Dexter: Resurrection Episode 5 brings truth and healing as Dexter confronts his past, Lady Vengeance goes on the hunt, and a shocking arrest is made in Ryan’s case.
Showrunner: Clyde Phillips
Genre: Crime Drama, Mystery
Number of Season 1 episodes: 10
Episode 5 Release Date: August 1, 2025
Where to watch: Stream it on Paramount+ with SHOWTIME
Episode 5 of Dexter: Resurrection might feature the best title of the entire franchise: “Murder Horny”.
In last week’s episode, we met the mysterious billionaire Leon Prater (Peter Dinklage) and attended his macabre little dinner party, which—don’t lie—you found fascinating. I did, too. It was clear that Dexter (Michael C. Hall), as Red, and Mia/Lady Vengeance (Krysten Ritter) connected, as he liked the fact that she seemed to have a code. What he didn’t know then that he finds out this week is that her code might not be a code at all.
Additionally, Episode 5 finally brings together Dexter and Harrison (Jack Alcott) in some deep moments of truth and healing as Dexter confronts and confesses his past to his son. We also follow Lady Vengeance on the hunt, but not before she makes an interesting proposition to Red that risks blowing Dexter’s cover, and that’s not all. In a shocking turn of events, an arrest is made in Ryan’s case that jeopardizes Prater’s privacy.
Dexter comes clean to Harrison
Finally, Dexter makes the move and reveals himself to his son. Episode 5 picks up right where Episode 4 ended: with Harrison about to enter the police station and Dexter stopping him. Harrison is shocked and angry to see his father, confused as to how he’s even alive.
“You’re like a horror movie villain who can’t be killed!” he yells. Dexter knows and doesn’t deny the similarities.
As he talks to Harrison about his Dark Passenger, he begins to see how much that day in Iron Lake (e.g., see Dexter: New Blood season finale) traumatized his son. The weight of Iron Lake and its effects on his psyche and identity are intensely palpable. What happened out there in the woods confused and terrified the boy, and Alcott does a fabulous job here of making sure we feel that in his performance. Dexter makes sure Harrison knows that nothing was his fault, that it was all him, then he apologizes. He then reveals he knows about Ryan Foster (Bryan Lillis).
Harrison panics before Dexter steps in and tells him about the time when he protected a woman from harm and how he would’ve killed the guy had Deb not stopped him. You can see this moment in Dexter: Original Sin Episode 3. Dexter tells Harrison he sees his darkness, then shares his own, starting with his first kill.
However, while the killings serve as releases for Dexter, they are nightmares for Harrison, who is currently “in hell, seeing Ryan’s face everywhere,” consumed with guilt and hearing the incessant ticking of Ryan’s watch in his head everywhere he goes.
Then, in a pivotal, symbolic moment between father and son that Harrison has needed his entire life, Dexter steps up and takes the watch, telling him, “Let me carry it [the weight, the guilt, the memory] for you.” When he does, the ticking in Harrison’s head stops and his guilt is alleviated.
Lady Vengeance proposes a ménage à trois
Mia is one interesting character. Her alter ego, Lady Vengeance, targets sexual predators. This is what piqued Dexter’s interest in her and made him wonder if she also operated by a code.
After seeing Harrison, Dexter and Mia meet up for some bowling alley fun. Don’t worry, though; no one stepped over the line (that’s a Big Lebowski reference for those of you who are lost). As they bond over their strained family relationships, Mia makes an interesting proposition: a ménage à trois. She wants to kill with Red, two against one. Dexter humorously narrates “Lady Vengeance and the Bay Harbor Butcher—it has a ring to it!”
In all seriousness, this clearly poses a problem for Dexter and risks blowing his cover if he agrees to it, but he does after their evening date at a wine bar. She wants to kill his way and says it can be anyone. Dexter’s bubble bursts when he realizes she, in fact, does not kill by a code and doesn’t even have one. Her career started out that way, she admits, but over time, it evolved into her just enjoying killing. In fact, her trophies belong to innocent men, not predators. This makes Dexter queasy, and as they set out for their collaborative kill, Red diverts.
“I’m not ready to bring someone else in on my process. I operate alone,” he says. Mia calls him a tease before telling him he got her all “murder horny,” then she sets out on the hunt for her next victim.
Dexter knows he can’t just kill her; two guests absent from Prater’s next dinner party would be too suspicious. However, he can’t just let her walk free, and he doesn’t plan on doing so.
A shocking arrest is made in the Ryan Murphy case
As Mia sets out on her hunt for prey, Dexter uses the time to break into her apartment. While there, he does a bit more than snoop, though, and that bit more later serves as an exoneration of sorts for him, at least where Harrison is concerned.
After seducing her victim and luring him to her lair, Mia knocks him out with a whack to the head by a wine bottle. Dexter, watching from atop the building across the street, makes an anonymous, panicked call to the cops, which is entertaining for us. When Mia’s victim wakes, he’s unclothed, ball-gagged, and strapped to a device. Dexter watches as, just before Lady Vengeance goes in for the kill, the police kick in the door and arrest her not just for attempted murder but also for the murder of … wait for it … Ryan Foster. Police found his watch amid the other keepsakes in her trophy box.
Boom. Harrison’s problem solved, father protects son.
The arrest of Lady Vengeance is big news, and when Prater gets wind of it, he sends Charley to “make [the problem] go away.” If Mia breaks his rules, his reputation will be at risk, as well as the exposure of his identity as a voyeur vampire of serial killers, not just a philanthropic self-made billionaire orphan.
Harrison experiences a change of heart
Harrison gets a call from Detective Wallace (Kadia Saraf), who asks him to come by the station in regards to why he called and hung up earlier.
Harrison tells her he felt guilty for not having more information and just wanted to see if he could do anything to help. His use of the word guilty catches her attention, and she lets him know he’s officially a suspect. However, when he learns from Elsa (Emilia Suárez) at work that Ryan’s killer has been caught, he’s confused and goes to see his father.
Dexter finally tells Harrison about how he felt when he was born, and about the moment Rita, Dexter’s wife and Harrison’s mom, died. Dexter felt the conflict between being a father and a killer. He admits he let the line blur with the Trinity Killer (John Lithgow) as a mentor, because, as a successful husband, father, and serial killer, Dexter thought he could learn from him. Instead, he allowed Trinity to get close and destroy what he loved, so Dexter killed Trinity.
After hearing his father admit that his mother’s death was inadvertently his fault and that it broke him, Harrison finally understands the why behind this reality he’s tried for so long to make sense of. Harrison has a goodness about him, a humanity that his father never will, and Dexter acknowledges this. He promises never to try and mold Harrison in his image again, and for the first time, Harrison sees his honesty and has a change of heart towards his father.
“I have a lot of reasons to kill,” Dexter says, “but only one reason to live, and that’s you.”
Harrison replies that Dexter is all he has, and thus, this long-strained relationship is finally healed, which means all kinds of space for it to move forward and evolve through the darkness together.
Dexter: Resurrection Episode 5 Review
Episode 5 sees a big moment in Dexter and Harrison’s relationship. Not only does Dexter drop the curtain and reveal his dark truth to regain Harrison’s trust, but he also faces his painful past by sharing it with his son. Furthermore, his fatherly act of protection allows Harrison to feel supported, and the two are forever changed as men, as killers, and the only family each other has.
I wondered how Dexter was going to take care of Lady Vengeance after finding out she’s just like the other killers. An arrest really was the next best option for a takedown to avoid drawing suspicion from Prater, though if Red/Dexter thinks he’s in the clear with Mia, I’d have to say he’s wrong. She’ll figure out he was involved in her arrest somehow, and if/when that happens, you can bank on the showdown being sexy, intense, and likely violent.
Also, in sending Charley to make this Lady Vengeance problem go away, what will happen? Will Prater work some magic to help her escape, or will he have her killed so she isn’t tempted to talk about him and his unconventional interests?
We’ll see what happens next week as the cats come out to play, so stay tuned … and don’t forget, we still have Red’s show-and-tell dinner presentation coming up!
Episode 5 of Dexter: Resurrection is currently streaming on Paramount+ with SHOWTIME. New episodes will be released weekly every Friday through September 12, 2025.
