Dexter has one of the all-time great opening sequences. This song is composed by Rolfe Kent, who has scored a lot of movies, but I hope he’s remembered forever for this. This song feels like it’s being meticulously plucked on its various instruments (mostly strings). The notes don’t blend into each other, they stand in stark contrast with each other. And Dexter is not a man who allows the notes of his life to blend. He’s a family man and police consultant, and he’s also a serial killer who KILLS SERIAL KILLERS (spoiler alert). The music draws along strings as delicate as the ones Dexter uses to draw lines in his life, and also to mark lines of blood splatter in his line of work.

As far as the video goes, it is the strongest argument for HD in all of history. Watch it in standard definition:

It is Just. Not. The Same. The video was largely supervised and edited by Eric Anderson (edited with Josh Bodnar, directed with Colin Davis), and designed largely by Anthony Vitagliano, animated with Nick Campbell and designed with Lindsay Daniels. This crowd works over at Digital Kitchen, who’s responsible for the opening titles to True Blood AND Six Feet Under.

This sequence has to accomplish two things. One is that it shows day-to-day life as being unspeakably grisly. We know the show’s about a serial killer who KILLS SERIAL KILLERS so we look throughout for clues about Dexter’s bloody crimes. Tight zooms-in let us see the violence in making Canadian bacon for breakfast, in shaving, in tying your sneakers.

Way back in college I took a class called “Post-Modernism in Film” which was NOT exciting but DID count toward my major (which was not film). The teacher was a world-renowned anti-futurist (what?) who showed us the opening scene from Pixar’s Toy Story, where young Andy tosses Woody around his house. He bumps Woody into banisters and walls, and generally treats him with the carefree abandon of a small child with a toy. The teacher paused the movie. “Andy or Sid?” he asked. While I still don’t care for this class, it definitely helped me understand the way that context is key. We know Andy loves Woody, so we don’t register what he does as violence. We know Dexter kills people, so we read his every action as dangerous.

Jim Emerson at the Chicago Sun-Times observes the real sinister nature of the opening sequence; the thing that actually DOES tell us Dexter’s a serial killer, even if we went into the show without knowing it.

Creating, assembling, integrating, asserting, and maintaining a personality is routine for most of us, but there’s no denying it’s hard work. Some of us have to do it from scratch every day.

This is not just a day in the life of Dexter Morgan. This is EVERY day in the life of Dexter Morgan. His routine is vital to his ability to keep his act together, and his ability to convince us he’s normal. And, like a Michael Haneke movie, Dexter lets us in the audience know that he sees us there, and he dares us to stop him. Emerson again:

We get a clear view of Dexter’s face for the first time. He looks us in the eye. For just a little too long. It’s uncomfortable. For us, not so much him. He’s pretty sure he can present a “normal” face to the world. He’s been doing it all this life, every day.

We see Dexter pulled together, the complete look, as he leaves his apartment and heads out into the world in the harsh light of day. His shoulders are a little hunched, held a bit too high. His walk, his taut expression, even his wardrobe — something’s off. They’re all stiff. Over-determined, controlled. Dexter catches our eye and flashes an unconvincing but polite smile. Cordial without being warm. Sociopathic. He knows we know. But nobody else does. It’s our little secret.