I thought the season started slow, but ah, then it got complicated again. LOVED IT. Now peeved as hell I have to wait before I can break off an hour lunch with my fave seraial killer. Hall does an ace job.

Yep, I liked this season a lot more than Season 2 as well (though I haven't yet seen the season finale -- I'm saving it for Friday night!); the whole Miguel conflict was just infinitely more interesting than the godawful Lila plot last season. Plus Jimmy Smits, for all his scenery-chewing, was clearly having one hell of a time. The chemistry between Smits and Hall as burgeoning friends/fellow sociopaths/sworn enemies was great.

This season was also notable for the fact that the Deborah character was incrementally less annoying (though I still think whatsherface who plays Deb is an atrocious actress; I mean, just flat-out AWFUL). Is it me, or does she seem to be playing Deb as if she's A) a teenager; B) mildly learning disabled; and C) has had some sort of stroke that has left her face partially paralyzed? Though I blame the writers for a lot of why most Deb scenes are fair-to-partly unwatchable.

Yup, learned to love the show. I did find that I had to watch the first episode of Season One about 4-5 times before I got through it, for some reason. That also happened to me with The Wire too, oddly.

Once I got into it, though, I sure did come to like it a lot. I don't think I liked any of the seasons more than another. Season two did provide one of my favourite lines ever, Deb describing Lila as an "English Titty Vampire".

I noticed Deb was a lot more subdued this season as well...I remember hearing that they were going to air Dexter on "regular" cable up here in Canada, and thought they'd have to cut Deb right out...nothing that she said was air-able even with our relaxed ideas about sweating up here! Scody, you are totally right though...definitely an adolescent vibe coming off Deb.

Oh yeah. Hell yeah. What all y'all said, plus that the opening credits are the best damn opening credits evar.

Oh richat, you Canadians are so relaxed with the sweating!

I want to hear more about these "relaxed ideas about sweating". Damn, mudpuppie beat me.

My favorite show. As for Deb, my reactions have changed a lot. Season 1, I hated Deb. IIRC, she mostly whined in Season 1. Then, all of a sudden in Season 2, Deb was actually pretty damn funny. They made her so profane, she stole the show for me several times. Season 3: Now I like her. She sealed the deal for me when Dexter told her Rita is pregnant, and Deb responded: "A baby? a motherfucking, rolly-poly, chubby-cheeked shit machine? Are you kidding me?" Perfect.

I'm sooo hanging out over here in the "grew to love Deb" corner with It's Raining Florence Henderson. That was exactly the line that got me too.

Also, now that Rita has a secret, I like her better. Please give Rita more facets dear writers, she tended to bore me a little.

Also, if I must think about Lila again, she was fascinating the first maybe two episodes that she showed up in because, well, hawt, and the accent stuck out (it was really overdone or played up or perhaps it was just because nobody else had one) but then oh god I hated her soooooo much. Even her formely hot lips in her formerly pretty face. As soon as they moved, I cringed. Is that good acting? Or a combo of camera, acting, plotline or what? She wiggled that way she does and I just wanted to rip her bony arms off.

I like Deb because the character just makes sense. She is a women raised without a female influence and competing with her brother for her distant father's attention and all the while wanting to be a cop like her dad. She was always more boy than her brother so yeah, she is loud and rough and profane.

I've seen Lila in Hustle - which is a great Sting-esque show from England, and I can't watch her in that either, something about her just really grates on my nerves.

I don't mind Deb - but I never *loved* her though.

I DO love Hatsumoko (spelling?). This series (though I'm only halfway through) has given him some really fabulous lines.

The one character this season that I'm not sure about (and remember, only halfway through) is the potential bent copper... Something about his face makes it really hard to remember what he looks like - even when I'm looking at him. I can't remember him. Not even his characters name. And I haven't seen enough of the character to work out if it's MEANT to be like that, or if that's just something weird about the actor himself.

Oh yeah Quinn! I have that same exact thing, he's... slimy! In a subtle way. And Hatsumoko ("She's the wikipedia of perv!") always has great lines I like him. I'm not sure what to make of the detective's new Vice-squad girlfriend though.... She brought him saffron pasta? Wait, what?

I like Deb because the character just makes sense. She is a women raised without a female influence and competing with her brother for her distant father's attention and all the while wanting to be a cop like her dad. She was always more boy than her brother so yeah, she is loud and rough and profane.

This definitely strikes me as true, even though there's something about how she's written/performed that I still find really off-putting. And it can't just be the swearing alone -- I swear like a sailor on a regular basis. I think it's that her swearing is so constant and often so inappropriate or out of proportion, almost like she's got Tourette's or something. (For example, I think the "roly-poly shit machine" line would have been hysterically funny JUST as "roly-poly shit machine." But to me, "motherfucking, roly-poly, chubby-cheeked shit machine" oversells the joke -- it's just a couple of beats too long to feel like authentic dialogue.)

I guess what really drives me nuts, more than the foul-mouthed/tomboy/emotionally stunted character notes (all of which are actually believable, given her backstory), is how she inexplicably seems like such a clueless rookie on the job -- all the times where she clearly has no idea how to question a suspect, doesn't know the proper procedure, etc. Cumulatively (especially combined with her varying shades of hysteria) they give the impression of her being unbelievably inexperienced or blatantly incompetent (both of which raise the question as to how she became a detective in the first place. Did she just get a pass because of her dad? Seems unlikely.)

But the incompetence angle is clearly undercut by her dogged tenacity in looking through evidence (e.g., staying all night to comb through evidence on The Skinner, which led to the epiphany regarding the connection with tree-trimming). So I think there's a sort of structural inconsistency/incongruence that the writers have created.

Sorry, overthinking this particular plate of beans is the curse of living in L.A. and knowing too many screenwriters and having written too many scripts (aka doorstops) myself!

RE Quinn: YES! He's always been a little slimy, a little off... but not enough to get a really good bead on him. Very interesting. He's going to bear watching next season.

My only real complaint this season was all the shots of Dexter surveiling Miguel from his car parked directly across from Miguel's on a residential street! In plain sight! As if Miguel couldn' see him sitting there twenty feet away! As if Dexter had no training or background in being sneaky! Really took me out of a couple scenes.

Damned typos. It was meant to be "swearing" of course.

the opening credits are the best damn opening credits evar.

They make me so uncomfortable, which is what is so very brilliant about them.

I skip the credits. I thought it was good the first time, but they're unnecessarily long.

I hate Deb as well. I get where her character is coming from, but I don't find her actress convincing. I have the same problem with Angel.

The sketchy cop looks like a slightly-plumped Johnny Depp to me. I had to check IMDB to make sure it wasn't. I hope there's still more to come about his character, since things just don't seem to line up quite right in his storylines.

Season 3 was fantastic overall. I'm glad they fleshed out La Guerta into a human being. I like her character a lot now. I hope they make Rita more human as well. I still find her really princessy and annoying.

I find it irksome how Dexter still runs database searches on people, even after he realized that Miguel was able to track his computer activity. I mean, come on -- he must realize that if Miguel could, others can. And I find his habit of keeping blood slides is just an unnecessary risk that, in light of his already-risky lifestyle, he would be better off without. He is supposed to be so fastidious, and those two things just don't fit his character.

There are a number of flaws with the logical details of the show but I don't notice them because it is a show about (for me) what it means to be a part of civil society and all the good and the bad that entails. And it's damned good fun.