Mudit Chhikara
(173 Articles Published)

Mudit Chhikara is a news writer at MovieWeb. He holds a bachelor’s degree in electronics, but being a lifelong cinephile, Mudit decided to write about movies for a living.

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