A Political Hypothesis about Why Dexter Original Sin Was Unrenewed

I've been a devoted fan of Dexter since it debuted on Showtime in 2006.  My very first review of a TV show on this blog in December 2006 was a rave review of the first season of Dexter 20 years ago on Showtime.  The review is entitled First Place to Dexter.

I've reviewed in this blog every episode of every season of Dexter since then.  And of course I reviewed every episode of Dexter: Original Sin last summer.  I was sad when the original run of Dexter ended in 2013, thrilled when Dexter returned in New Blood in 2021, disappointed when Dexter Morgan apparently died at the end of that one season in 2022, delighted with the prequel Original Sin, glad that it was renewed earlier this year, and I think Dexter: Resurrection this year was masterful.

So you can imagine how stunned I was about the announcement that the renewal of Original Sin for a second season had been reversed, the prequel series cancelled, this past August.  As Alisha Grauso pointed out in her Screen Rant article four days ago, Original Sin "immediately became Showtime's most-watched premiere ever, with 2.1 million viewers".  She then says its about-face cancellation by Paramount four months after Original Sin had been renewed "was seemingly a casualty of the Skydance-Paramount merger," and goes on to explain that after the merger, Paramount reviewed all of its programming (ok, that makes sense) and she further suggests Paramount may have to decided to revoke its renewal because prequels are narratively difficult and even when successful often satisfy their viewing audience with just a single season.  And that makes no sense to me at all.  Even if that characteristic of prequels is true, there was no way Paramount would not go for a second season of Original Sin, given how successful -- immediately becoming "Showtime's most-watched premiere ever" -- Original Sin on Showtime was.

My wife, also an avid fan of Dexter on television, didn't get a chance to watch Original Sin until this past week.  I was half-watching it with her and enjoying it immensely.  And I starting wondering, again, why had  Paramount reversed itself?  Why cancel at a time when the Dexter franchise was taking the screen by the storm? Yes, that decision was indeed a result of the Skydance merger.  And what else had happened with Paramount and CBS after that merger?  Well, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert had been unceremoniously cancelled (effective May 2026) after Skydance got in the driver's seat.   And why was that?  The billionaire who owns and runs Skydance is a big Trump supporter, and Colbert's sarcastic comedy has been at its sharpest when it came to Trump.

But Dexter: Original Sin had no political comedy, right?  Ok, but maybe one of its lead actors, or writers, or directors, had spoken out against Trump and the march towards fascism in America he's engendering and leading.  I did a search on Christian Slater (who brilliantly plays Dexter's father Harry in Original Sin) and Trump.  And bingo!  Back in 2018, Slater called Trump an "asshole".  Breitbart, a right-wing publication, was so upset about that, they devoted a whole article about it.   Surely Trump, who keeps track of every insult, real and imagined, was bearing one of his myriad continuing grudges, and desire for revenge, against Christian Slater.

Of course, I have no proof of this.  But I wanted to put this hypothesis out there.  Was Christian Slater and thereby Original Sin another victim of Trump's rampage against free expression, abetted by the billionaires who support him, in this case, a billionaire whose company now in effect owns Paramount, and thereby has easy control over its programming?  Maybe, given the damage Trump has already done to the arts and culture in this country, I'm being too quick to see him as the villain behind Paramount's illogical reversal on its renewal of Dexter: Original Sin.  But the other explanations just don't add up, given Original Sin's enormous success, and I really can't think of a more convincing explanation of why it was cancelled after it had been renewed.

See also: Dexter: Resurrection 1.1-1.2: The Imposter ... 1.3: Killers and Prey ... 1.4: The Nefarious Club ... 1.5: Father and Son and the Watch ... 1.6: What's Half of Gemini? ... 1.7: Batista and Dexter in the Car ... 1.8: The Enemies: An Evaluation ... 1.9: And Then There Were Two ... Season 1 Finale: First Place in the TV Age of Sequels

And see also Dexter: Original Sin 1.1: Activation of the Code ... 1.2-1.3: "The Finger Is Missing" ... 1.4: The Role of Luck in Dexter's Profession and Life ... 1.5: Revelations and Relations ... 1.6: On the Strong, Non-Serial-Killer Parts of the Show ... 1.7: First Big Shocker ... 1.8: Dexter's Discovery ... 1.9: Brian's Story ... Season 1 Finale: Satisfying

And see also Dexter: New Blood 1.1: Back with a Vengeance ... Dexter: New Blood 1.2: Dark Tendencies ... Dexter: New Blood 1.3: Fathers and Sons ... Dexter: New Blood 1.4: Harrison and Kurt ... Dexter New Blood: 1.5: No Satisfaction for Serial Killers ... Dexter: New Blood 1.6: Breaks and Arm Breaks ... Dexter: New Blood: 1.7: Dexter vs. Kurt ...Dexter: New Blood 1.8: The Hug in the Car ... Dexter: New Blood 1.9 One Down, One To Go ... Dexter: New Blood Finale: Superb, and I Didn't Like It All

And see also Dexter Season 8 Premiere: Mercury in Retrograde, Dexter Incandescent ... Dexter 8.2: The Gift ... Dexter 8.3: The Question and the Confession ... Dexter 8.4: The "Lab Rat" and Harry's Daughter ... Dexter 8.5: Just Like Family ... Dexter 8.6: The Protege ... Dexter 8.7: Two Different Codes? ... Dexter 8.8: "A Great Future" ... Dexter 8.9: The Psycho Son ... Dexter 8.10: Watch Out, Buenos Aires ... Dexter 8.11: "Not the Old Dexter" ... Dexter Series Finale: Solitude, Style, and a Modicum of Hope

And see also Dexter Season 7.1-3: Sneak Preview Review ... Dexter 7.4: The Lesson in Speltzer's Smoke ... Dexter 7.5: Terminator Isaac ... Dexter 7.6: "Breaking and Entering" ... Dexter 7.7: Shakespearean Serial Killer Story ... Dexter 7.8: Love and Its Demands ... Dexter 7.9: Two Memorable Scenes and the Ascension of Isaac ... Dexter 7.11: The "Accident" ... Dexter Season 7 Finale: The Surviving Triangle

And see also Dexter Season 6 Sneak Preview Review ... Dexter 6.4: Two Numbers and Two Killers Equals? ... Dexter 6.5 and 6.6: Decisive Sam ... Dexter 6.7: The State of Nebraska ... Dexter 6.8: Is Gellar Really Real? .... Dexter 6.9: And Geller Is ... ... Dexter's Take on Videogames in 6.10 ...Dexter and Debra:  Dexter 6.11 ... Dexter Season 6 Finale: Through the Eyes of a Different Love

And see also Dexter Season Five Sneak Preview Review ... Dexter 5.4: Dexter's Conscience ...Dexter 5.8 and Lumen ... Dexter 5.9: He's Getting Healthier ... Dexter 5.10: Monsters -Worse and Better ... Dexter 5.11: Sneak Preview with Spoilers  ... Dexter Season 5 Finale: Behind the Curtain

And see also Dexter Season 4: Sneak Preview Review ... The Family Man on Dexter 4.5 ...Dexter on the Couch in 4.6 ... Dexter 4.7: 'He Can't Kill Bambi' ... Dexter 4.8: Great Mistakes ...4.9: Trinity's Surprising Daughter ... 4.10: More than Trinity ... 4.11: The "Soulless, Anti-Family Schmuck" ... 4.12: Revenges and Recapitulations

And see also reviews of Season 3: Season's Happy Endings? ... Double Surprise ... Psychotic Law vs. Sociopath Science ... The Bright, Elusive Butterfly of Dexter ... The True Nature of Miguel ...Si Se Puede on Dexter ... and Dexter 3: Sneak Preview Review

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 

Ejection of Breitbart Reporter from Beto Speech Is Inconsistent with Democracy

I just saw the news that a Breitbart reporter, Joel B. Pollak, who actually is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News, was ejected, apparently for no valid reason (he wasn't being disruptive, his mere presence was deemed as such) from a Beto O'Rourke speech at Benedict College.

Before I tell you why I think that was such a bad move, let me make two things clear:

1. I intensely disagree with Breitbart's political views.  The last and only time I voted Republican was for John Linsday for NYC Mayor in 1969 (because he was an early opponent of the Vietnam War).  He won, and two years later became a Democrat.

2.  I don't think what Beto's people did is literally a violation of the First Amendment.  A political candidate not currently in office is not a member of Congress ("Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press") or of any government (prohibited from abridging speech by the extension of the First Amendment in the Fourteenth Amendment).

But, the removal of any reporter on account of his or her political views is grievously in violation of the spirit of the First Amendment, and flies in the face of what the First Amendment is designed to protect, which is the public's right to information and opinions about people in office and people running for office.  How else can a democracy work, if we're not as thoroughly informed as possible, meaning exposed to the entire gamut of political views and actions?

Trump's daily denunciation of the press he finds unwelcome as fake news echos Hitler's attack on the press in 1930s Germany as the Lügenpresse or the lying press.  Trump's characterization of the press critical of him as "enemies of the people" picks up a favorite phrase of Stalin.  Further, Trump not only speaks these epithets, but acts upon them, recently revoking CNN political correspondent Brian Karem's press pass after an exchange between Karem and Trump supporter Sebastian Gorka.  Karem has taken this to court. (The White House backed down last year after taking away CNN correspondent Jim Acosta's pass, and Acosta filed suit.  Acosta and CNN were lambasted as "fake news" by Trump even back when he was President-elect, in January 2017.) 

In tossing out Pollak, Beto's campaign is joining Trump in his contempt for the press, and by extension the American people, which I assume is the last thing that Beto wants to do.  People on Twitter, typically seeking to justify any attack on the right, have sought to explain what happened to Pollak by saying he isn't really a reporter and Breitbart not a legitimate source of news.  That, alas, is a traditional fascist tactic, used to justify suppression and even killing of human beings by arguing that the victims are not fully or really human.

Beto O'Rourke and his campaign can do better than emulating Trump and his fascist tactics.  I hope they see the light and apologize to Pollak.  It would amount to an apology to our democracy.