The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic

The city of Miami seems an unlikely setting for the Gothic. Like the global capital that has made Florida the fastest growing US state, it is all ephemeral present, with glittering surfaces that reflect appear to be too new to harbour the ghosts of the past. This is the setting for Showtime’s televi...

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Autor principal: Macleod, Mark
Formato: info:eu-repo/semantics/article
Lenguaje:Portugués
Publicado: Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.e-publicacoes.uerj.br/ojs/index.php/soletras/article/view/11276
http://biblioteca-repositorio.clacso.edu.ar/handle/CLACSO/55910
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author Macleod, Mark
author_facet Macleod, Mark
author_sort Macleod, Mark
collection Repositorio
description The city of Miami seems an unlikely setting for the Gothic. Like the global capital that has made Florida the fastest growing US state, it is all ephemeral present, with glittering surfaces that reflect appear to be too new to harbour the ghosts of the past. This is the setting for Showtime’s television series ‘Dexter’ (2006-2013) about a blood spatter analyst who works for the metropolitan police and is a serial killer. This paper explores two key story-arcs in the series. Punter (1998) argues that ghosts arise on the site of vanished cultural territory, and in ‘Dexter’Miami’s extraordinary growth has left many such spaces behind, but what kind of ghosts are possible here? Nelson (2012: xi) claims that gothic narrative in the 21st century has outgrown its ‘heritage of dark supernaturalism’, and yet the trimmed lawns and flowerbeds of season 4 hide a monster known as the Trinity Killer, who forces Dexter to confront his own horrific past in a devastatingly literal bloodbath and by season 6, in the story arc of the Doomsday Killers, Dexter’s monstrous double life is exposed to the one person he loves and fears above all others: his sister Debra. A complex series of doppelgängers, characteristic of high gothic narrative, concludes with Dexter’s attempts to lay to rest all the ghosts of the past that torment him, and to save the remains of his family by constructing his own death.
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spelling clacso-CLACSO559102022-03-17T19:51:37Z The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic Macleod, Mark Literatura; Estudos Literários The city of Miami seems an unlikely setting for the Gothic. Like the global capital that has made Florida the fastest growing US state, it is all ephemeral present, with glittering surfaces that reflect appear to be too new to harbour the ghosts of the past. This is the setting for Showtime’s television series ‘Dexter’ (2006-2013) about a blood spatter analyst who works for the metropolitan police and is a serial killer. This paper explores two key story-arcs in the series. Punter (1998) argues that ghosts arise on the site of vanished cultural territory, and in ‘Dexter’Miami’s extraordinary growth has left many such spaces behind, but what kind of ghosts are possible here? Nelson (2012: xi) claims that gothic narrative in the 21st century has outgrown its ‘heritage of dark supernaturalism’, and yet the trimmed lawns and flowerbeds of season 4 hide a monster known as the Trinity Killer, who forces Dexter to confront his own horrific past in a devastatingly literal bloodbath and by season 6, in the story arc of the Doomsday Killers, Dexter’s monstrous double life is exposed to the one person he loves and fears above all others: his sister Debra. A complex series of doppelgängers, characteristic of high gothic narrative, concludes with Dexter’s attempts to lay to rest all the ghosts of the past that torment him, and to save the remains of his family by constructing his own death. 2014-10-13 2022-03-17T19:51:37Z 2022-03-17T19:51:37Z info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion https://www.e-publicacoes.uerj.br/ojs/index.php/soletras/article/view/11276 10.12957/soletras.2014.11276 http://biblioteca-repositorio.clacso.edu.ar/handle/CLACSO/55910 por https://www.e-publicacoes.uerj.br/ojs/index.php/soletras/article/view/11276/10344 application/pdf Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro Revista Soletras; n. 27 (2014): (Re)Leituras do Gótico literário; 220-232 SOLETRAS; n. 27 (2014): (Re)Leituras do Gótico literário; 220-232 SOLETRAS; n. 27 (2014): (Re)Leituras do Gótico literário; 220-232 SOLETRAS; n. 27 (2014): (Re)Leituras do Gótico literário; 220-232 SOLETRAS; n. 27 (2014): (Re)Leituras do Gótico literário; 220-232 2316-8838 1519-7778
spellingShingle Literatura; Estudos Literários
Macleod, Mark
The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic
title The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic
title_full The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic
title_fullStr The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic
title_full_unstemmed The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic
title_short The Trinity Killer, the Doomsday Killers and Dexter as Suburban Gothic
title_sort trinity killer, the doomsday killers and dexter as suburban gothic
topic Literatura; Estudos Literários
url https://www.e-publicacoes.uerj.br/ojs/index.php/soletras/article/view/11276
http://biblioteca-repositorio.clacso.edu.ar/handle/CLACSO/55910