San Diego Comic-Con usually attracts tens of thousands of visitors but for the second year running the annual celebration of all things geek was forced to take place online only. Held over the past weekend, this year's event was a largely muted affair. Usually Hollywood uses Comic-Con to premiere trailers for their upcoming blockbusters, but this year new trailers were thin on the ground.
One trailer that did premiere was for Dexter: New Blood, the upcoming revival of the cult show Dexter.
Premiering in 2006, Dexter starred Michael C. Hall as Dexter Morgan. The title character was a Miami police forensics scientist who lead a double life as a serial killer, carrying out vigilante killings of murderers the police weren't been able to bring to justice.
The show received critical acclaim for its early seasons, with Hall and John Lithgow winning Golden Globes for their performances as Dexter and his nemesis, serial killer Arthur Mitchell. By the end of its eight season run, the reviews had become less favourable, but the show managed to maintain its audience throughout. The series finale was viewed by 2.8 million viewers in the US, making it the most watched show in the history of America's Showtime network.
Ever since the show wrapped up back in 2013, fans have been hoping for a return, and now they don’t have long to wait. Dexter: New Blood is scheduled to premiere in the US on Sunday November 7th. Details of when Irish fans will get to see the show have yet to be announced.
Dexter: New Blood sees Hall return to the role of "America's favourite serial killer." The new series will run for 10 episodes. Moving to a small town in America's snowy north, Dexter is now living under the alias of Jim Lindsay. But as you might expect, his past catches up with him.
Lithgow is set to reprise his role, as will series regular Jennifer Carpenter. New additions to the cast include Clancy Brown, Julia Jones and Jamie Chung.
Appearing at Comic-Con via Zoom call were stars Michael C. Hall and Julia Jones, along with producers Clyde Phillips, Scott Reynolds and Marcos Siega.
Asked why it was the right time to revive the show, Hall answered "I think enough time has passed, and the storytelling opportunities were a lot more interesting, I think, for having had some time between the end and now."
"It felt strange, but mostly because of how strange it didn't feel," Hall said of returning to his signature role. "You know it's just like a sense of time compressing, starting to wonder if all the time has passed since we last did it to now actually was a dream. It's wild. It's wild to reactivate something that you thought was gone, though I guess they didn't suspect that it was totally gone."
The ending of Dexter's original run drew a largely negative reaction from critics and fans. Hall was asked if this negativity was a factor in bringing the show back.
"It was a huge part of it," the actor admitted. "Yeah, I think the ending was mystifying at best to people. Confounding, exasperating, frustrating, and on down the line of, you know, negative adjectives. And I think this is a show that is very important to all of us, and the chance to revisit it and maybe, in the process, redefine the sense of the show's ending, the sense of the show's legacy more broadly, was certainly a part of our motivation. No doubt."
Producer Clyde Phillips teased the return of some fan favourites.
"There will be some returning cast members from the original series that will make some people's brains explode," he revealed.
You can watch the first trailer for Dexter: New Blood, along with the full Comic-Con panel below.
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