Dexter Season 8 Episode 7 “Dress Code” Recap: Primal Instincts and Love Renewed

Hannah McKay is back but Dexter doesn’t seem as upset as he does jealous while Zach’s instincts are in overdrive…

By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer
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Dexter Morgan is a man built around two essential passions that drive his every decision—obsession and need.

Now those two particular traits may sound eerily connected, but in Dexter’s world they both have their place and hold over the moves he makes and each plot he unfolds. For his obsession in the latest episode titled “Dress Code”, Dexter has an unyielding desire to track down and find out what his ex-girlfriend Hannah McKay is doing in town, but that also comes with the deeper need that he struggles to deal with realizing he misses her in his life.

Deep down, Dexter probably felt something for Rita—she was a damaged and broken woman who he helped save unlike his mother when he was just a baby as he saw her slaughtered before his eyes. The same can be said for Lumen, who he rescued and as an extension of Rita, he actually taught her how to be her own strong person to battle back against those who wanted to harm her.

In the case of Hannah McKay, Dexter really met his match because she was as cold and calculating as he was when he has a victim on his kill table, but she also had the need to feel normal in her everyday walk of life. Hannah was the parallel that Dexter always truly desired, and for all of the past disasters that he’s had with women including Lila, he’s never found anyone that held those same two core emotions—obsession and need.

Obsession and need played a big part in this week’s episode so let’s get right into the recap

Dexter and Hannah Find Their Way Back to Each Other

The buzzing of a cell phone with a call from Dr. Vogel wakes Dexter up after he was drugged by his ex-girlfriend Hannah McKay last week, and immediately he knows things could very easily be falling apart if she’s back in town. He can’t forget that for all the love he truly felt for her, he also turned her into the police and she was well on her way to prison before escaping. Immediately, Dexter checks on Deb, who is fine outside of a few foggy memories from Hannah’s drugging, and the two collaborate and agree that they need to track down his ex and find out why she’s in town and for what purpose.

Dexter quickly discovers that Hannah is not only married, but her husband Miles is a casino magnate with enough cash and power at his disposal to make Dexter’s life quite uncomfortable if he so chooses. Miles even knows who Hannah is, what she’s done and why she’s on the run, not to mention having knowledge about how Dexter betrayed and turned her into the police.

Sometime later on a quick rendezvous to her old greenhouse, Hannah reveals her real agenda to Dexter. Apparently, Miles is not only rich, but he’s also wildly obsessive and very possessive over her every move. She knew she’d be the prime suspect if Miles popped up missing or dead, not to mention the moment her photo makes television or newspapers she’d be on her way to a steel cell courtesy of the Miami police department. Her plan was to have Dexter get rid of her husband, but there was always the underlying need for her to run back into her ex, who wronged her on so many levels, but she just can’t give him up.

Turns out, Hannah was right about her husband because he quickly confronts her back at his yacht where they are staying, and asks about her meeting with Dexter at her old greenhouse. Things quickly turn bad for Hannah as her husband makes it known that she’s going to belong to no one but him. A few moments later, Dexter pops up on the boat because deep down he can’t let Hannah go either, and he just has to find out what’s really happening with her and this supposed obsessive husband.  Dexter shows a side of jealousy that he’s never had before, and these rare flashes of emotion that aren’t rage tend to overrun him. He feels something real for Hannah, and she fills a void in him that no body count will ever satisfy.

As Dexter stalks the yacht, he enters the bedroom cabin and finds Miles on the floor with a puncture wound to his neck, and Hannah covered in blood over top of him. He instructs her all of the tools he needs to dispose of the body, and they move quickly to get rid of Miles before the staff on the yacht discovers he’s dead. Hannah and Dexter go on a midnight ride to dump the body, and as she reveals her plan to get out of town he implores her to please have at least one more call with him before she leaves town.

While all of this is going on, there are a set of eyes on Dexter and Hannah the entire time…

Deb Sees Dexter Slipping Away

For the biggest part of this season, Debra Morgan was wallowing in a pit of anger, rage, sadness and depression after making the choice to sacrifice Maria LaGuerta instead of finishing off her brother when he was confronted with the awful truth about he he is and what he’s done. Over the last couple of weeks (outside of crashing her car into a lake to try and kill both herself and Dexter), Deb is on the road to recovery both in her own life but more importantly with her brother.

There was an uncomfortable subject brought up a couple of seasons ago about how Deb is secretly in love with Dexter, but not in a brotherly way. She confronts this ugly truth just before discovering that her brother is not just a blood splatter analyst, but in reality is a serial killer that’s been offing Miami’s most wanted for years.

Originally the storyline was met with some outrage, maybe a few “you’ve got to be kidding me’s”, but in reality the writers and producers behind Dexter really understood the character of Deb. She’s a woman that lost the strongest male figure in her life (Harry) when he died, and she’s always sought out men that could help fill that void in someway. In season one with Brian (Dexter’s brother), she felt loved and wanted. With Quinn, she felt the same, but also protected, and the same can be said for Lundy. Dexter was the combination of all those qualities, plus he had been there for Deb at every turn, no matter how ugly, no matter how traumatic.

So with Deb getting back to her old self and building a new foundation with Dexter, she’s none too happy that Hannah is back. It’s not even about the fact that this woman has now drugged her twice and knows her brother’s deepest, darkest secrets—it’s about a threat that could take Dexter away, maybe this time for good.

Deb decides to do a little hunting of her own, which is when she runs into her boss Elway, who obviously has a crush on the former police lieutenant. He flirts, she backs off. He pushes, and she pushes back. Finally, Elway has had enough and calls Deb on her constant abuse saying that when she was a wreck, he hired her, gave her a job, gave her support, and she constantly acts like a bitch when in reality she should be showing some gratitude.

Maybe it’s me, but it seems this is a classic romance for Deb—the overpowering male figure in her life that provides for her in some way, and now has shown his dominance as well. Look for Deb to make some bad choices with Elway in the next couple of episodes.

He does come in handy, however, by letting Deb borrow his fancy GPS tracking kit, and she decides to put the device on Dexter’s SUV because she doesn’t buy that he’s not following Hannah every step of the way. While marking Dexter’s car, she runs into Cassie—the pretty neighbor who had a thing for Dexter, but quickly dropped out of the picture when he feigned to show her any real interest. She asks Deb for advice, but instead Deb says to stay clear of Dexter because he’s a package that no one should even try to unravel (again more evidence that Deb wants Dexter for herself).

While following Dexter with the GPS system, she watches and he and Hannah exit his boat after a night out in the ocean, and she now knows that her brother is not only spending time with the woman that tried to kill her just months ago, but he’s lying to her on top of it all. Deb is not always the most rational person, so expect something major to go down next week without Dexter having any prior knowledge.

Zach’s Impulses Can’t Be Contained

Last week, Dexter decided to take on a project—namely young serial killer Zach Hamilton, who felt the same kind of thirst and need to kill that he’s felt for years. Dexter is going to school the kid in the ways of “The Code”, but patience is not a virtue of young Zach.

First he shows up at Dexter’s house uninvited, and clearly they are not to be seen together. He then shows up at the police department where he convinces Batista along with his lawyer and the deputy chief that Quinn needs to “back the fuck off” and stop following him no matter what his instincts are about who killed Norma Rivera.

Dexter realizes he’s got his hands full with Zach, who is feeling the same kind of empty hunger in the pit of his stomach when he needs to kill, and right now there is no way to quell that desire unless he finishes off a victim. Unfortunately, Dexter has his hands full with all things Hannah, and decides to blow Zach off from a scheduled meeting.

Prior to that meeting, Dexter has a chat with Dr. Vogel about Zach and his impulses. She’s convinced that he can teach Zach “The Code” but she also reminds him that his new progeny isn’t in the same scenario as he was years ago when Harry taught him how to kill without being caught. See back then, Dexter only felt the desire to kill, but never acted on it until after Harry showed him the way and who the right people were to kill.

Zach has already killed one person, and now he’s got that thirst back again, that obsession, that need to feel a life taken by his own hands. Dexter realizes too late because when Zach showed up to pay him a visit, and he wasn’t home, he visited his neighbor Cassie instead.

The next time we see her, Cassie’s head has been bashed in and Dexter realizes that his obsession with Hannah may have just cost his lovely neighbor her life.

Masuka’s Topless Adventure, Quinn’s Got a Roommate

Masuka and his daughter quickly patch things up from last week’s falling out, and Nikki decides to invite her new father out after she’s off work from a local sports bar. Vince wants to surprise her and pay a visit, which is where he discovers that Nikki is actually working at a topless sports bar.

“I’ve stared at a million boobs, but until now, I’ve never considered them daughter boobs,” Masuka says scoring the best line of the week.

He tries to get his new daughter a job at Miami Metro working as an assistant in the lab alongside he and Dexter, but she’s not ready to jump at the $13.75 an hour gig just yet. There’s more to this story of course, but how Nikki will play into the finale remains to be seen.

Jamie wants out of Angel’s house, so she begins looking for new digs and invites Quinn to be her new roommate. Of course beyond the fact that Quinn is still head over heels in love with Deb, he’s also not ready to jump into a living situation with his new girlfriend. That is until Angel busts his balls for following Zach Hamilton, so he decides to drop the bombshell “and oh yeah, I’m moving in with your sister”.

“Dress Code” quickly sky rocketed to being one of the best episodes in this final season of Dexter. Some plots played out as we are reintroduced to Hannah McKay, and we see Deb’s love and obsession for Dexter come back to life in a big way. We also see how Dexter’s own needs and obsessions cost an innocent woman her life, after he didn’t have time for the pitbull he let out of his cage without as much as some kibble around to chew on.

Come back next week as we draw one episode closer to the final episode of Dexter as he grows closer to Hannah again and his sister closes in as well.