Almost everyone I know acknowledges Dexter was an amazing show that peaked at the end of season 4 with the Trinity killer and then just took a cliff dive after. The plan was for season 5 to be Dexter being outed as a serial killer and Deb chasing him down and the series ending with Dexter getting the death sentence and seeing all the victims he murdered before he faded out. Perfect fucking ending and would've made the series itself ranked far higher in the long term.
But Showtime was like, "wait, your killing him off now? Fuck you, we can milk this four more seasons and make him a lumberjack!"
You can even tell how bad the change was by the very start of season 5. We saw season 4 he says to deb at the end with cops arriving "I'm a murderer". Season 5, Deb just is like huh, that's odd and goes on to become a completely pointless character for the rest of the series.
That whole thing pissed me off with Showtime and will always be the reason they are shit tier to HBO. Execs shouldn't have that much power over where a show goes and they completely ruined Dexter. I don't trust them with shit if it comes to a drama now. Not unless it is completely finished and people say it was great.
https://www.eonline.com/news/461558...lips-reveals-how-he-planned-to-end-the-series