Remember that show Dexter that I wrote about a few months ago?  Well, it debuted last night.

David!  Put down the knife!  Don't make me get Keith to subdue you!

So, what's the verdict?  I'd say I'm intrigued, but not necessarily hooked yet.  It's really effing gruesome (yes, I should have expected that), but has enough psychological drama to keep me interested.

To bring you up to speed/refresh your memory, Dexter's title character is a Miami forensics expert (he specializes in blood spatters and, boy, do the set designers exploit that for all it's worth) who moonlights as a homicidal vigilante.  While he comes off as nice (charming, even) to all his co-workers, but no one suspects anything about his double life.  That is, unless you count a fellow cop (the black, bald guy above who I keep thinking is Keith Charles — the character who was Michael C. Hall's lover on Six Feet Under) who constantly berates Dexter for being a loony.

The rest of the cast includes: Dexter's foster sister, a C-minus cop who aspires to be assigned to the homicide division (I'll predict here that she will either a) get whacked at some point b) be the person who catches Dexter in the series finale); Dexter's girlfriend, a former domestic abuse victim who (luckily) isn't really ready to share herself too much, physically, emotionally or otherwise; the police lieutenant who wants to bone Dexter in a bad way; and a detective who Dexter exchanges some token Spanish with.

The artfully shot series premiere began with Dexter seeking revenge on a family man also happens to be as a child murderer. In the opening moments, Dexter is cruising through Miami in his car like Robert DeNiro in Taxi Driver.  He's watching the people on dates, thinking about Cuban pork sandwiches and providing voice-over narration about how he really has no feelings (but has learned how to fake it).  He then hides out in his "victim's" car and waits for him to enter.

The unsuspecting murderer enters and Dexter begins his ritual: he brings him to an undisclosed location and injects him with a sedative.  While the subject is asleep, Dexter binds him to a table with saran wrap and duct tape.  Upon awakening, Dexter cuts his cheek with an exacto knife (yeesh!) and collects a blood sample on a slide (a gross souveneir).  They have some tense chit-chat (that may or may not involve remorse) and then Dexter hacks off their head.

This was all within the first ten minutes of the show and I found myself questioning whether it was a good idea to get invested in a show this disturbing.  Needless to say, I didn't touch the remote.

The main plot of premiere — a storyline which will presumably take up most/all of the season — deals with a serial killer who murders prostitutes, drains the blood and then hacks them into many pieces before laying them all out in order to be found.  When the killer realizes Dexter's on his trail, the game of cat and mouse begins.

In the end, I'd say I definitely liked Dexter.  That is, I liked it enough to add a "Dexter" tag in the right-hand column, indicating that this isn't the last you've heard about it.  Michael C. Hall is great, as always, but it's going to take me a while to separate Dexter (homicidal forensics expert) from David Fisher (obsessive gay funeral director).  I have to admit, it seemed wildly unnatural to see Michael C. Hall kiss a woman.

And on a side note: Six Feet Under premieres tonight on Bravo. It's a beautiful thing.