An Edmonton man named Mark Andrew Twitchell from Canada has been arrested on suspicion of murder after a man named Johnny Brian Altinger went missing after setting up a blind internet date . Why is this in my TV news, you ask? Because Mark Andrew Twitchell was a huge Dexter fan, and had written a screenplay in which a male killer who also happens to work in a forensics unit - yes, exactly like Dexter Morgan - lures a cheating husband to his death by pretending to be a woman on the internet, decapitating his victim with a power saw. Well, at least he got slightly creative with that last part, if you don't count every single gorefest B horror movie this guy certainly also saw. Not to make light of a homicide, but so much of this is so unoriginal, from the doing exactly what the TV says, to the writing of a screenplay (Remember the Virginia Tech killer's screenplay, Richard McBeef ?) to the Dateline NBC gotcha, to the chainsaw. Hell, he even has three names, like every killer ever - John Wayne Gacy, Lee Harvey Oswald, Mark David Chapman. Although his victim also has three names, so maybe that's an Edmonton thing. But mostly this is really frustrating to Dexter fans like us, who now fear the inevitable backlash this homocidal idiot will create for a show we love. Melissa Rosenberg, the show's executive producer, had this to say when she heard about the murder:
Every time you think you're identifying with Dexter and rooting for him, for us it's about turning that back on you and saying: 'You may think that he's doing good, but he's a monster. He's killing because he's a monster.'
Well, this guy is apparently all text and no subtext. Why couldn't you just fantasize about killing people, like the rest of us, Mark Andrew Twitchell? When you hear the demons in your head, Psycho Killer, fa fa fa fa far better run run run run run run run away from them.
-- Jake Kalish is the author of Santa vs. Satan: The Official Compendium of Imaginary Fights