We’re less than a week from the broadcast of the Dresden Files TV series. Are you ready? Fred talks about Jim’s recent visit to the set, viewing parties, a good reading order for the books of the series, the first five episodes, and some early reviews. Plus, he dishes a little on White Night.
Download the podcast here (16MB MP3, 28 minutes)
57 thoughts on “Are You Ready For Some Dresden? – The Latest Butcher Block”
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I really enjoy listening to these podcasts! 3 more days until the show! Can’t wait!!!
I can’t stand the anticipation. I wish it were Sunday.
AHHHHH ITS ALMOST SATURDAY WHICH IS ALMOST SUNDAY!!!!!!
One more day! One more day ’til I get to *see* Harry!!!
I’d originally promised a friend we’d go shopping on Sunday, but this is probably going to be much too distracting. I’d probably be a gibbering mess in front of the TV by 8Pm.
Counting hours…
Does any one know if the Dresden TV show will be available for download? I am overseas and we do not get the SciFi channel. I hate this because I am dying to see this show. OH and I noticed that Bob is not a skull on the show. What’s the story on that?
Wow the first episode of The Dresden Files was a complete disappointment. Harry hardly did anything until the end, there wasn’t much setup at all, and what? I guess the whole “unable to come near electricity” thing has been thrown out too? This wouldn’t have been a bad mid season episode but as a Series Premiere??? People who haven’t read the books aren’t going to stay with the series based on an episode like that, it was generic in every way. Why didn’t they just do the 2 hour premiere based on the first book?? Scifi is screwing up already and I believe Jim Butcher should have kept a tighter rein on the rights to his series if Scifi are just going to crap on it right from the beginning. I’m so pissed right now its not even funny, why even bother with making it into a series if it’s not even going to be like the books and its just going to be turned into some type of X-Files ripoff????
I was looking forward to the television series, but unfortunately was disappointed in what I saw. The changes are significant (Bob as a british ghost?) to the tone and narrative. Throughout the episode the sci-fi character appeared unsure of himself and his abilities, which seems really off base. In the books Harry knows he is powerful, but understands that he is just not powerful enough to save everybody he wants to. Simply said, the lead actor needs to do a better job understanding what makes Harry Dresden tick: his unwavering ability to make a bad situation worse with his quick wit and overriding talent for making others (normal and paranormal alike) hate him enough to make crucial mistakes. (Aptly illustrated by my favorite paraphrased Harry quote, “Are you always this annoying?” “No, sometimes I’m asleep.”)
That said, I remain a loyal reader from Chicago who looks forward to reading White Night in the spring.
As I’m sure you all have, I was highly anticipating the premiere of the Dresden Files tv show. The show I watched has almost no resemblence to the books I read. I will watch a few more to see if it gets any better, but to say I was disappointed would be a gross understatement. It’s always a shame when you see something you love turned into something you don’t even recognize, but I think it’s worse when they have the chance to do it all and do it well, yet still drop the ball. I could understand if it was just a single movie. They have time restraints and must trim things to work, but in a tv series you can circumvent that by virtue of the fact that you have a whole season in which to tell a tale. They chose (apparently) to make each episode stand on it’s own and that is a huge mistake. One of many.
As I said I am going to give it a few weeks before I completely disregard it, but it is off to a horrible start. I feel bad for Mr. Butcher inthat he had to watch that travesty that in no way resembles the characters and situations that he created. That has to hurt.
I was disappointed at first, but now I realize this is what was told from the beginning; an alternate, unique Dresden-verse that can exist with the laws of television, and has completely different nature to the books. To me, this isn’t a reinforcement of the literary Dresden Files, its a separate entertainment, and I won’t mind watching more of it at all on that basis.
I wasn’t expecting the books, so I’m not as dissappointed as the rest.
If I had never heard or read of the books and came by this, I’d have thought it was okay.
The rich universe of the books is NEVER going to be translated to the screen – big or small.
Now if they carry some arcs throughout the show with the council and Harry’s supporting cast of brother vamps and girlfriend-vamps etc – then it will be an entertaining little program inspired by the books.
But as with any book or comic book – the translation to film is never as good.
Bob as a ghost and not an oversexed talking skull? Damn – that’s one of the coolest quirkiest things about the Dresden files.
Oh well . . .I’ll tune in next week.
One word of advice to all: it’s TV – lower thy expectations.
Dresden lives in his fullest at our local bookstore.
Hey, I liked it. I mean, having listened to the various podcasts, I knew it was going to be an offshoot, a non-cannon if you like. That doesn’t translate as ‘bad’, just different. I loved the actor portraying Dresden, he did a wonderful job of coming off as upbeat-roguish in the mere hour he was given. The acting, overall, was a vibe I could ride and that didn’t, for a moment, give me the Buffy:TVS chilly-willies. Presumably, later episodes would require less backstory, as more time for present-moment explanations. For example, I think my soul issue with the show (woman in corner screaming omage to classic horror films aside) would be that the ‘doom-box’ and the effect it had on the skinchanger was never actually explained. There was some mention as to what it does, some mention of dark powers inside it when he gave it to her, and boom. Thats it. Normally, I would expect Dresden’s follow up explanation, that while not making everything perfectly clear, is usually more than sufficient to buy the reader a certain suspension of disbelief. Still, for a one-hour adaptation of amazingly massive and intricate mythology, it did its job. My younger sister (21), was sufficiently excited by it that she finally agreed to start reading my Dresden books. Always a good sign that.
There is a difference between creative license and simply making something else entirely. The tv series is unfortunately the latter.
Some things are simply too fundamental to dispense with, and scifi apparently doesn’t understand that.
1. Bob’s moral neutrality and ownership allegiance
2. Magic messing with technology
3. Both bob and murphy’s characters are COMPLETELY different
4. Thresholds are ignored
5. The way magic works has been changed (wards)
6. White council = High council?
It’s like the tools at scifi knew that the series was about a wizard working with the chicago PD and made the rest up from there.
I hate to disagree with most of you, but I enjoyed the show. I went into it expecting to be entertained by a television show, and that’s what I got. The show is not the books, and it never can be, so that’s not even what I was hoping for. I miss the blue beetle, I miss the cat, and I miss the real Bob, but I have hopes that the show will grow into the shoes it’s been given. And when Jim’s next book comes out, I will still be first in line to buy it, because the show will never ever replace the real Dresden Files.
So here’s to Sci Fi, for taking a chance and listening to us when we begged for them to make this series, and here’s to Jim, whom we will always beg to keep writing for us, because he can never be replaced.
I hate to disagree with most of you, but I enjoyed the show. I went into it expecting to be entertained by a television show, and that’s what I got. The show is not the books, and it never can be, so that’s not even what I was hoping for. I miss the blue beetle, I miss the cat, and I miss the real Bob, but I have hopes that the show will grow into the shoes it’s been given. And when Jim’s next book comes out, I will still be first in line to buy it, because the show will never ever replace the real Dresden Files.
So here’s to Sci Fi, for taking a chance and listening to us when we begged for them to make this series, and here’s to Jim, whom we will always beg to keep writing for us, because he can never be replaced.
I thought the show was great. I didn’t notice any big differences between Murphy and Murphy. Sure they look different, but we didn’t see enough of Murphy to really judge personality.
Harry was great. Bob was cool despite being skull-less, and I don’t get what you’re all talking about with the whole “moral neturality” thing. On the show Bob, was influenced by his affection for his “owner.” That’s the same as it is in the books. What’s the big deal.
It was good.
The books reign supreme – but who would expect differently?
I remember when James Cameron was supposed to do the Spider-Man movie there was talk about, you know – NOT being in a costume! Or the Hulk TV series starring a RED Hulk.
The show is simply inspired by and that’s good enough for me. If it gets into running arcs with vampire brothers and clans etc – it will be a cool TV show. The same way people liked shows such as Buffy, Angel, X-Files, Alias etc . . .
I liked the backstory with the uncle and the father showing there’s some meat to the bones of this character.
What I didn’t like? The God in the Machine like ending. It was cool that the Raven people were not the villains you thought, but to defeat the skin-walker with a box of magic. Yikes!
I knew as the clock lumbered towards 10 PM that the ending would be rushed and fall flat.
A magic box! No Dresden explanation as to why it would work on a skin-walker particularly. It just seems like a “kill the bad-guy” device. Why wouldn’t he use this every time?!
SO the only real complaint is that in the tv world the ending was a little empty for me.
But here’s hoping that next week we get to see some more supporting cast and Harry backstory.
And more importantly Jim keeps writing more of the real canon!
I goota agree with those fans here who were disapointed in the first episode. I liked all the actors, but so much of the fundamental background and rules of how things worked were changed, and for aparently no real reason could see that it really threw me off enjoying the episode. I also was very disapointed that in the very first episode Harry doesnt use any of his normal stock of majic, no staff, no blasting rod no fire balls, no soul gazes, etc. etc, no brewing of potions, instead he turns to some weird doom box contraption to solve his very first problem. And even tho I like the actor who portrayed Bob, I have to wonder why they felt it necesary to try to change him so much, he is not only a man now but aparently some type of ghost? And the very first look we get of Harry he is some type of Ladies man? One of Harrys charms in the books is he isnt smooth with the females. So overall I was disapointed. It in no way makes me disapointed with the books or the Author, just the tv series.
I’m going to give it a chance. As been mentioned 1) alt != Dresden-verse and 2) 2 very different mediums.
Sure, I’m disappointed that I haven’t seen the Sight-view (yet) and a myriad of other “ooo wouldn’t that be totally awesome to see”
Where’s Marcone? Where’s the gum-shoe maltese-falcon-esque noir? Try to squeeze that type of plot onto TV.
Comeon it wasn’t Dreadful Files and it could have been. (Monk with Magic)
The biggest problem with adapting a book series to TV is whether you keep to the books or not. In this case – they are just using the concepts and not the stories or all the details. If you keep to the books, your core audience is ambivalent since they know the story and plot and really, you
We LOVED the tv show!! We enjoy the Jim Butcher Dresden books sooo much and were highly anticipating the new series. It did not disappoint.
We approached it as like a parallel universe type story, if you dont get hung up on the details (like what matches what in the books) then it’s just more Harry Dresden. And MORE Harry Dresden is fantastic!
I saw some criticizing of the show not following the books exactly…so what? Every one would rather scifi putting more wrestling on? Good tv shows get canceled all the time. Instead of criticizing a GREAT show over little details I think people should appreciate what we got and support the show…
We are eagerly awaiting next Sunday’s show. It’s been a long time since we were as excited about a tv show as this!
Will definitely help pass the time till…..the NEXT Harry Dresden book! woohoo