'Dexter' Season 6, Episode 11 Recap - 'Talk to the Hand'

Last night's episode of "Dexter" was titled "Talk to the Hand," but a more apt title might have been "Well, That Was Easy."

The episode presented three major challenges, each of them met with a degree of ease that made them seem barely a threat at all... even the dreaded Wormwood.

First off, there was Batista's abduction by Travis and Beth, which we were left with as a cliffhanger last week. When Batista is missing from the crime scene later that morning, the team catches on quickly enough and calls dispatch. Quinn, racing his way over, gets to play hero drunk cop and bust into the house, saving Batista from being burned alive. Travis, meanwhile, ducked out the window, giving Quinn no opposition. Heck, that blanket even put out that huge fire pretty fast.

Well, that was easy.

Next, we had the Wormwood attack. Travis set Beth up with a keycard for the police station taken from Batista, and sent her away with the gas bomb in a backpack with Miami Metro Homicide as a target... specifically, Debra Morgan. But Dexter is quick enough to notice some pictures of Doomsday Adam with Beth, and throws Beth into the interrogation room as soon as the gas goes off. Nice, brutal death for Beth at Dexter's hands, and in plain sight, too. Wonder if that counts towards feeding the dark passenger? In any case, less than halfway through the episode, Wormwood is foiled.

Well, that was easy.

Finally, there's the question of Travis' next tableau, the lake of fire. Dexter feels the need to draw him out, and does so by becoming a beast himself to incite Travis' rage. He nails Gellar's hand to the angel statue at the museum and covers it in blood. Thematically a little inconsistent, but striking nonetheless. You get a B+ in creepy tableau-making, Dexter. Good job.

Dex also sends Travis a video by phone (that's pretty sloppy... what if Travis got caught and they searched his phone?), luring him to the marina. But the pesky (and convenient, plot-wise) side effects of the poison gas knock Dexter out, and he finds himself as part of the next tableau: tied up in a boat full of gasoline cans, floating in the water that is being filled with more gas by Travis. The lake of fire.

Fortunately, Dexter is quick enough to break out of his bonds and jump underwater so he isn't blown to smithereens on the boat. He lives to fight another day.

That was... less easy, but still pretty easy.

Seriously, how about a conflict that has some consequences, or at least takes some time to resolve? Until the Wormwood thing, Travis was pretty tame as "Dexter" standards go, killing only random Miami residents and not targeting anyone that we really care about (sorry, Miami residents).

Speaking of not caring, the storyline with Laguerta and Matthews finally tied up, with Matthews having to resign in disgrace while Laguerta, who apparently set this whole thing up, takes his job. In other news, Matthews is a dick and Laguerta is a bitch. And neither of them are interesting.

More interesting, in that totally weird and creepy kind of way, is the turn that Deb's conversations with her therapist took. It seemed odd to me that their sessions always focused on Dexter, but then again Deb has always been very close with him. The therapist suggests that they might be a bit closer than Deb thinks, suggesting that perhaps Deb is in love with Dexter.

Yeah, they're going there. Deb even has a creepy romantic dream sequence that focus pretty heavily on Dexter's lips. It's all incredibly weird, but when you think about it, it makes some sense: of course Deb and Dexter aren't blood-related, but even more than that, Deb was at one point engaged to Dexter's biological brother. If she was attracted to him, doesn't it stand that she could be attracted to Dex as well?

This is opening up a big can of worms. Incestuous thoughts, blood-related or no, aren't just a storyline that you can bring up and then ignore.

Then again, every other problem in this episode went away pretty quickly, so maybe Deb will solve this emotional crisis next episode and we'll all be able to say "well, that was easy" one more time.