'Dexter' Season 6, Episode 7 Recap - 'Nebraska'

It must be hard to be Dexter. He never really knew his real parents, and just when he found out he had a brother he had to tie him to a table and slit his throat. And that's not even going into his love life, which has been... well, unsuccessful.

So when Dex turned away from the light of forgiveness offered by Brother Sam and instead turned to the ghost of Brother Brian, there was something kinda nice about it, despite the fact that Evil Dexter was coming out to play. Look, the two of them are tossing body parts off of a boat and then going on a road trip! Awww, quality brother time!

For all the talk of Dexter's dark passenger thus far, it seems that a more accurate description would be that Dex has been carrying a light passenger: his father. When Harry's Code is gone and brother Biny is on board, it's nothing but dark.

But for a while at least, that just means fun times ahead. Dexter hears from Deb that Trinity has killed again, this time in Nebraska. That comes as quite a shock, considering that Dexter personally killed Trinity. The conclusion Dexter comes to is that Jonah, Trinity's son, did the double murder... of his own sister and mother.

For all the stress we've seen Dexter go through, it's fun to watch him release. He tries firing a gun from his car, bangs a cute gas station attendant, and eats some very unhealthy-looking nachos. Not only that, he skewers the nosy Norm, who runs the Bates-ish motel that Dexter stays in, with a pitchfork. Whee!

But the fun stops when Dex finds that Jonah didn't kill his sister; she committed suicide, and Jonah beat his mother to death afterward. Jonah actually asks Dexter to kill him, which leads Dex to do quite the opposite. He spares Jonah, despite Brian's objections, and tells Jonah to forgive himself.

Thus, within just one episode, Dexter switches back to his light passenger from his darker one (quite literally... notice how Brian spent most of the episode literally as a passenger in Dex's car, and then he picks Harry up as a hitchhiker?). I guess Biny won't be making too many more appearances, which is a shame. It seemed as though there was some room here. Dexter could have spent at least a couple of episodes on this twisted bender, fallen a little further off the path, and it would be more difficult for him to right himself.

However, there's the possibility for some trouble down the line. A big to-do was made over that pen that Norm said Dexter could keep, which very clearly says the name and location of the motel. If Dex does keep that pen and Deb finds it, that could be trouble. Not to mention the fact that Dex was pretty sloppy this episode, killing Norm with a pitchfork and dumping him in a grain silo.

It seemed that freedom was the theme here, as stated through Travis' attempts to finally break from Professor Gellar. "What I want is to be free," he rather obviously proclaims, and it seemed for a moment that Dexter had found a new freedom with Brian running the show. But maybe the point is that neither of them will really be free. Travis will go back at some point, and Dexter can't just kill the way Brian did. He's a slave to the code, even if it's a good one.

Other notes:

-Love the American Gothic shot with Dex and Brian in front of the painting while Dex is holding the pitchfork. Cute.

-Really fun editing with Dexter having to physically push Brian out of his way when trying to not kill Jonah.

-"How do you feel?" "Like anything is possible." That was kind of an exciting idea for a second, that Dexter could be totally unleashed. Sadly, it looks like the writers were unwilling to let this bender run for more than one episode.