Michael C. Hall, who played younger brother David on HBO’s “Six Feet Under,” stars in “Dexter,” the newest one-hour drama from Showtime. The network, which is a distant second to HBO in the pay-cable wars, has done an excellent job developing series over the past few years, finding critical (if not commercial) acclaim with “Huff,” “Brotherhood” and “Weeds,” and “Dexter” seems poised to continue that trend.

Hall plays Dexter Morgan, a forensic blood expert for the Miami-Dade Police Department by day, serial killer by night. Only Hall isn’t your average serial killer (is there such a thing?), he’s a serial killer with morals, only taking the lives of people he believes should be punished. It’s a code of ethics passed down from his adopted father, a homicide cop, who we see throughout the series in flashback, and who apparently had a similar struggle in his life with “the urge.”

The show is weaved together with Hall’s hollow, monotone voiceover — a running inner monologue that provides a glimpse into Dexter’s dark nooks and crannies. The narration provides a second layer to Dexter’s surface life, something akin to listening to a director’s commentary track on a DVD, only we get to hear Dexter comment on his life as he’s living it, rather than looking back on it. By all appearances, Dexter is a normal dude, but underneath his calm demeanor is an unfeeling monster, a sociopath who is only alive in the presence of death, either by piecing together murder scenes for work, or orchestrating them on his own.

The city of Miami is also a character in the show. You can almost feel the hot summer heat on your back as the multi-cultural inhabitants shuffle around to the sounds of salsa and meringue in between scenes.

The show is based on the book “Darkly Dreaming Dexter” by Jeff Lindsay, and Hall’s narration seems culled from chunks of its pages. Dexter is a complex, complicated protagonist, and unlike few we’ve seen on the small screen before. The show’s biggest weak spot in the three episodes we previewed, is its handful of less-interesting supporting characters, namely Dexter’s police lieutenant, who shamelessly makes passes at Dexter. But Hall’s performance and the show’s exciting visuals make the show a cut above the majority of primetime’s dramas, while reinforcing Showtime’s status as a legitimate contender for the pay cable crown. The series airs Sundays at 10 p.m. ET/PT on Showtime.

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