Dexter: Original Sin Filming Locations: Blockbuster Video



DEXTER: Original Sin Filming Locations - the actual places where the TV show Dexter: Original Sin was filmed.




The location: Deb & Sofia make a buy
outside a Blockbuster Video store.


Q. What is it supposed to be on the show?

    A. A Blockbuster Video store.

Q. Where is it supposed to be on the show?

    A. In or near Miami, Florida.

Q. When did we see it on the show?

    A. We see the video store in Episode 4, of Season 1, when Deb & Sofia meet a young Blockbuster employee outside video store to buy drugs.

    The two are fresh off a disheartening incident at Deb's school, where they were snubbed by some local mean girls, and are rebounding by planning to get high.

    The guy sells them a baggie full of grass, but then asks them if they want cocaine.

    Debra says they would have to try it first, so he offers them a tiny sample. They snort it, and Deb proclaims it is “awesome”. She hands the guy two 20s and looks pleased, ending the short scene.

Q. What is it actually in real life?

    A. This was shot in front of a storefront at a strip mall.

Q. Where can I find it in real life?

A. This scene was filmed outside a shop at 14504 Haynes Street, in Van Nuys, CA.

The strip mall is at the southwest corner of Haynes St. & Van Nuys Blvd, in the San Fernando Valley.




That is a storefront which, at the time, housed an ASAP Glass & Mirror shop.

It's about 5 miles northwest of the studio.

( The scene only shows the exterior of the “Blockbuster” store, they don't go inside. But if you look closely when the door opens, you can catch a very quick glimpse of the interior, and they put up at least one shelf of videos inside. )

Q. How the heck did you figure out where it was?

A.  At first, this looked like it would be very difficult to find. There were no street numbers showing, the Blockbuster was obviously a fake (the chain went out of business a long time ago), and although it's a very distinctive-looking strip mall (with a certain Miami Vice look), I didn't recognize it.   (I haven't spent all that much time in the Valley. )

When I fed the image of that strip mall into Google Images, it didn’t immediately identify it.
However when I cropped the selection and forced it to look only at the decorative upper portion of the building, it returned this page, which reported  a story about the Van Nuys Post Office being renamed in the honor of Marilyn Monroe.

It was obviously the same strip mall. 

So all I had to do was Google the address of the Van Nuys Post Office, and then use StreetView to take a look at it and determine where in that corner mall the fake Blockbuster was located.

The Post Office is on the corner of that strip mall, and this storefront is just west of the Post Office, facing Haynes Street.

(And spinning the StreetView around to look at the other side of the street, one can also see the unusual looking white building that we glimpse in the background as Deb & Sofia are walking towards the store.)

    Here is a StreetView from Google:

Here is an aerial photo of the location.  And here is a map link.

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