The Dresden Files [B]

In spring of 2007 the Sci Fi channel began a new series, The Dresden Files. As is oft the case with sci-fi shows it’s life was a short one being cancelled officially in August with only 12 episodes (Tremors at least got 13).

The Dresden Files

The Overview

The show, based on a series of books by Jim Butcher (also called The Dresden Files), follows Harry Dresden a wizard who makes his “living” as a private investigator. Harry’s life has had it problems, dead mother, murdered father, uncle who raised Harry after his father’s death was the one who murdered his father, Harry self defenses his uncle to death with black magic which puts Harry in the bad graces of the High Council of Wizards. The High Council, the controlling body of wizards, looks poorly upon the use of black magic let alone when it is used to kill, so Harry is not on their favored person list.

Several years after his uncle’s death Harry moves back to Chicago, takes out an ad in the yellow pages under Wizard and takes cases as they come to him. Living with Harry is “Bob” a long dead, immaterial, and once powerful wizard who is trapped forever inside his own skull for his own transgressions with black magic. Bob was responsible for training Harry in use of magic and now helps Harry out with the cases that come along.

Most of Harry’s work comes courtesy of Lt Connie Murphy of the Chicago PD who uses him as a consultant for unusual cases she comes across. Serious and professional, Murphy doesn’t really believe Harry is a wizard but as long as he helps her close cases she doesn’t care.

The Review

The series is episodic so there is not much carry over from week to week. I really prefer my sci-fi to be serial in nature but it’s not unusual for a series to be more freak of the week in the beginning and then evolve towards a long term epic storyline. Since the series got the boot it’s probably for the best since it really stinks to get pulled into a series only to have it canned leaving things unfinished (any sci-fi fan gets dulled to this pain after a while).

The pilot episode was cut from two hours to an hour, had parts re-shot and shown as the 8th episode. This seems kind of representative of the series, a certain amount of confusion of the mythology or what the show is supposed to be. There is maybe two episodes where Harry really does something “Wizard”, one of these being the previously mentioned pilot. You get the feeling they wanted to tone down the wizard part and emphize more the investigator part. Rather disappointing but more main stream which should equal audience which should mean not being cancelled.

When the series started I filed it away in my “I will watch it but if it gets cancelled I won’t be upset category”. As the series went along through it grew on me. Not sure what it was, could have been been Harry as the down on his luck guy who is always willing to put himself on the line to help people out, Bob the witty and kind of sleazy sensei , or just Murphy. Probably all of that and the interest in seeing where it would go. Would something happen with Harry and Murphy? How much more of the world of magic are we going to see?

Regardless of it being unfinished and a bit uneven it’s good stuff and worth watching.

Where

The series is out on DVD. I assume it costs some amount of money and can be obtained at a place that sells stuff. A store yeah a store or maybe a website.

You can also watch the whole series on Hulu for free.

To seem cool I have embed the whole first episode here for your viewing pleasure.

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Tags: B, review, The Dresden Files, tv