Debra Morgan Deserved Better

My favourite complex female character

Jennifer Carpenter’s portrayal of Debra Morgan in Dexter will forever be one of my favourite performances in a TV series. She brings to life a complicated, nuanced character, full of raw emotion and extreme dedication.

(PS, if you haven’t seen the show all the way through, there will be a few spoilers so please read at your own discretion!)

We’re introduced to Deb in season one as slightly dorky, eager, and foulmouthed, working in Vice, though she’d determined to be in the Homicide department at Miami Metro. Throughout the entire show, Deb is quite expressive of her emotions, often confusing her brother, Dexter, not only because of his lack of understanding social cues and ideas, but because sometimes she didn’t even understand herself why she was upset. She oftentimes uses her heart more than her head, letting her emotions take power in situations. While this affected her role at Miami Metro when she finally did get transferred to Homicide, especially later in the show when she is promoted to Lieutenant, it also kept her human and raw, kept her accountable, and drove her to follow through on cases that others in her department wanted to keep cut and dry, for reasons personal or otherwise.

Deb has a strong moral compass, determined to bring justice to the villains of society. She believes no one is above the law, and that rules are in place for a reason. This belief starts to crack when she discovers at the end of season 6 that Dexter is a serial killer. She tells him early in season 7 that she was close to arresting him the morning after she discovered his dark side, that she couldn’t believe the monster he was. Throughout the last two seasons, she is greatly afflicted by her need to protect Dexter, and her need to serve justice. Despite her guilt and disgust towards his tendencies, she keeps him safe, and even gets involved in some of his “extra-curricular activities” to help him from getting caught, not only because Dexter is her brother whom she loves dearly, but because she is not in a place to lose anyone else in her life. Deb had quite the tumultuous childhood, always feeling second place to Dexter, and losing both her parents early on, but even in adulthood, she has a rocky personal life. In season 1, she gets engaged to a serial killer, unbeknownst to her until he tries to kill her, and in season 4, she loses the man she loves to another killer. All she has known in her life is loss, and putting Dexter in prison could meaning losing him, too.

I found myself quite angry with her character development over the last 3 seasons because I thought she had so much potential, and instead her storyline fell quite flat. In season 6, Deb has to see a therapist to discuss her wellness following a particular case. After a few sessions, discussing not the case, but her personal life and the issues she has faced in love and relationships, her therapist suggests that Deb’s trauma bond with Dexter is in fact, her being in love with him. After Deb yells at the psychiatrist and storms out, she ends up getting back in touch with her to divulge her relationship with Dexter, realizing she truly is in love with him, and decides to confess her feelings to him. While her initial plan to tell him was thwarted by the discovery of his secret, she does end up telling him later in season 7.

I personally thought this storyline was ill-developed, and made no sense in the context of the later seasons. Had the idea been introduced as part of their trauma bond in the first few seasons, and we saw Deb working through the nature of these feelings, I think it could have been better executed. However, it threw quite a curveball in the middle of season 6, and I felt as though it was a poor attempt to explain Deb’s close relationship with Dexter. I had always viewed the two as having a deep bond because of losing both their parents, and being the only close family in each other’s life. I think it was an underdeveloped concept, and it really undermined Deb as a character, and dumbed their relationship down.

I’ve read a lot of discourse online surrounding Deb as a character, and found mixed reviews. While a lot of people like her, there are a lot of those who disliked her, calling her annoying and even going as far as referring to her as a “bop”. The problem I have with this is that while, yes, Deb has had a lot of romantic relationships, it did not go without reason. Other than the obvious fact that she lost two of her partners to extenuating circumstances, Deb also has severe trust issues, due to her past (and also her fiancé from season 1). Another point that is brought up is that she cheated on one of her boyfriends, and while I do not agree with her infidelity, she showed immediate remorse following it, and didn’t keep it a secret for a prolonged period of time. It was a lapse of judgment, and it doesn’t define her as a character. Furthermore, a lot of the people who dislike Deb for this reason don’t often take into account the way Dexter treated Rita while Lila was in his life, and Dexter is not a commonly disliked character among the show’s fans. There are quite a few other characters on the show (all men) who treat relationships with the same flightiness, and even providing crass descriptions of their sex lives, and I have yet to see someone call them “bops”. The disdain towards Deb due to her romantic relationships goes without a strong argument, and based on the way her male counterparts are treated for the same behaviours, I would say that it is an inherently misogynistic view.

While I hated the ending of Dexter for a variety of reasons, one of the biggest factors was Deb’s death. I found out two days before I watched the last episode that she was going to die, and even though I was expecting it, I was still completely heartbroken when she did. I felt that she deserved a happy ending more than anyone else, and that there was still so much more left for her to accomplish. Not to mention, her character arc over the last few seasons was so rocky, that I felt the writers owed it to her to have some sort of redemption. She was the most resilient, hardworking character, and I take the ending she was given quite personally.

In full transparency, I did have moments throughout the show in which I did question certain actions from Deb, and felt that didn’t she didn’t always go about things in the right way. My feelings about her wavered during some of the changes she underwent in the first few seasons, but towards the end of the series, I realized how real her character felt, and despite her tendency to say the wrong thing, I appreciated how human she was.

XO