What Did They Do To Dexter?

[Brian Damage]

February 11, 2008 -- FOR a series whose title character is a compul sive serial killer and whose murders are ritualistic and bloody, the editing of Showtime's "Dexter" for airing on CBS is easier than you might think.

How hard could it be? Like "Dexter," CBS' most popular shows - the "CSIs" and the other cop shows -are awash in severed body parts and blood-spattered crime scenes.

In that environment, Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall), who is a forensics technician with the Miami police force, should feel right at home. The first season of "Dexter," seen originally on Showtime in 2006, begins a 12-week run on co-owned CBS next Sunday night at 10 - with some judicious tweaking, of course.

"Language was probably the biggest thing," said Bob Greenblatt, president of entertainment for Showtime who worked with editors to prepare "Dexter" for the transition from anything-goes pay cable to sponsor-supported broadcast TV.

"There's no real sexuality" in "Dexter," he said on the phone from LA. "It was really language . . . and we shortened, very minutely, a couple of shots of pools of blood or the length of time you see a severed limb on screen, but only small deletions."

Violence and its aftermath are OK in some form or another, but not the F-word, which gets replaced in the CBS version of "Dexter" with the usual substitutes, including "freakin' " and "mother lover."

In this, the editors of "Dexter" were lucky since there aren't really that many F-bombs delivered in "Dexter," anyway.

The "Dexter" editors even caught a break from the series' principal story line: The emergence of a serial killer (not Dexter) who removes all the blood from the remains of his victims, resulting in crime scenes that are literally bloodless.

"Dexter" is the only series on TV that you might say has benefited from the writers' strike. It was the strike that spurred CBS in the first place to go in search of an alternative drama series to fill in its regularly scheduled programs.

The good news is that "Dexter," a show about butchery, isn't butchered at all in its edited-for-CBS version. I watched the first episode last week and the show still looks great - colorful and sun-splashed, as befits its south Florida setting.

And the character of Dexter is as troubling as ever - his creepy, dual nature undiminished in the transition to CBS.

Outwardly, he's still amiable as a Boy Scout, while inwardly he is calculating, emotionless and coldly capable of concealing horrible secrets.

I am such a huge fan of this series that watching it "graduate" largely intact to broadcast TV, where it has a chance to be sampled by many millions more than saw it on Showtime, actually gives me a thrill.

Enjoy the freakin' show.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/02112008...ter__43810.htm