Dexter Season 6 Episode 2 - "Once Upon a Time..."

Once a Wolf Always a Wolf?

“Once Upon a Time…” opens with Dexter espousing his belief in the power of rituals, specifically the bedtime rituals for putting Harrison to bed. Dexter feels that he can “be himself” with Harrison, though we learn that Harrison is already picking up on some of Dexter’s secrets.

This leads Dexter to ask (rhetorically) if it’s possible for wolves to become sheep. This is a question about redemption.

In response to this question, we meet Brother Sam (played by Mos – formerly Mos Def). Brother Sam used to be a wolf – he was a thief who graduated to murder (and got off free). Before he went to prison (on an unrelated drug charge), he was on Dexter’s short list. Brother Sam is out of prison and now runs an auto shop called Good Shepherd Repair. Good Shepherd is Brother Sam’s new identity: he shepherds former inmates towards a new life.

Brother Sam is in the business of turning wolves into sheep.

Dexter is naturally suspicious of Brother Sam’s alleged conversion. In his mind, Sam must still pay for the murder he got away with. But when Dexter visits Good Shepherd Auto Shop, he surprised by the Sam he meets. Sam seems truly to have become a shepherd. He seems truly to love his flock. He freely confesses his crime to Dexter, admits that he must pay for his sins. But for Brother Sam, redemption looks not like Dexter’s kill table, but the Good Shepherd Auto Shop. Sam sees his shepherding as redemptive, his service as restorative. Looking at a car that’s just been towed into his shop, Sam muses with Dexter that

Nothing broke that can’t be fixed… no car is ever totaled. Like a man’s life, a man’s soul.

In Dexter’s world, this is too good to be true. Dexter believes himself to be beyond redemption. He’s a monster, a wolf. He can’t change, and he doesn’t believe Sam has changed either. That Sam can change.

According to Dexter, redemption is a fairy tale. Wolves will always be wolves. Monsters don’t get happy endings.

But Dexter’s been wrong before. And he’s wrong again about Sam. Sam rescues Nick, one of his employees/sheep, from his own relapse into drugs. Sam seems to have changed. So if Sam can change, what about Dexter?

Choose Your Savior

Episode 2 presents two different understandings of atonement and salvation, through Brother Sam and Professor Gellar. Both men have a sheep they’re trying to save. For Sam, it’s his employee, Nick. For Gellar, it’s Travis.

Both Nick and Travis are torn between their past and the promise of salvation their mentor offers. Nick wants to revert back to his life of drugs, his old gang/family. Travis has sacrificed his relationship with his older sister. They clearly used to be close, until Travis took up with Gellar. Now, she belongs to the old world – Gellar indicates that she cannot be saved.

Both Nick and Travis see their old worlds as evil, sinful, but both still desire them. They need to be saved from them.

But what does that salvation look like? How will their mentors rescue these sheep from the evil wolves of the world? Therein lies the major difference between the two would-be saviors. Interestingly enough, both men embody pictures of Jesus' salvation the Church has used to explain Salvation.

Brother Sam becomes the Good Shepherd of John 10. While Dexter watches, Sam goes out into the evil world (Nick’s old, evil life, represented by Nick’s house). Nick doesn’t want to come, so Sam knocks him out (he later compares it to a Shepherd breaking a sheep’s leg). Sam brings Nick back to the sheep pen (Sam’s auto shop) to care for him. As he and Dexter discuss Sam’s unique method of “shepherding” the ex-cons, Nick’s gang shows up (whom Dexter refers to as wolves). They threaten to kill Sam if he doesn’t give Nick over to them, and Sam offers up his own life instead.

In this model of Salvation, pain and death are the consequences of our own choices. Just as Nick chose to go back home, so too we choose to live toxic lives. The Shepherd rescues us out of those consequences, going so far as to substitute himself for us. Taking the consequences of our actions on himself, even if that means dying for his sheep. As Jesus said in John 10:11,

I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. (NRS)

In the face of death, Sam the Good Shepherd quotes Psalm 37:37 to the wolf threatening his sheep:

Mark the perfect man and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace. (KJV)

Sam’s salvation is one that seeks to bring peace to all people. He is the Good Shepherd who is willing to die to bring that peace to his sheep.

This is a very different picture of Salvation than we get from Professor Gellar, who models Penal Substitutionary Atonement. When Travis misses an appointment with Gellar because his sister begs him to spend some time together, Gellar is furious. Travis finds him in an abandoned Church.

When he confesses that he has been visiting his sister, Gellar reminds him that he must give her up, since she can’t be saved. When Travis is reluctant to embrace Gellar’s worldview, Gellar pulls a hot poker from a fire he’s tending. With Travis watching (and expecting to receive the poker’s punishment), Gellar sears his own flesh, asking

Is this what you want, Travis? To hurt me? You see how I suffer for your sins?

Travis falls to his knees, begging Gellar to stop while swearing total allegiance, finally forsaking his old world in the form of his sister.

In this model of Salvation, pain and death are punishments poured out by a vengeful God. Just as Travis worshiped Gellar in response to Gellar’s suffering, so too God pours our punishment onto Jesus in our place. We worship God out of fear and awe, and perhaps out of gratitude for sparing us punishment.

Gellar punishes the wicked for transgressing Gellar’s arbitrary laws. Gellar is willing to suffer to show everyone how righteous he is – even if he as to invent that suffering.

Gellar is the Avenging Angel who brings punishment to the wicked and salvation only to those who fearfully follow him.

Important differences between Sam the Good Shepherd and Gellar the Avenging Angel

1. Sam goes after his lost sheep. Gellar stays in the Holy Place waiting for his sheep to come to him.
2. Sam’s suffering is on behalf of his sheep. Sam bears the consequences the sheep bring on themselves. Gellar suffers in front of his sheep. He bears the consequences he chooses inflicts on them.
3. As a result, Sam motivates through encouragement and love. His self-sacrifice is to protect his sheep. Gellar motivates through fear and guilt. His self-sacrifice is to manipulate his sheep.
4. Sam hopes for the redemption of the wolves, too (he offers to pray for the gang-leader, Julio). Gellar has written off even the good, like Travis’ sister, who are for whatever reason outside his plan for salvation.

Predictions and Resolutions

On a side It already looks like my prediction last week was wrong. Gellar and Travis consider themselves to be agents of Salvation. It’s technically possible they might think that comes through Satan, but it looks like they’re being set up against Sam as two alternative models of Christian salvation.

Score so far: Dexter Writers 1, JR. 0. My predictions based on this episode:

1. It’s interesting that Dexter’s model of justice is retributive (giving the criminals what they deserve – death), aligning more closely with Gellar’s at this point. What might it look like for Dexter to embrace Sam’s restorative model of justice?
2. Gellar’s apocalyptic scenario will involve him sacrificing himself to stave off doomsday. He’s got a messiah complex. Will it cost Travis his life, too? Or will his sister’s love save him from Gellar?
3. Gellar and Travis’ presentation of the jogger they killed at the end of the episode will involve lambs’ horns and a snake in the victim’s mouth, to mimic the Land Beast in Revelation 13:11.
4. Given all this talk of monsters, wolves and sheep, we’re going to see a lot more of Revelation played out. Sam will represent Jesus the Lamb/Shepherd and Gellar will end up as Satan/ the Dragon. But where will Dexter fall?
5. Hail Mary Prediction: Sam will sacrifice himself to save Dexter. This will be Dexter’s opportunity to sacrifice his own inner wolf. Will he do it?

A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing

Dexter’s Dark Passenger has been his only faithful companion throughout his life. The one constant. Everyone else has either abandoned him (Harry and Lumen), turned on him (Miguel Prado, Lila and Rudy), or doesn’t know the real him (pretty much everyone else). Could Dexter truly be free of his darkness? He asks Brother Sam that very question when Sam tells Dexter his story of redemption:

Dexter: So that darkness inside is gone? Sam: No, it’s still there. I’m fighting it everyday. I really don’t have a choice. I sacrificed that dark part of my soul to make up for some of the pain I’ve caused.

Sam claims to vanquish his darkness every day through the Holy Spirit. Dexter can’t decide if it’s the Holy Spirit or Sam’s own Darkness. Perhaps only time will tell for Dexter in Season 6. But Brother Sam’s fate will likely be Dexter’s as well.

At the end of the episode, Dexter is once again putting Harrison to bed, but has changed the ritual. Now it’s a ritual that conceals who he really is. Dexter has become a wolf in sheep’s clothing even to Harrison. We can’t help but wonder if he’ll be saved.

Do you think Dexter can change? Can this wolf become a sheep? And be honest: do you want him to?