Warning: Contains spoilers for Dexter: New Blood episode 8.
His identity as Dexter: New Blood’s Iron Lake serial killer has been confirmed, but it is possible that Kurt Caldwell is also a cannibal. As the Dexter revival unfolds, more is revealed about parts of Kurt’s MO and the motivations behind how and why he kills. In Dexter: New Blood episode 8, “Unfair Game,” some new evidence arises that might support the theory that Kurt is eating the remains of his victims.
At the start of Dexter: New Blood, it is revealed that Kurt Caldwell (Clancy Brown) has captured a runaway named Lily (Kimmy Anne Dunn) who he forces to run before he shoots her in the back while wearing full hunting gear. Later, he captures and kills another girl, Chloe (Skylar Wright), but she refuses to participate in his game and he shoots her in the face. In Dexter: New Blood episode 8, after attempting to have Dexter brought to him, Kurt attempts to kill Harrison (Jack Alcott) in a similar fashion as vengeance for Dexter having killed Matt Caldwell.
Several elements of the way that Kurt Caldwell acts in Dexter: New Blood point towards him secretly being a cannibal. There are still some unanswered questions as to how certain parts of his MO would fit into cannibalism and why he might have turned towards it as an option in the first place. Here is all the evidence supporting the theory that Dexter: New Blood’s Kurt Caldwell is a cannibal, and what still needs to be answered in the final episodes.
Kurt Offers Harrison Venison
Kurt Caldwell has spent much of Dexter: New Blood getting close to Harrison and has come to be seen as a sort of father figure by him. This means that he doesn’t think it that strange when Kurt Caldwell invites him over to cook him venison out at his cabin. Before attempting to kill Harrison, Kurt gives him a last meal of venison and scotch and the two appear to bond more.
However, Kurt doesn’t invite Harrison to have food with him until after he has confirmed that Harrison has never had venison before. While this is passed off as Kurt filling in a fatherly role that Dexter has failed to provide by giving Harrison the local cuisine, it could have a darker motivation. If Harrison does not know what venison is supposed to taste like then he would be unlikely to suspect that what Kurt is offering him is not Venison but rather the human remains of Lily or Chloe. This possibility is compounded by the fact that the viewer never gets a clear view of the meat that is being cooked despite a Dexter tradition of showing meat sizzling in a pan. Once the meat is cooked the plates are not shown again until the discernable pieces of meat have already been consumed. This all suggests that Kurt might be a cannibal and could even include feeding his victims human flesh as part of his ritual.
Kurt Drains His Victims Blood
There are a lot of implications throughout the show that a part of Kurt Caldwell’s Dexter: New Blood kill routine is based around ritual and symbolic aspects. While this is particularly obvious with his playing of the song “Runaway” by Del Shannon on vinyl during his kills (a callback to Dexter season 4’s Trinity Killer who played a song on vinyl during the first kill of his cycles), he also dresses in full hunting attire. Given that he is only shooting one person from his front stoop, this seems a little excessive but does emphasize the view that he is hunting them like animals.
After Kurt kills Lily in Dexter: New Blood episode 3, “Smoke Signals,” he is then seen cleaning her body and draining it of blood. This drew a lot of comparisons to the blood drained victims of Dexter season 1’s Ice Truck Killer who retained his victims’ blood to eventually stage a bloody crime scene and remind Dexter of his past. For Kurt, however, there is no reason provided as to why he would want to drain their blood and no indication that he keeps it afterward. The draining of the blood makes the most sense if he is effectively bleeding his kills so that he can prepare to butcher and eat his victims. This is possibly hinted at by the inclusion of a scene where Dexter visits a butcher who is at work, bleeds out the white deer after it is dead, and the later presence of the white deer at the butcher’s shop.
Where Does Kurt Hide The Bodies?
If Kurt Caldwell is eating the flesh of his victims in Dexter: New Blood, then it would go a long way to explaining what he does with the bodies. Much of the second and third episodes of the revival series detail Dexter trying to find a long-term solution for how to dispose of Matt Caldwell’s body and emphasizes how so many of the possible options are not truly viable. If Kurt is eating the meat, then he might be able to process the rest of the remains more easily.
After Dexter: New Blood episode 3, it seemed probable that Kurt Caldwell was hiding the bodies of his many victims in the caves north of town. When Angela Bishop (Julia Jones) informed him that the search for Matt was going to go out as far as Clarke Caves he quickly had the search called off. However, it was later revealed that only one set of remains was in those caves: those of Angela’s friend Iris, who was likely Kurt’s first kill. This leaves the story with a need to explain how Kurt is actually disposing of his victims’ bodies, and while cannibalism might be a grisly possibility, it would fit with a lot of the setup for Kurt’s MO.
Why Does Kurt Try To Fix Chloe's Face?
The big question that remains unanswered about how Kurt Caldwell’s Dexter: New Blood kills could lead to cannibalism comes from his post kill care for the bodies. Cleaning the bodies and draining the blood can be seen as consistent with the preparation of the victims to be consumed as meat - however, there is more to Kurt’s work than that. After he has killed Lily it appears that he is putting an unknown chemical into the body that could suggest that he is performing embalming on the remains. After he has killed Chloe, he is upset that he shot her in the face rather than the back, and works to unsuccessfully build a patch for her face to hide the wound.
Both of these actions would not be necessary if he intended to eat the meat, but might not preclude it depending on what the chemical inserted into the bodies is. An element of ritual is clear with the washing of the bodies and the listening to particular songs that recur in the Dexter: New Blood soundtrack. This might explain choices such as trying to repair Chloe’s face if the goal is to rebuild the remains that were left behind after he killed Iris. Ultimately, while there are some details that could do with more explanation, there is a lot of evidence to suggest that Dexter: New Blood’s Kurt Caldwell is a cannibal and just fed Harrison the remains of one of his victims.
Dexter: New Blood Is Paying Homage To Original Dexter Killers
One more element that points to Kurt Caldwell having cannibalistic tendencies tied up in his kill pattern comes from a more meta reading of Dexter: New Blood and the original eight seasons of Dexter. After the controversial end of the original series, the revival series has paid homage to some of the best moments while working to fix some of the show’s injustices. As noted above, Kurt’s MO mimics aspects of the Dexter season 1 Ice Truck Killer (who turned out to be Dexter’s brother, Brian Moser) and the season 4 Trinity Killer (Arthur Mitchell, played by John Lithgow who has already had a Dexter: New Blood cameo), and the show has repeatedly referenced the Bay Harbor Butcher which was attributed to James Doakes in Dexter season 2 (although it was Dexter himself). By having Kurt Caldwell be an occasional cannibal, Dexter: New Blood can fit in one more reference to the original series, as one of the Dexter season 8 kills was Ron Galuzzo (Andrew Elvis Miller), a cannibal he suspected of being the Brain Surgeon.
Dexter: New Blood releases new episodes Sundays on Showtime.