• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 636 0

shut her down simply because she liked asserting her political power and did not like Debra. Instead of confronting her boss’s impulsive stone-walling with the confidence her strong ideas warranted, she withdrew and complained to Dexter. Her self-perception was laced with insecurity and a sense of helplessness. For a while she became entrenched in a doomed cycle—she relentlessly pursued bad guys, but she was so plagued with self-doubt and chronic dissatisfaction that each successful collar failed to address how her father never fully appreciated her. As discussed, Harry infected Dexter with a different but equally destructive self-perception. Dexter sees himself as dangerous and incapable of fitting in. Similar to Debra, he became entrenched in his own doomed cycle, in which a code of killing kept basic human connection at arm’s length. As Debra continues to overcome her insecurity and helplessness and gain composure and assertiveness, she is exorcising Harry’s toxic heirloom. She is helping Dexter to realize that he, like his fellow Harry-survivor, can evolve into a conqueror of their “dark passengers” instead of their prisoner.

The other way Debra helps is by fully embracing an aspect of herself that Dexter struggles to embrace within himself. Dexter battles most viciously with the part of him that wants to live within the bounds of law and order, and he rejects what most citizens take for granted about the justice system. He pursues criminals because he views the system as a dilapidated dam, leaking injustice from all sides. On the other hand, Debra’s belief in law and order is rock solid. Almost everything about her is squeaky clean and by the book, a tribute to her conviction in the justice system. She relentlessly pursues bad guys, strictly abides by the “cop” code, and never does drugs or anything remotely corrupt (with the exception of an occasional drink). In season two when she fell into a psychic funk and thought of herself as the idiot cop who failed to realize her boyfriend was actually a serial killer, she emerged from her identity crisis because of—among other things—around-the-clock exercise. While Dexter chooses to kill as a means of managing his mounting distress with life, Debra chooses one of society’s most popular and palatable outlets.

To live more effectively within society and be mentally well-rounded, Dexter needs some of Debra’s societal faith and optimism. Fortunately for him, a slow but steady internalization of Debra’s gung-ho societal attitudes has unfolded. This was most vividly articulated in the climactic scenes of season one. When Rudy, Dexter’s long-lost, sociopathic brother, surfaced with plans to form a brotherly version of Bonnie and Clyde, he seduced and abducted Debra in the hope that Dexter would play the villain by killing her and, by extension, commit to a life of code-less murder. Dexter chose the hero option and, in between tears, killed his brother and watched the blood drain from his body.

Let’s recount this sequence with an eye toward symbolism and in the context of Dexter’s battle with self. Rudy clearly represents the worst of Dexter—the anti-social part that wants to reject a law and order that abandoned him as a child when he needed it most (during his mother’s brutal slaying). Debra, we now know, represents the pro-social part of Dexter that fully accepts a law and order that is mostly just and deserving of a second chance. When Dexter chose Debra, he was not just choosing his little sister over his big brother. He was embracing an aspect of himself and a way of life.

Debra props Dexter up in more literal ways as well. She builds his self-esteem like a psychological cheerleader on steroids, through myriad channels, both unintentional and intentional. She does this unintentionally through the rather large chip on her shoulder that stems from suffering second-place syndrome as a child. Indeed, flashbacks expose a family dynamic in which Harry clearly prioritized Dexter. When at crime scenes, Harry yelled at Debra to get back in the car while he eagerly showed Dexter