Dexter's Michael C Hall on how character surviving gunshot "became increasingly compelling"

But why bring back a character we’ve believed dead for three years?

Speaking to RadioTimes.com, Hall said: "It would have blown my mind to think that we would do eight seasons, let alone return after however many years it was, and do another season, let alone be doing it again."

"I've spent as much time not doing it as I have doing it over the past [20 years]," he explained, though acknowledged it had proven to be the "through line of his acting career".

"I don't know, whether I had returned or not, I think Dexter would remain in the first sentence of anything anybody wrote, if they were to write about what I've done as an actor, and that wouldn't change whether or not we did more.

"But the idea of him surviving that gunshot, and being given some sort of new lease, became increasingly compelling once that conversation started, and I just surrendered."

In Dexter: Resurrection, fans pick up with Dexter after he was shot and left for dead in the snowy woodlands of Iron Lake, a town in Upstate New York.

It doesn’t take long for the character to make his way to Manhattan in a bid to be reunited with his son, Harrison (Jack Alcott), who is trying to build an under-the-radar life for himself as a member of staff at a hotel.

As Dexter finds himself in a tangled web of other serial killers, his close brush with death weighs heavy on his decisions as the series plays out – but as Hall states, that’s kind of the point, with his character wanting to kill off his Dark Passenger sinister side for a fresh start at life, only to find trouble at every turn.

Can Dexter manage to be the good man he’s always wanted to be capable of?

Read more:

• Dexter: Resurrection review – Surprisingly gripping tale breathes new life into story that should be dead
• Dexter boss admits sequel Resurrection isn't "necessary" but says it's "welcome"

"Growth cannot always be about moving forward, but can be about moving back and revisiting something that once was, with the sense of personal wisdom that you didn't have before," Hall teased.

"I feel like maybe that's what Dexter is up to, and that taking responsibility for your mistakes, or your past, or the things that torment you isn't necessarily about putting yourself through hell, but putting those things down.

"I think maybe Dexter has finally come to a place, as we've discussed before, that he's able to do that, and I don't know if there's a shortcut to that.

"I think you have to go through whatever experiences lead you to that being the only choice you can make."

Dexter: Resurrection is now showing on Paramount+ – get a seven day free Paramount+ trial at Amazon Prime Video.

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