Earlier this month we found out NBC had picked up an Inception-like pilot from Lone Star creator Kyle Killen. The series, titled REM, is said to be a procedural hybrid which follows the simultaneous and parallel lives of a detective who can not let go of any aspect of his fractured family after a horrible car accident. Now Deadline reports Jason Isaacs (who plays Luciius Malfoy in the Harry Potter franchise) has landed the lead role in the new pilot. Apparently the actor was quite the popular commodity this development season receiving about a half-dozen offers for various new series. This is one pilot I’ll be looking forward to with great interest.

Though she’s taken part in several crime thrillers like Kiss the Girls on the big screen, Ashley Judd is ready to make a jump to her first full-time TV job. TV Line reports the actress is in talks to lead ABC’s new drama series Missing. The show would follow a former CIA agent (Judd) who travels overseas in search of her son who has gone MIA. The series comes from writer Greg Poirier (National Treasure: Book of Secrets) who will also serve as executive producer while Dexter director Steve Shill is set to direct the pilot and several more episodes.

Dexter is a show that works thanks to a Herculean effort by Michael C. Hall.  The show is founded on a precarious premise that depends on you investing in the adventures of a serial killer, anchored by a sardonic inner monologue and visions of a dead father.  And with Chip Johannessen (24) taking the reins for the new season, Dexter is on its third showrunner in five years, which messes with the auteur theory.  It’s not the effort of a singluar creative vision that holds the show together as Showtime’s flagship drama — at least not behind the camera.

Hall is brilliant.  He has three Emmy nominations (plus a fourth for Six Feet Under) to prove it.  Is it any surprise that he’s no less brilliant in the first three episodes of season five, reacting to the closing events of last season in which… Oh.  Wait.  This gets into spoilers for the first four seasons from here on out.  If you’re cool with that, you can find my review of the first quarter of season five of Dexter after the jump.