[Warning: This story contains spoilers from the season eight premiere of Showtime's Dexter.]
"This year is going to be a no-holds-barred year," executive producer Sara Colleton says of the eighth and final season of Dexter. Sunday's return set up a new world for the Showtime serial killer series to explore: Dexter's maker, if you will, has returned to see her creation develop a humanity she never expected. Meanwhile, Deb has spiraled into a life of drugs, alcohol and shady men after leaving Miami Metro for work as a PI.
While Deb continues to push her foster brother away as she continues to grapple with her decision to kill LaGuerta and protect Dex, there's a long way to go if the duo (hopefully!) find their way back to one another.
"I've been pretty vocal about how I'd like Deb to wrap up," Jennifer Carpenter (Deb) tells The Hollywood Reporter. "I think she should be cremated; she should die and I only say that for my own selfish reasons because I feel like it would be really hard to live my life imagining that something was left undone with her. That's the swiftest way to put it to bed."
Here, the cast talks with THR about what's ahead in the final run of the Michael C. Hall starrer.
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Can Deb and Dexter both survive the season?
"Anything is possible and that's always been true in the storytelling," Hall says, noting that it's not necessary for one of the Morgans to die in order for the series to have a sense of completion. Adds a hopeful Carpenter: "Considering what they've both survived up to this point, yes. I have every hope that they will!" Showrunner Scott Buck, meanwhile, warns that Dexter and Deb's relationship will become "increasingly complicated" as the season progresses, with some hope at the end of the road. "Eventually they do find their way back to each other."
What can Dexter learn from Dr. Vogel?
Sunday's launch introduced Charlotte Rampling as the woman who helped Harry (James Remar) create the code by which Dexter learned to co-exist with his Dark Passenger. Her reappearance in Dex's life will further illustrate the distinction between Dex and Deb, who until recently was following in her father's footsteps. "Deb isn't a psychopath and has a conscience and is not traumatized in the manner that Dexter was as such a small child, which is what we've been expressing: the roots of Dexter's pathology," Remar tells THR. "That he witnessed his mother's brutal murder and he sat in a pool of her blood with his crazy brother for three days and something snapped. Dexter's equipment, if you will, for feeling and emoting is broken, whereas Debra's is not."
Can Dexter trust Vogel?
After their icy first encounter, Dexter learns that Vogel has been following his Dark Passenger since he was a boy -- making her one of a small group of people in his life who know everything about who he really is. But can she continue to guard his secret? "There's a moment when you do have to trust someone and maybe she is somebody he can trust," Rampling previews, remaining mum on whether Vogel will tell anyone else about Dexter's true self.
Will Masuka finally have his day?
C.S. Lee has lofty hopes for his pervy alter-ego, noting he'd like to see Vince Masuka's story end with a girlfriend or a wife. "I don't know if we'll see that but who knows," he says with a laugh. "We're going to see some things with Masuka this year that we haven't seen before. It's a very fun and interesting premise that the writers have set up and I hope people enjoy it."
Can Quinn get a win?
Desmond Harrington's Detective Quinn continues to make his way through the ladies, now romantically linked to his new boss' sister, Jamie (Aimee Garcia) -- but still at Deb's beck and call it seems. "My wish for Quinn is that he ends up a happier man than he came in as," Harrington tells THR of Quinn's journey. Expect to see Angel (David Zayas) push Quinn to man up and Jamie to take issue with her new love interest's old flame.
Where's Hannah?
Yvonne Strahovski was MIA from the season eight bow but the actress notes it's not a question of where she is but how Hannah comes back. "When does she come back and in what fashion does she re-introduce herself into Dexter's life? She's kind of a psycho, kind of in love with him and a lot of different things. She comes back to stir it up," the Chuck alum previews, keeping mum on which episode will mark her return.
What did you think of the Dexter premiere? Sound off in the comments below. Dexter airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on Showtime.
E-mail: Lesley.Goldberg@thr.com
Twitter: @Snoodit
