Eric Stonestreet Returning for ‘Dexter: Resurrection’ Season 2; Krysten Ritter’s Role Teased

Eric Stonestreet is returning to the Dexter franchise as fellow serial killer Rapunzel, and Krysten Ritter‘s resurrection was made a bit clearer during the show’s newsy Thursday panel at New York Comic Con.

“I love the surprise of people seeing me in that role. I love the challenge of bringing my game. But I also love that he’s a family guy who seemingly has it all, which is what somebody else might covet and is jealous of in some ways,” Stonestreet said about why he wanted to return to the role of Al Walker a.k.a. Rapunzel for season two, which releases on Paramount+ Oct. 30. “I like the duality of that and knowing what an awful, awful person Al is, is really fun to play.”

Stonestreet recalled his initial brush with the series, which came before he landed his role on the Emmy-winning comedy he starred on for 11 seasons, Modern Family. “I was a grinding actor going on every audition that I was fortunate enough to get, and Dexter popped up on my fax machine back then,” he said. “I made my way over to Paramount, looked for parking for probably an hour and a half, and then made my way in to see Clyde, and he said no thank you.

“To put a finer point on it, when you did not get the role in the first season, and had you gotten the role, you would not have been available to audition for Modern Family,” the showrunner noted. Added Stonestreet: “It worked out good. Thank you, Clyde.”

The panel, which was timed to the franchise’s landmark 20th anniversary, featured Michael C. Hall, Uma Thurman in her first New York Comic Con appearance, James Remar, Jack Alcott, Bokeem Woodbine and Krysten Ritter, as well as showrunner and executive producer Clyde Phillips and executive producers Reynolds and Marcos Siega.

The second season of Dexter: Resurrection sees Hall’s Dexter Morgan “caught between two killers — one with decades of notoriety and a lifetime of kills behind him, and the other a fresh young face terrorizing New York in ways no one has ever seen.” Dexter will also battle a new, unexpected enemy — a mid-life crisis — as Harrison (Alcott) continues his own pursuit of justice as father and son face their darkest chapter yet.

Alongside Stonestreet’s return, Ritter is also back to the Dexter universe, but the cast and crew were more careful about not spoiling how. Her character, Lady Vengeance, died last season, but Ritter had teased to The Hollywood Reporter that she was keeping her fingers crossed about a resurrection of some sort.

“If you’re a fan of the show and you saw New Blood, we shot and killed Michael at the end of New Blood in the last in season one of Resurrection, Krysten was pronounced dead at the prison, and here they both are,” Phillips teased.

“The chemistry was undeniable, and we all looked at each other when we were shooting when Lady Vengeance died, and we thought, this can’t be the end of this thing,” added Siega. Added Reynolds: “She has a profound effect upon Dexter.”

While speaking to what’s ahead for the series, Phillips said the franchise’s location shift to New York “just brings an energy that I don’t think Miami had. Quite frankly, we’re in an environment where we really get to show the city as a character, and you know it’s a place where your Dexter gets to cross paths with a lot of interesting people, and no place better to hunt than in New York City.”

When asked about whether the location and focus changes this season will affect if Dexter is still an apex predator, according to Reynolds, “I mean, absolutely, but it’s a different kind of challenge. The core of Dexter, despite how dark he is and the stuff that he does — he kills people. You guys know that, right? But he’s optimistic at his core in a way that I think really launches into all of us, and why we love Dexter so much,” he shared. “Dexter’s thinking, ‘Can I have a family? Can I have it all?’ Questions that a lot of us will think about, whether it’s our actual family or friends that would make a family. Ultimately at the end of that season, it’s: no, he can’t, literally and figuratively. And yet Dexter’s like, ‘Maybe I can.’ I think that really helps us just love and feel so much hope toward this character.”

In terms of whereHarrison and Dexter will go this season, “It’s nice to jump into a relationship, to the father-son relationship, with that little time skip, because we get to sit into a space where there’s familiarity and there’s there’s comfortability. The conflicts and the tension that you’re going to experience with somebody that you don’t know very well, it’s a different set of conflicts. It’s a different color. It’s a new flavor of what you’re going to run up against.”

When it comes to Harrison’s love interest in season two, Reynolds shared that, “It’s really fun too because we placed Harrison between his father, who he very much loves and respects, and the sense of justice that his father has. Then he’s part of the cops, as you’ve probably seen online and he’ll be working possibly with Claudette, who has her own very moral code. So it’s fun to watch him play.”

At another point, while teasing the first episode, Hall noted that “some time passes before we rejoin the show, and we fill in the blanks with a montage of sorts. I got to do a number of scenelets with some really, really amazing people who were playing these unsavory victims. That was fun.”

During the panel, the cast also reflected on their introductions to the franchise and why they took on roles in the Paramount+ universe. For Thurman, “I think it’s the best decision I ever made in my life, was to be the security guard.”

“I received this script, and I don’t know. I’m not jaded. I swear. I just — my heart sinks when I go to crack a script. I’m just like, let’s see — and I couldn’t put it down. I burned through the whole season,” she continued. “Clyde and I had a Zoom that went on for about 90 minutes, and I just completely fell for the whole situation. I was like, you don’t need me. I mean, I’m a security guard. And I’m so glad.”

Thurman was also quick to speak up about how the set environment has been one of the better she’s experienced in her career. “I think there’s this incredibly high standard, both of moral character and warmth from the top down,” said Thurman. “People are treated with respect on the set from every single department across. It brings out the best in people. It’s not hard, shouldn’t be, but it’s so prevalent in this environment that as a very serious veteran of the show business profession, I will say it is absolutely a gift to get to have this kind of working community.”

Added Ritter: “It’s a well-oiled machine, and you hear that about productions, but this one really is. I think because everybody’s been together for so long, it works, and you feel that when you get to set. Everybody is bringing their A game, and the way Marcos shoots is really efficient, so you have to be really efficient. It keeps you energized, it keeps you on your toes, and somehow Michael ends up going deeper every take, which makes you so much more engaged every take.”

Explaining how the show is able to pull actors like Stonestreet, Ritter and Thurman, Phillips first pointed to Hall. “It’s Michael. Everybody wants to work with Michael. He attracts these stars to come be on the show like this. Also, it’s the writers. We have a great writing room, and we work hard to tell [these stories].”

He later added how potential stars are pitched on their roles, noting that the writers break the entire season so actors know exactly what they’re getting into. “We write all 10 scripts so that when the actors get them, they get the book of what the season is going to be, and they know they’re not going to get screwed over in the end,” he said. “They know what the ending is, and then they can make the decision if they want whether or not they want to be involved, which is why we have such an amazing cast.”

Earlier in the panel, Hall along with the rest of the cast reflected on the launch of the franchise, with the franchise’s long-running star noting, “We made this pilot just hoping that the first season would get picked up. It seemed like a crazy proposition to invite people to identify with a character like this, but it worked.”