Dexter Review: "If I Had A Hammer"

This episode was great. Out of all the possible directions the writers could have taken once Dexter discovered that Trinity had a family, they decided to take the road less traveled.

In true Dexter fashion, Dex watches Trinity to learn as much as he can from a distance and in doing so Dex learns that Trinity’s man behind the mask is vastly different from Dexter’s.  Trinity, or should I say Arthur Mitchell, winds up being the perfect family man, not to mention deacon and humanitarian. The most horrible part of it, or the most amazing part if you are Dexter, is that Mitchell isn’t faking his feelings and his life isn’t a cover.  The more Dex works his way into Mitchell’s life, the more he realizes that he could learn a lot from this ‘monster.’

Meanwhile Rita whines some more about Dexter’s secrets and forces him to go to a couples therapy session, which he attends awkwardly and fails miserably at. In a futile attempt to appease her, Dex buys Rita a bread maker because “we’re always out of bread.” Rita snaps back with a “We’re always running out of milk, too. Did you get me a cow, too?”  Nice one Dex.

So Dex needs some help with his family life, who does he turn to for advice? None other than Trinity/Arthur Mitchell! Having learned of Trinity’s scarred family past and the incidents leading to the birth of his monster, Dex probes Mitchell about his past while at the same time gleaning whatever family advice he can. Dexter’s big epiphany of the episode comes when he asks Mitchell how he came to terms with his past to save his family, to which Mitchell replied “My family saved me.” The realization that he could hide in plain sight by not giving his family a reason to suspect him gives Dexter the courage to open up a little to Rita about needing some private space.  Being the wonderful woman she is, Rita accepts Dexter’s needs with open arms and together they move some of Dexter’s things, including a certain chest full of killing tools, into a shed in the back yard… The Dark Passenger’s new man cave.

Meanwhile Debra is upset when she finds herself boxed out of her own case.  She tries to convince herself that the Vacation Murderers shot her and contemplates lying in order to bring them to justice, but she realizes that this would risk both her career and integrity as well as be in clear violation of any morals and ethics she has.

The Angel and LaGuerta romance seems to have reached its peak, with Angel being transferred after the Captain found out about their situation.  LaGuerta tries to turn the tables and take the bullet for Angel, knowing how much he loves homicide, but they wind up finding a better solution.  They tell the Captain that their relationship is over and they both want to stay in homicide, which he allows after warning them that there will be consequences if this is a lie.  It is unclear as to what they want to do from here, but then again I must say I really don’t care.

I must say that overall this has been a relatively slow season up until this point, with several plotlines I could live without and not nearly enough of a body count for Dexter, but this episode took the season and pointed it in an interesting direction. I look forward to the remaining episodes.  Tune in next week!