Breaking Up is Hard to Do

If you don't get that title, don't worry about it. You're young and you won't get my other references in this post either. You probably ought to just move along or get a pencil and be prepared to write down the stuff you'll need to Google.

So here's the break-up. Sort of. It's with Dexter Morgan. Oh yeah. I'm genuinely concerned divorce is on the horizon.

My affair with the Showtime series, Dexter, began when friends kept telling me it was some of the strongest writing on television. I was eventually forced to succumb to peer pressure and experience this phenomenon for myself just so I could participate in the myriad of conversations about theme and character complexities and sub-plots and sub-sub plots and sub-sub-sub plots.

For six seasons, I have been hooked -- hanging on every episode and watching each one several times to make sure I don't miss anything. Yup. A hopeless Dexter-holic. That show was the television writing love of my life. I thought it was flawless. Even when I found a flaw and had one of my lovers' spats with the show, that flaw was explained in a later episode and I was forced to kiss and make up out of sheer awe.

Our relationship was perfect.

But it was too good to last. With the show's final two seasons ahead of us, the romance is over. I'm now stuck in a loveless marriage with this show -- with Dexter. I watch now because I must, not because I want to. I am bound to this show because of unanswered questions and possibilities that I cannot risk missing. But the thrill is gone

WHY??? 

I want to be in love again!

Maybe my fellow viewers aren't there with me but it feels kind of like when Mulder and Scully became a couple on The X-Files and that sexual tension was over. I was over, too. Same think happened on Mork and Mindy, Moonlighting, Boy Meets World, and an abundance of other shows where the chemistry just petered out for me.

Welp. Back to Dexter. What happened here was not sexual tension released when the principals became a couple, but tension that was released when the principals were no longer facing each other from opposite sides of a cavernous gap of a secret. I won't explain the secret (no spoilers here) but if you watch the show you know which wall was torn down. That conflict, once resolved, left me without an ever-present conflict on the back burner, simmering, waiting to erupt and keeping me fearful, excited, and expectant at all times.

Or, there's another possibility. Maybe the show has run its course as all shows eventually do. Maybe I'm burned out the same way you get burned out on a favorite song you've heard one too many times. It's sad when your heart no longer flutters at the sound of the opening instrumentals. 

Journey - Don't Stop Believin'. 

I rest my case.

So, what's the solution here? The writing on Dexter is still solid but instead of the giant claw gripping my chest week after week, year after year, I'm being swatted at by a bunch of little claws. They're thrashing aimlessly at me hoping they'll land one good slap. 

Yeah, "breaking up is hard to do" so not much choice here but to fall back on that favorite song that says "don't stop believin', hold on to that feelin'" and then hope against hope that Dexter and I kiss and make up on Episode 8.