TV: The Dresden Files

[Munsu]

http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/4065/thedresdenfilesrc6.jpg

Based on some popular series of books. The show premiered last night in Sci-Fi and it was quite good, I think many of you will like it.

First episode:
http://www.mininova.org/tor/554265


HARRY DRESDEN -- WIZARD
Lost Items Found. Paranormal Investigations. Consulting. Advice. Reasonable Rates.
No Love Potions, Endless Purses, Parties, or Other Entertainment. Harry Dresden is the only wizard who advertises in the Chicago yellow pages. And he's the real deal. Charms. Potions. Spells even. Dresden is a haunted man (in more ways than one) who has sinned and been sinned against. But in the darkness of his past, he finds an inner strength and a driving desire to set things right. Armed with his trusty staff (okay, it's a hockey stick) and winning personality (if you don't mind the snarky sense of humor), and aided and abetted by his annoying spiritual advisor, Bob (doomed soul, expert in magic, noodge), Dresden champions the underdog against all manner of supernatural threats -- for five hundred dollars a day. Plus expenses. Dresden doesn't do parties and he doesn't do love potions. But if the hocus starts to pocus, if the going gets... strange, if the things that go bump in the night start packing a punch, call him. He's in the book. Based on the best-selling novels by Jim Butcher, The Dresden Files has been described as being a lot like Harry Potter... if Harry Potter had been written by the illegitimate love child of Raymond Chandler and Douglas Adams.

[Assassin]

The Dresden Files has been described as being a lot like Harry Potter... if Harry Potter had been written by the illegitimate love child of Raymond Chandler and Douglas Adams.

lol, that line alone is enough to make me watch. Definately sounds like an intresting premise. I'll give it a go and report back in a day or two.

[Assassin]

Well definately a good show. It seems though that they're gonna be cheap with the special effec though. Those raven guys looked like a bunch of 30+ goths, and they didn't even show them transforming or anything like that. Even when they showed the one guy with his wings spread, it was a quick flash and nothing more. Hopefully they'll get better as the series continues. Definately good to see a series based on magic. The only otehr one i remember is charmed which i didn't really watch.

I didn't see the Douglas Adams style comedy, but im hopeing it'll happen eventually.

[Death13a]

I liked the premier and if people liked the show it would probebly get better effects.

[Munsu]

Hopefully it will, but I don't think I've ever seen a show that has improved its effects.

[Mae]

How weird, I've recently been reading some of the books. I had no idea that they were made into a TV show.

The books are ok, but seriously trashy in a cheap detective novel sort of way. You know, the protagonist is all hard-boiled and world-weary but secretly has a heart of gold kind of thing. And he gets beat up a lot.

I can't see them doing any sort of direct translation of the plots as they are somewhat unnecessarily long and complicated. But it might be interesting to check out the series.

[Munsu]

Well episode 2 is out:

http://www.mininova.org/tor/562043


The episode was much better than the first one in my opinion. Fairly good action.

[Yukimura]

I too liked the episode, b/c both the Harry and Murphy charachters felt like they were right out of the books, eexcept for one major problem...they seem to have neutered Harrys magic.

In the books he usually has to consult Bob for specifics like how to get the guy out of Murphy, but he has lots of innate skills and active powers like shielding, basic fireballs and a wind powered 'telekinesis' of sorts. The shield bracelet working the way it did was nice (and probably cheaper than the book version would have been), but it feels like they left out the bulk of his power and are instead focusing just on his detective abilities with magic as more of a gimmick/excuse for being on Sci-Fi. Hopefully they'll change that soon, but the show might manage to survive without it.

[Munsu]

Indeed, I'd like to see more spells... But more than that I want him to start carrying his freaking hockey stick.

[el_boss]

Reallu good show. It's almost good enough to get cancelled. I hate when they do that. Start a promising show then suddenly just cancel it. Well I hope this doesn't happen.

The show is kind of similar to Supernatural but with more brains. Which is good.

[Munsu]

Well he finally took out his hockey stick in the last episode, but didn't really use it... It was a waste of time. Aside from that, I really liked the episode. Warewolves are always awesome.

[el_boss]

Just saw ep 3. It was pretty weird thought. It was like the wolf girl and dresden where going to have sex all the time. Weird vibe indeed.

[Munsu]

Last night episode was pretty good. We saw a bit from Dresden's past, plus the episode had vampires, and that's enough for me. But man, this Harry Dresden is getting all the girls, was he such a player in the books?

[Yukimura]

No Harry is not supposed to be getting all the girls, he runs around saving them usually, but they don't end up with him. The show is basically only taking charachter names, backgrounds, and statuses from the books. Harry is a wizard with a messed up family life in the books, Murphy is a detective in the books, Morgan is a Warden in the books, Bianca is a Red Court vamp in the books, Bob lives in a skull and is really old in the books. Nearly everything else is completely generated by and for this show. I've only seen half of the ep with Bianca, but so far her behavior is not quite like what I expect from my memories of their relationship in the books.

I din't know if it's because i'm looking through adaptation goggles or what but this show really isn't grabbing me. I'll probably give it the rest of the half season Sci-Fi usually runs it's shows on but I doubt more than that.

[Assassin]

Hasn't been alot of discusison about this show for a while...can't say im surprised since it started off rather slow, but it seems to be getting better, little be little. I enjoyed the last 2 episodes. It was good to find out more about harry's past, and see his uncle in the flesh. The latest episode was especially good, with the whole 'otherside' thing. The idea of them all beign pulled into hell as a defensive manuever was pretty intresting. And it seems ancient mai is actually a dragon, which is pretty kool i think.

One thing that still kinda annoys me with this show, theres no emotional depth to the characters. They're all so bland and 1 dimensional. I dunno if its cuz all the actors just suck at acting, or the writing staff blows, or if the director/producer is a hack, but its really keeping the show from being potentially great (as far as sci-fi shows go).

[Munsu]

Well the season finally was last Sunday, episode 12:
http://www.bt-chat.com/download.php?info_hash=97620e8793cbed6f4f928e31aaf 466eb87321c91


As you said, the last couple of episodes were pretty good, especially with all the character "development" there was, characters' past and stuff. I'd say that the cast is not that bad acting, I mostly blame the writers and director for the lack of depth and emotion the characters may portray, the series having a low budget compared to others doesn't help, especially for a show with superpowers.

[TruthofMistake]

I haven't gotten around to watching this yet, I'v read every book but another guy I know who reads them as well says the show just doesn't compare. They are also making a tabletop game using the D20 system(I think?) using the world of The Dresden Files as its basis.

http://www.dresdenfilesrpg.com/

[Munsu]

Of course this won't compare to the novels, and if you go into watching this series expecting some sort of brilliance, you'll be hugely dissapointed. It's simply an alright low-budget show with some entertainment, and that's all it is.

[TruthofMistake]

Last night episode was pretty good. We saw a bit from Dresden's past, plus the episode had vampires, and that's enough for me. But man, this Harry Dresden is getting all the girls, was he such a player in the books?

As of right now in the books Harry hasn't gotten laid in 4 years. His love interest skipped town due to certain events and he still hasn't let go, although he did try to put the moves on Murphy. That ended up not working out because he didn't want something casual and Murph didn't want something serious.

[TwisT]

I enjoyed this show alot. Ever since Charmed ended i have been looking for a great "magic"-type show. I was wondering why there was no new episode this week but now i know why. It suck that it was so short but i really hope they will continue for a few more seasons.

And yes it was really exciting to see the defensive move to pull the house in to hell. And also to see the backstory on Dresden and his uncle. As was the episode with the Vampire-chick (she was hot). Those 3 was probably my favorite episodes.

I would like to see more of the dark magic that Ancient Mai, her warden (forgot his name) and Harry can use. And maybe see Harry cornered in such a way that he is forced to use it to save himself or someone else.

So thank you Bud. If you hadn't told me to watch this i would have skipped it after i read about it earlier and it didn't sound very intresting.

[Munsu]

Another show bites the dust... The Dresden Files is cancelled:
http://community.tvguide.com/blog-entry/TVGuide-Editors-Blog/Roush-Dispatch/Dresden-Sci-Fis/800019821

[TwisT]

Sad news indeed. was one of my favorites and i really hoped for another season. Time to mourn.

[infidel]

Awe, this is quite depressing. I loved this show when it first came on...it followed in the footsteps of Firefly though. The network rearranged all the episodes out of production order so there really wasn't any continuation.

[Yukimura]

So Ancient Mai was in the show? She's only been seen like once or twice in the books, and near the end of the second most recent book it was revealed that there was a chance she was in league with the bad guys. Did she do evil shit in the show?

[Assassin]

She was more 'beaurocrat evil' then 'evil evil'. It was implied that she was a dragon though.

[Munsu]

Flash Gordon was pretty bad, I don't know how they can cancel this and go with the crappy pilot of Flash Gordon.