Paul Levinson's Infinite Regress

reviewing Black Doves; Dark Matter; Dept. Q; Detective Hole; Dexter: Resurrection; Fauda; For All Mankind; Foundation; Hijack; Memory of a Killer; MobLand; Outlander; Paradise; Presumed Innocent; Reacher; Severance; Silo; Slow Horses; Smoke; Star City; Star Trek: Strange New Worlds; Tehran;The: Day of the Jackal, Diplomat, Night Agent; Your Friends & Neighbors +books, films, music, podcasts, politics

George Santayana had irrational faith in reason - I have irrational faith in TV.

Friday, November 6, 2026

Dexter: Resurrection 2.2: What Do Aaron Burr and Phil Spector Have in Common?

An excellent second episode of the second season of Dexter: Resurrection that fired on many levels. But I think my favorite was:

Harrison trying to convince Dexter to go after the Five Borough Killer, and Dexter objecting that FBK, notwithstanding the Five Borough Killer's name, had killed only one person -- in Queens in last week's episode -- and therefore hadn't met the minimum number of kills, three, to qualify for the serial-killer distinction.

"That would put him in the same category as Aaron Burr and Phil Spector," Dexter tells his son, in a wild but instructive duo of names that have only one thing in common. As far as we know, Burr never put together a wall of sound with the instruments available at the beginning of the 19th century. And Phil Spector never ran for office. But they both killed one person only.

[Spoilers ahead ... ]

The Five Borough Killer, though, is on his way, throwing someone off the roof on Broadway in Manhattan, adding a second victim to his tally. And, in a good touch, Dexter and Charley were right there on the sidewalk, right where the body fell -- the episode, btw, is entitled "Fallen" -- getting Dexter to put aside his three-killing criterion for his constructive destructive attention.

And speaking of Charley, it's nice to see Uma Thurman's character back in the picture, and is there perhaps a hint of romantic chemistry between her and Dexter in this episode? Maybe, just a hint -- she comes certainly along at the right time given Dexter's midlife crisis, which, at very least, has caused Dexter to realize that he needs to put aside his earlier solitary ways, and start working in some ways with a partner.

There are almost of plethora of serial killers on hand for Dexter to kill. In addition to the Five Borough Killer, we have the New York Ripper, the Sleepy-Eyed Stranger, and the Jaw Splitter. Good thing we have so many cops on hand like Harrison, not to mention Joey Quinn (Desmond Harrington) who's left the Miami force and come up to New York. We both know that, despite his big smile and apparent joy at seeing Dexter, he's going to pose a threat to him before this season ends.

Reviews of Season 2: Dexter's Back: A Preview and Dexter Meets Heroes and 6. Dexter and De-Lila-h and 7. Best Line About Dexter - from Lila and 8. How Will Dexter Get Out of This? and The Plot Gets Tighter and Sharper and Dex, Doakes, and Harry and Deb's Belief Saves Dex and All's ... Well

See also about Season 1: First Place to Dexter

Saturday, October 31, 2026

Nocturne 1.1-2: Nordic Noir in Western Pennsylvania

Lots of excellent streaming TV these days. Just today, Dark Matter's season 2 finale was up on Apple TV, Dexter: Resurrection season 2 debuted on Paramount, MobLand's episode 2.7 was up on Paramount, and Nocturne debuted its first two episodes on Apple. I saw and immensely enjoyed all of them. I reviewed Dark Matter and Dexter: Resurrection, will review all of season 2 of MobLand when it concludes, and here I am with a review of Nocturne. Good thing it's Friday.

Nocturne is a powerful detective series (adapted from The Sandman and Lazarus novels -- which I haven't read -- by Lars Kepler -- pen name for Swedish writer couple Alexandra Coelho Ahndoril and Alexander Ahndoril) and has True Detective vibes. Liev Schreiber is Jonah Lynn, a retired, somewhat burned-out detective who gets sucked back into a kidnap case when one of the two kids shows up staggering across a bridge in Fairfield, a small fictitious town in western PA. His nemesis is Jurek Walter (played by Stephen Graham, with a perfect American accent), who's been in a high security prison for three years, and has a way getting into people's heads -- including guards -- and getting them to do his bidding. The FBI is involved (it's a kidnapping case), as is the daughter (Saga Bauer played by Zazie Beetz) of Jonah's partner who took his own life.

The incandescent acting of Schreiber and Graham works especially well in the rural Pennsylvania locale, which lends Nocturne a Mare of Easttown, American Rust, and even a side of Task flavor, which complement its True Detective and Nordic Noir tones. The key questions at this point are how much will the freed boy be able to tell Jonah and the police, who is Walter's accomplice on the outside, and how powerful is the mental control Walter has with those on the inside he has chosen to enlist with hypnotic effect.

I'm looking forward to see how this all plays out.

Friday, October 30, 2026

Dexter: Resurrection 2.1: His Work Brilliantly Cut Out for Him.

Dexter is back -- in the second season of Dexter: Resurrection on Paramount. It's one of my all-time favorite television series, and I've been reviewing it for 20 years. In fact the very first post in this blog was First Place to Dexter in December 2006. Jeff Lindsay's idea of a serial killer who kills serial killers was and is flat-out brilliant, and Clyde Phillips has done an extraordinary job bringing it to the screen, including getting Michael C. Hall to perfectly animate the title role.

The debut of the second season of Dexter: Resurrection was powerful and empathetic indeed. Dexter's in his 50s, and muses after his kill, which was more difficult than usual, that he needs to work out more. He's less careful than he should be, and his late father Harry (still wonderfully played by James Remar), who lives in Dexter's head, is almost constantly sounding warnings.

This new episode has everything: Dexter needs to attend to some unfinished business from the previous season. New serials killers are emerging in New York City. One of them (the New York Ripper) is played by Succession's Brian Cox. Another (the Five Borough Killer) announces that he plans to kill someone at a baseball game (oi!). Dexter has his work cut out for him.

Meanwhile, Harrison has become an NYPD cop. Joey Quinn is up from Miami, his real motive likely to find out what exactly happened to Batista. (We haven't yet seen Charley, but coming attractions say she'll be in town as well.) Detective Claudette Wallace -- the Saturday Night Fever fan and shrewd detective --is back in style. Dexter has his work cut out for him indeed.

It has always been a real pleasure to see Dexter on the screen. Based on this debut episode, it looks like the pleasure this season will be even realer.

My brand new time-travel story, "Aaron Judge on the Cape", in the just-published 100th Anniversary issue of Amazing Stories. Get the magazine here!

Interview with Jude O'Reilly, who has a kick-a novel about a serial killer

Dark Matter 2.10: A Lesson in Media Determinism

The finale of the second season of Dark Matter, up on Apple TV, was many things: a short, ferocious battle scene in an alternate Chicago (one of the best in the series); the reunion and stranding of characters; the surprising death of others -- though, as I said last week, there inevitably are an infinity of killed characters left in existence in an alternate reality story like this -- all of this and more lit up the fast-moving final episode of the second season of this series.

But my favorite was the lesson in media determinism that Olu delivers to Leighton as they argue about whether to destroy the pyramid and therein the network of boxes. After Leighton gives a list of all the terrible consequences these boxes have brought into being, Olu tells his alternate self that all technologies have destructive unintended consequences.

"Even the printing press triggered wars, genocide," Olu observes. Yes, indeed. That's what media and all technology do. I wonder if versions of Harold Innis and Marshall McLuhan and their path-breaking work about media and their impact were known by Olu in the reality he came from. I certainly hope so, if only because their works were the impetus for my own 1998 book, The Soft Edge: A Natural History and Future of the Information Revolution, which explained how the Protestant Reformation, the rise of national states, the European settlement of America, the scientific revolution, and the rise of public education and democracy, to name just a few, were products of what Gutenberg brought to Europe and the world.

But in the context of Dark Matter -- which in addition to all its other merits is a philosophic picnic -- Olu's point may miss the point that Leighton was trying to make. All of the non-fictional results of the printing press and other media and technologies in our world don't hold a candle to what Jason Desson has brought into being and Leighton Vance has vastly extended. A world of infinite worlds, a universe of infinite universes, holds infinite possibilities, good and bad. So far, we have seen just a tiny, two-season sample of what such an infinity of worlds and carbon-copy characters could bring.

In principle, that could be mean that Dark Matter could be an infinite series. But I'll gladly take that one season at at time, and look forward, for now, to season three.

Thursday, October 29, 2026

Audio Podcast: Paul Levinson interviews Jude O'Reilly about Heartbreaker

Welcome to Light On Light Through episode 423, in which I interview Jude O'Reilly about her novel Heartbreaker. Among the issues we discussed: author/editor frictions and benefits, first readers, serial killers in fiction, wonders of the British north, and time travel and time stoppage. Among the authors we discussed: Karl Popper, Rob Sawyer, George R.R. Martin, Isaac Asimov, Nicholson Baker, Solvej Balle.

Relevant links:

get the novel here
my review of Heartbreaker

Check out this episode!

Sunday, October 25, 2026

Pride & Prejudice, Part 2, Napoleon at Pemberley: A Secret History and More

Jane Austen is in the news these days, given the opening last week of Georgia Oakley's movie adaptation of Sense and Sensibility. Tina and I took a different road tonight, and went to see Ken Ludwig's new play, Pride & Prejudice, Part 2: Napoleon at Pemberley, which had its world premiere at the Westport Country Playhouse in Connecticut. We and the packed house loved it.

Wait, Jane Austen didn't write a sequel to her 1813 novel Pride and Prejudice that has been read around the world by high school students for at least a century, right? Right, this Part 2 is a comedy-drama that continues Jane Austen's story of Elizabeth Bennet and Darcy after they get married, and get a defeated Napoleon on his way to Elba as a house guest.

As such, this play qualifies as a secret history, a close cousin of alternate history, but in which real history is not changed, and we're treated to an account of something that happened in real history that we didn't know about. As is the case in alternate history, you need to keep everything that has not changed as accurate as possible. The at turn brilliant, petulant, vain, and always forceful Napoleon is known to us and well written in this play, and memorably acted by Reg Rogers.

But melded into this secret history is a genuine sequel to Austen's masterpiece, and Ludwig gets this right, as well. Elizabeth and Darcy (well played by Delphi Borich and Tony Roach) and are instantly recognizable from the novel, and continue to grow in this sequel. And the supporting characters, both from the novel and newly invented, are fine and sparkling, too. Emily Mann did an excellent job directing this play, i.e., putting it all together, the comedy and the drama, the history and the secret history and the fiction, on the stage.

Mark Shanahan, the Playhouse's Artistic Director, was wise indeed to bring this world debut to Westport. Jane Austen's novel, like Shakespeare's plays and the Beatles's music, is well on its way to being with humankind as long as we survive. Once word gets out about Ludwig's play, who that has read Pride and Prejudice will not want to see the play?

Friday, October 23, 2026

Dark Matter 2.9: Good News for Actors

So it occurred to me, after watching episode 2.9 of Dark Matter on Apple TV last night, that this series is very good for everyone who is acting in it.

[And there will be spoilers ahead ... ]

The episode ends with a Chicago struck by a fearsome attack -- right after Jason whatever or a closely related Jason lures a Mitchel MacNamara (Chris Diamantopoulos) with a beard onto a sunny beach with happy people just as the attack is about to happen. So Mitchel who is hardboiled is about to get hardboiled in a different way, and I felt a little bad for the character, because I liked him, at least sometimes or in some realities.

But then I realized, in a universe in which there are infinite universes, we'll likely see Mitchel again. A series like Dark Matter is, among its many attractions, good news for actors. In the meta-universe which contains all the universes, all characters are immortal. Even if you kill a character a hundred different times, there will be many more of them potentially on hand.

And this is good news for viewers, too. As I said in my review of Dark Matter 2.2, I liked Mitchel's Sam Spadish vibe. And in Dark Matter, killing off one of them means it's more than likely I'll see him again.

The immortality of characters also plays well into another thread of this fine episode, when Charlie finds a universe with his twin-brother Max alive and thriving. This reunion made for a tender, winning part of the narrative, and Oakes Fegley did a fine job as the two Charlies (our Charlie and the Charlie in the universe in which Max is alive) and Max.

Next week is the season finale, and I miss this show already.

Sunday, October 18, 2026

My Story "Aaron Judge on the Cape" in 100th Anniversary Issue of Amazing Stories

My brand new time-travel story, "Aaron Judge on the Cape", in the just-published 100th Anniversary issue of Amazing Stories. Get the magazine here.

See Ian's Ions and Eons for three previous stories featuring this time-travel agency in the Riverdale section of the Bronx.

Saturday, October 17, 2026

Dark Matter 2.8: Amanda's Smile and Laurel's Singularness

I loved Dark Matter 2.8, because of its tenderness, because we get more of Laurel's story, and because of Jason and Amanda.

I said in a review of an earlier episode this season that I like Amanda (Alice Braga) much more than Daniela. I felt that way in Season 1, and even more so in Season 2. She's a better match for Jason than is Daniela. Jason and Daniela rarely if ever seem as happy as Jason and Amanda. And as I also said earlier, Amanda's smile radiates a feeling that no other character on Dark Matter has.

But let me also say here that I'm not sure which version of Jason we see in episode 2.8. We know that Jason 1 has a tattoo, which we didn't see in this episode. I know it takes place near the beginning of this season -- I think it was in the second episode -- when Jason 1 gets the tattoo, which means not seeing the tattoo on Jason in 2.8 does not absolutely disprove that's he's Jason 1. But if he is Jason 1, that means, what? After what we see in this episode, he goes back to Daniela? And this Charlie in this second season is which version of Charlie?

I think maybe the only character with just one version (so far) is Laurel (Margo Martindale). It was great to see her again, and learn about her past and her world, and since she's not going through a box (as yet, as far as we know), we can reliably believe we're seeing the exact same person, not a different version of her.

In a meta-universe in which there are alternate universes bumping into one another with the drop of a hat/ampule, this reliability becomes a rare and beautiful thing. You could well say that about this whole season, which is why I'm always looking forward to another episode.

Friday, October 16, 2026

The Diplomat Season 4: How to Deal with Trump

How to continue a streaming Netflix series like The Diplomat in its 4th season of edge-of-your-seat American, British, and therefore world political intrigue and turmoil when the real world we see on our news screens is beset by an American President, Donald Trump, who creates crises home and abroad, with our allies and friends and enemies almost every time he opens his mouth?

You tell a story of an American President who embarks on a course of action even more dangerous than Trump's.

[And there will be some spoilers ahead ...]

Grace Penn (Allison Janney) became US President when the elected President died in office, and Penn as per our Constitution assumed the office. At the end of season 3, she appointed Hal Wyler (Rufus Sewell) Vice President, and his wife Kate Wyler (Keri Russell) continued as our ambassador to the United Kingdom. This season, President Penn is shot during a visit to London. It turns out out that she wasn't very badly wounded -- physically -- and is back up and working as President in lightning-fast time.

Not badly wounded physically. But we soon learn that her close brush with death did something to her mind, soul, brain, or whatever you want to call it. And she makes a series of decisions that amazingly pit the United States not only against Russia, but the UK, NATO, and some crucial members of her cabinet.

Kate and Hal and a variety of people -- including Grace's husband Todd (Bradley Whitford, who plays a welcome larger role this season) -- increasingly try, in their disparate ways, to bring the President to her senses. I won't spoil this season any further by telling you how that worked out, but I will say that wouldn't it be wonderful if people in the current Trump administration tried to do some of that with Trump and his policies of getting us into economic conflicts with our friends in Canada, setting ICE on murderous rampages in the US, starting an ill-conceived war with Iran, and the rest of his depredations.

I guess that's the difference between riveting fiction like The Diplomat and the harrowing reality of Trump. But, optimist that I am, who knows, maybe watching this season of The Diplomat on Netflix will give some people in his administration a little more courage.

My 2021 in-depth interview with Rufus Sewell about The Man in the High Castle

"challenging fun"
- Entertainment Weekly

e-mail received from a reader:
Dear Paul, I just dreamed of airships flying between raindrops. I just returned from 2042 CE, where I sold my hardcover copy of The Plot to Save Socrates for seventy million Neo-Euros, because it had your response to this e-mail from way back in 2007 scotch-taped onto the inside of the cover. A Paul Levinson collector paid top Neo-Euro, because of the authentic archaic e-mail printout from you. It turns out that not many of your e-mails from before your tenure as CEO of HBO/Cinemax and terms as United Nations Secretary General will survive that far into the future. So, please respond to this e-mail, to help found my great-grandchildren's fortune. My Will will stipulate that they must share with your great grandchildren. Thanks! Tom

I of course happily replied...

42 reviews of The Plot to Save Socrates!