All in the Family (Early Cuts)

“All in the Family” is Season 3 of an animated Dexter Early Cuts web series released by Showtime in 2012. Each of the six chapters are approximately two minutes long.

Dexter Morgan hunts a serial killer on New Year's Eve, and ends up killing two.

Chapter 1

 * Release date: 21 August 2012

(New Year's Eve, 2000) Dexter is sitting in his car, watching the revelers. He doesn't think of himself as human, although he sometimes feels at home with them. Nearby, a bearded man slashes his own tongue. This same man watches a john pick up a prostitute and drive away. The bearded man immediately follows them.

Upon arrival at a hotel, the bearded man puts on a bloodstained mask, knocks out the john with a makeup case, and slashes the throat of the struggling prostitute with a straight razor. The bearded man then encloses the (seemingly dead) john inside a bag and drags it away with him.

Chapter 2

 * Release date: 28 August 2012

(Two weeks before New Year's Eve) It's after dark, and Dexter is on his fishing boat, Slice of Life. He reflects that, during the holidays, his Dark Passenger surfaces, as he dumps black trash bags containing body parts into the ocean.

As days pass, Dexter feels his mask starting to slip. He needs to hunt and he’s kept track of the “naughty ones.”

Dexter researches a new killer, Tony Rodriguez, who has escaped justice for killing his best friend. However, when Dexter breaks into Tony's house he discovers that Tony no longer lives there.

While at work, Dexter targets someone else, Sam Duke, who killed two people during home invasions. He is also a dead end, though, as Sgt. James Doakes has just arrested Sam. Dexter thinks that Doakes is getting too good at his job.

An officer informs Dexter about a dead hooker at the Twilight Motel in Little Havana.

Arriving at the crime scene, Dexter finds the woman lying on a bloody floor. Her neck had been slashed with a sharp instrument, such as a knife or straight razor.

Judging by the aerial spurt on the wall, the left-handed killer cut her from behind. Dexter takes photos of the cast off blood patterns from the weapon. He realizes that he has seen this pattern before. He smiles and reflects that maybe his Dark Passenger can be sated after all.

Chapter 3

 * Release date: 4 September 2012

(Two weeks before New Year's Eve) At the hotel crime scene, Dexter muses on how being a blood spatter analyst can feed nicely into his night time activities. He notices a void in the blood pattern on the wall, as if someone was standing there. The killer had slashed the victim’s neck from right to left, and held her as she bled out in front of someone else. Perhaps it was an accomplice, who was likely male, judging from the foot size.

During his research, Dexter learns that, between December 1 and New Year’s Day, there have been five similar kills a year for the last two years in different locations throughout Miami. However, prostitute murders don’t rank high in the “pecking order of homicide.” As Dexter marks the spots on a map, he realizes that they will form a star with the next kill. Dexter drives to the next suspected location, encountering several prostitutes. It’s a street full of predators.

Chapter 4

 * Release date: 11 September 2012

(1981) During his childhood, Dexter felt that Deb, his little sister, always had a knack for getting in the way. After he broke her dolls into pieces, she began crying. He didn’t explain why he needed to do it. Dexter knew that their parents would be upset, so he asked Deb to keep it a secret, promising to repair the dolls. In this chapter, young Dexter is also shown with a basic kill tools kit, and setting a toy bear on fire.

(New Year’s Eve, 2000) As Dexter watches the revelers, Deb, who is working in the Crime Suppression Unit, flags down Dexter. She asks why he’s driving around that area. He claims that he couldn’t sleep, and was just driving around until he felt sleepy. He considers it a half truth, but he doesn’t want Deb arresting his victim that night.

Soon Dexter spots a man, holding a knife to his tongue, and he takes his license plate number. He runs the plate and identifies the driver as Coleman Lindquist. He decides to wish him a Happy New Year.

Chapter 5

 * Release date: 18 September 2012

Dexter arrives at Coleman’s house, but he’s not home, so Dexter picks the lock. He looks at the family photos, noticing that the mother is not in the latest ones. He then enters Coleman’s room which is plastered with photos of scantily-clad women. Opening a drawer, Dexter finds numerous letters from Coleman’s mother begging for his forgiveness, and explaining that his father was the reason she left, not him. The letters have all been ripped apart. Suddenly, Dexter hears the front door open, and Coleman drags in a large bag. To Dexter’s surprise, he discovers that Coleman is not working alone, but with his father, Max. Both men stare at Dexter.

Chapter 6

 * Release date: 25 September 2012

Having found the proof that Coleman is killing the prostitutes, Dexter is excited. Coleman and Max approach Dexter and a fight breaks out. Dexter knocks out Max, before kicking a knife from Coleman’s hand and choking him with a clothes hanger. Both father and son are injected with M99.

While the Lindquists are sedated, Dexter drives the blindfolded john to another location and drops him off, believing that the shame will keep him quiet.

Back at the Lindquist house, Dexter wraps the father and son in plastic and secures them to a kill table. They were killing during the holiday season because that’s when Coleman’s mother had left. Coleman would kill the prostitute, and Max would kill the john.

Dexter holds up an ornament -- a gold, five-pointed star. Coleman had received it as a gift from his mother in the first letter she wrote to him. It was a constant reminder every year that she left them.

As Dexter takes a blood slide from Coleman, he realizes that he must improvise. Since he had not come prepared for two kills, Dexter also saves Max’s blood on Coleman’s slide. He then kills the Lindquists with a hacksaw.

At sea on his boat, Dexter drops trash bags holding the Lindquists overboard. Some people like to spend New Year’s Eve on the prowl, doing things they never do the rest of the year, Dexter thought. Finally, a holiday I can get behind.

Related Pages

 * Dexter Early Cuts
 * Blood Slide Boxes
 * Coleman Lindquist
 * Max Lindquist
 * The Lindquists
 * Sam Duke
 * Slice of Life
 * Tony Rodriguez