Sunday, August 5, 2012

TV Show Review: The Dresden Files

My review: 4/5.

Though it was on the hokey side, "The Dresden Files" television series (based on the book series of the same name by Jim Butcher) was really entertaining and unfortunately short-lived. The abrupt summary from IMDB: "A Chicago-based wizard works as a private investigator." It may run as re-runs on the Sci-Fi channel (SyFy now, right?), but since we don't have cable, all I know is that at one point it was available on Netflix's instant queue.

Harry in this show is everything a viewer could ask for in a good-guy supernatural protagonist: he's sarcastic (but not too sarcastic), angsty (but not too angsty), smart and powerful but with plenty of screw-ups and weaknesses both past and present (see: angst), and an adult with a boyish sense of humor along with a healthy dose of maturity.  All of the other characters (Karin with the Chicago Police Department, Bob the ghost/mentor stuck in his long-dead skull, etc.) also exceeded my expectations after having read the first few books of the series; to the point that, if I may say so, the TV series outdid the books. Where the books try to make Dresden out to be Superman with the angst of a clique of teenagers (and is super sexist in most of what he notices about women, how he treats women, and in what he thinks about women, but all the women want him...?), Dresden in the TV series just IS powerful, and just HAS angst, without it being hammered into your consciousness every five minutes. And he isn't the pinnacle of fashion, but he isn't the sloppy bum the books describe him as either.  And he's shy in his occasional romantic moments and seems much more gentlemanly.

Anyway. tl;dr - I miss this show, and I wish the books were more like it.

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