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Dexter Review: “Do The Wrong Thing” (Season 7, Episode 6)

Harry, Dexter's adoptive father, may be long dead and now nothing more than a mental projection of Dexter's super-ego, but that doesn't stop me feeling sorry for him in "Do the Wrong Thing."

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Did I expect Dexter to strip down with unparalleled speed and take her right there on that table? In a sense, I did, yet I hoped so desperately that it wouldn’t happen and groaned as it did. It seemed to me too obvious, in addition to too nail-on-the-head an act. Dexter goes from being about to kill her to having what is known in some circles as la petite mort, “the little death,” also known as an orgasm.

Sex and death, linked on this show from the very beginning, now come together (pun intended) in what is easily the most blatant fashion so far in the series. Watching it, I wanted to see something happen akin to that scene in the trailer for Woody Allen’s To Rome with Love where Alec Baldwin’s character is giving running commentary on the two about to have sex on the couch in front of him. Replace Baldwin with Harry and you could’ve had the makings of some great comedy.

It would’ve at least given the moment the levity, the breathing space that I feel it so desperately needed. As is, I felt like the writers were beating me over the head with things.

Still, that beats being able to predict every last one of the episode’s major plot-points. Quinn was always going to take the money and do as he’s told because he’s a “dirty cop” and a moron. It was also clear Nadia’s safety was either a hollow promise or that it wouldn’t come the way he wanted. With her not picking up or returning any of his calls, it’s either one or the other.

Deb getting with the writer was also a foregone conclusion once he expressed interest in both her, as a date, and Hannah, as a suspect, to Dexter. Moreover, one knew Dexter “fudging the report” on the bodies they dug up, an act that made bafflingly little sense (that act was really going to make her confess to murdering her husband when her immunity makes any incriminating evidence against her meaningless?), would come back to him in some way as it does thanks to that writer and his personal analysts.

Likewise, one knew his careless dealings with Hannah would work against him as well, as it looks like they will in next week’s episode. It’s like Dexter doesn’t even think things through anymore. He tells Harry he has to kill someone because he has so many people bearing down on him, a statement which makes no sense since that should make murder inadvisable. He suggests Deb go out with the writer, the same one who could incriminate him for fudging that report. He has sex with Hannah, a woman prepared to kill anyone who gets in her way. If he’d only have listened to Harry, all this trouble wouldn’t be about to come crashing down on him.

That being said, he’s not the only idiot on the show. As I mentioned already, Quinn’s stupidity knows no bounds. It’s absurd to think that it took Nadia telling him to give the money back to actually go ahead and do it. Because of these men, one of his own is dead along with multiple other people, yet the pull of a large sum of cash is enough for him to forget all that and aid them in covering everything up?

On top of that, with such a high-profile case, there’s no way he gets away with his tampering of the evidence. Someone will notice the blood missing, probably in the next episode, see his name on the sign-in sheet, and put it together. Thanks to his involvement with the stripper from that club, it wouldn’t take long for him to come under suspicion.

Knowing this, his actions are absolutely confounding. Some may say he only wanted to protect and provide for Nadia. To them I repeat what I said before: given who he was dealing with, the promise he was given was sure to be broken in some way and he should’ve realized that.

That being said, the writers needed a way to get Sirko out and this was the easiest way. I just hope this temporary lapse in judgment on Quinn’s part makes for some riveting television in weeks to come thanks to Sirko about to be in play once more.

Bits and Bobs:

  • Outside of one discussion near the end of the episode, the conflict between Dexter and Deb was more or less entirely absent from this episode. Seeing as that’s been the driving force of the season for me thus far, it’s no wonder I was so disappointed.
  • Can Batista just retire already so we won’t be subjected to anymore of his bothersomely dull storylines?