The Dresden Files > DF TV Series
POLL: End Game Opinion of the Series
Darkling:
--- Quote from: bkwyrm on May 01, 2010, 01:26:21 PM ---I doubt many would have noticed or cared about the distinction.
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Clearly you haven't seen the fan fiction archives...
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Now about what works and what doesn't.
This wasn't about what a TV audience can make sense of, they can make sense of everything from "The X-files" to "Fringe" and track the twist and turns of Walter ( Who is "grey" morally if ever a sympathetic character was.) and the seasons end of "Burn Notice" has just put Michael Weston in immediate moral peril that's been building for 3 seasons now.
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You're talking about the first season of a forty minute an episode urban fantasy. The shows you're comparing to to are high budget major network productions that were long established before they added any real complexity to the storyline. Do you remember the first season of X-files? It's nothing like the final season. It was two FBI agents with a week by week strange paranormal or extraterrestrial case that Dana would try to explain away.
We're talking about the first season of a weekly TV series about a wizard living in modern day Chicago as a private eye with a past of having murdered his mentor who wanted to likely use him as a weapon, meanwhile his female cop friend is having trouble adjusting to his supernatural world and is highly suspicious of everything. When you think about it that's a lot of plot to cover in just twelve episodes. There's simply not enough room to overly complicate Bob's back story with something that hasn't even been fully covered yet in the books thirteen years into the series.
Consider also Scifi only had the rights to the first five or six books. If Jim Butcher had finally elaborated on Bob's back story with a clear cut explanation they would not be allowed to use it. And the explanation has to cover: 1. Why Harry doesn't question his lack of past. 2. The still running headache inducing debate about free will (because the Dresdenverse definition of free will is VERY questionable that being bound by an enchanted skull suddenly destroys will. No, freedom and free will are not the same thing. They should NOT be treated like the same thing. It's highly disrespectful to real historical slavery because they were stripped of freedom as well, just their chains were physical, not magical. Bob's shifting personality according to his owner can be viewed as the lack of free will but what about the claim that the faeries have no free will just because they can't lie? That doesn't make sense to me. 3. What Bob's original personality was. The fact is once it was revealed that Bob's personality in the books was not really his own, but an adaptation of Harry's subconscious when he first met him, I lost intersted in the skull all together (so did most of the Hrothbert of Bainbridge fans). How can anyone really care about a character whose personality is nothing more than something programmed? And Harry doesn't stop to ask or wonder what his SLAVE'S original personality was? That's kind of cruel when you think about it. Without several books to try to justify it the TV audience is going to be turned off by it. I am turned off by it. That's why I've stopped looking forward to the skull's snarky scenes in the books.
Also I'm partial to human soul spirits. The actual continued consciousness of an individual after death. Other flavours of spirit bore me after a while. They're vanilla to my rocky road ice cream.
--- Quote ---Terence Mann as Bob struck me as a necessary change, that was correct even if turning him to the remaining half of a pair of star-crossed lovers wasn't.
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Again, clearly you haven't seen much of the Dresden Files fan fiction archives. Even in fanfiction net you'll find more fan fictions mentioning Winifred than Mab. When you consider how rarely Winifred was even mentioned this is pretty impressive. Over two hundred of the three hundred Dresden Files fan fictions on fan fiction net contain the show version of Bob or have tweaked the skull version of Bob to be the ghost. Not necessarily on this forum, but in general, you're going to find the ghost version of Bob was liked more, and not just because he was physically standing there.
You can't blame Terrence Mann's Bob being a ghost on what ended the show. The show had high ratings (go to neilson's website archives if you don't believe me). There were times when the show's ratings beat those of Battlestar Galatica. Check the forum archives of syfy's own forum for the show. There was a poll back in 2007 on who was your favourite character on the show. Guess who beat Harry Dresden himself by about twenty five percent more votes?
In fact, I came across a very recent interview with Terrence Mann where he was asked about Dresden Files. Apparently he's still getting fan e-mail asking him about Bob and Winifred and if there's a chance he'd ever play Bob again. Simply do a google search. Hrothbert of Bainbridge has more fans than the spirit of intellect ever had. So, like it or not, people with the same views as me (and there are more of us than you may realize) really liked him as a ghost and probably would have loathed a spirit of intellect even if it was Terrence Mann. That's not enough humanity. There's more to humanizing a character than giving him a physical / visible body. We're not that shallow.
finnmacha:
So, I'm guessing this is no longer an issue, but I recently found TDF Season 1 on Netflix and was able to watch it in it's entirety. As a big fan of the books, all I can say is...really!?
From what I saw, there was absolutely nothing...well...Dresden about the TV series! Now, I'm not stupid. I know transitioning from written to visual medium can be dicey at best, but I was absolutely unthrilled with the series.
Call me shallow, but:
An Army Jeep?
No trenchcoat?
A hockey stick!?!?
Murphy a single mom?
Butters a college drop-out slacker? Ok, so that's just how he came off to me. I expected him to pull out a Mt Dew and a bag of Cheetos everytime he was on screen.
A magic store?
And while Paul Blackthorne has been lauded around here, for me, he was quite possibly the most un-Dresden actor they could've cast. I know everyone has a different "vision" of the characters of their favorite novels and I've always pictured Dresden in the novels as looking a bit like the author himself. Tall, lanky, a little "geeky". Blackthorne just seemed too....polished. And where was the ever present Dresden sarcasm?
I'm going to leave the "look" of the show alone as I'm sure there wasn't a huge budget and they did what they could. I'll also leave Bob alone as I get how a disembodied voice in a skull wouldn't translate well to a TV series. But, again, where was the sarcasm?
Suffice to say I was sorely dissapointed and if there's a Big Screen adaptation in the works, I hope it gets completely re-tooled.
I'm sorry if I offended anyone or hurt anyone's feelings, but, man! Really!?
Darkling:
--- Quote from: finnmacha on May 31, 2010, 12:08:36 AM ---
An Army Jeep?
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If you bothered reading these forums these questions would have been answered about forty eight times by now.
The fact is the beetle can only work in the books. When you got a six and a half foot tall actor those long takes are going to be brutal. Besides that Beetles and Beetle parts are expensive and they would have had to slice one in half for interior shots.
Think about it. The Jeep is low tech. It's old. It serves the same exact purpose as the beetle. Besides... (click to show/hide)The Beetle doesn't exist anymore in the books either.
--- Quote ---No trenchcoat??
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I heard this was a mobility issue. A trench coat / duster would have been difficult to move around in.
--- Quote ---A hockey stick!?!??
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Dresden is a blue collar wizard. The idea was he would enchant whatever he could get a hold of. Some people debated that a hockey stick is less conspicuous. According to Jim Butcher the Hockey stick was supposed to have emotional significance for Harry but the show was canceled before they could get into that. Apparently Harry's father used to take him to play hockey.
--- Quote ---Murphy a single mom??
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I don't recall if it was on this forum or not but I remember reading that Jim Butcher wished he had made Murphy a mother but it was too far along in the book series to do it.
--- Quote ---Butters a college drop-out slacker? Ok, so that's just how he came off to me. I expected him to pull out a Mt Dew and a bag of Cheetos everytime he was on screen.?
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That's not fair. Butters physically of the show was exactly what was described in the books. Or did you miss the short nerdish polka loving guy with issues bit that's all through the novels and show in regard to him?
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A magic store?
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That's a scrying crystal. It's traditional occultist magick. As in real folklore. They had magical practitioners and occultists on set to make sure the magick in the show was real and researched. Every symbol on Bob's skull for example is real spirit binding symbols, mostly from the Key of Solomon (One of the oldest known Grimoires of the dark ages). If you pause your DVD on any scene in Harry's lab you can see dozens of artifacts used in real magical tradition. The magick on the show was impressively researched. To this day I can't find any fantasy show that even remotely made as big of an effort into it's occult research. Remember, Nic Cage was executive producer. He's very into the occult and he wanted accuracy in occult / New age / Hermetic tradition. Harry has a tracking spell he uses in almost every novel, you realize. And quartz crystals DO come up in the books. Wow... Just Wow... The fact that a fan of the books actually complained about this AND how Butters looked goes beyond ... that just blue my mind. As someone who has studied parapsychology the fact that THIS was something that bothered you, the extensive research into the occult, using rare and out of print real grimoires... My headaches... This was one of the aspects of the show they went all out for.
I can understand most of the questions but this one!?? Why was a WIZARD using a scrying crystal in a tracking spell!?! To me that's like asking 'Why does he have a pentacle?!'
--- Quote --- And while Paul Blackthorne has been lauded around here, for me, he was quite possibly the most un-Dresden actor they could've cast. I know everyone has a different "vision" of the characters of their favorite novels and I've always pictured Dresden in the novels as looking a bit like the author himself. Tall, lanky, a little "geeky". Blackthorne just seemed too....polished. And where was the ever present Dresden sarcasm?
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It's there. My favourite line being 'The barn door's open and the bag is seriously devoid of cats!' That's from The Dresden Files episode Things that Go bump. In a recent Q and A you can find on youtube Jim Butcher said he did not look like the wayhe hoped Dresden would look but he did act like him once the cameras started rolling.
finnmacha:
--- Quote from: Darkling on June 01, 2010, 12:58:48 AM ---
--- Quote ---If you bothered reading these forums these questions would have been answered about forty eight times by now.
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Oh, I get that. I really do. In fact, I have read through these forums and found a lot of similar complaints and the fact of the matter is, no matter how many times someone tries to explain why certain changes were made, it doesn't change the fact that, with the exception of my Murphy complaint, the things that were changed were iconic parts of Dresden. It's kinda like saying Wolverine can be a guy with some knives, those claw thingies just don't work.
--- Quote ---Dresden is a blue collar wizard. The idea was he would enchant whatever he could get a hold of. Some people debated that a hockey stick is less conspicuous. According to Jim Butcher the Hockey stick was supposed to have emotional significance for Harry but the show was canceled before they could get into that. Apparently Harry's father used to take him to play hockey.
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I'll give ya this one. Still a damned silly looking staff and maybe it coulda been more Wizard Staff and less Magical Gun. Also, it's not like a guy carrying a walking stick draws much attention in the real world, doubt he woulda been much more conspicuous in the Dresdenverse.
--- Quote ---That's not fair. Butters physically of the show was exactly what was described in the books. Or did you miss the short nerdish polka loving guy with issues bit that's all through the novels and show in regard to him?
--- End quote ---
Ok, ok, ok...maybe this was my own little hang up. ::)
--- Quote ---That's a scrying crystal. It's traditional occultist magick. As in real folklore. They had magical practitioners and occultists on set to make sure the magick in the show was real and researched. Every symbol on Bob's skull for example is real spirit binding symbols, mostly from the Key of Solomon (One of the oldest known Grimoires of the dark ages). If you pause your DVD on any scene in Harry's lab you can see dozens of artifacts used in real magical tradition. The magick on the show was impressively researched. To this day I can't find any fantasy show that even remotely made as big of an effort into it's occult research. Remember, Nic Cage was executive producer. He's very into the occult and he wanted accuracy in occult / New age / Hermetic tradition. Harry has a tracking spell he uses in almost every novel, you realize. And quartz crystals DO come up in the books. Wow... Just Wow... The fact that a fan of the books actually complained about this AND how Butters looked goes beyond ... that just blue my mind. As someone who has studied parapsychology the fact that THIS was something that bothered you, the extensive research into the occult, using rare and out of print real grimoires... My headaches... This was one of the aspects of the show they went all out for.
I can understand most of the questions but this one!?? Why was a WIZARD using a scrying crystal in a tracking spell!?! To me that's like asking 'Why does he have a pentacle?!'
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I'm not sure what this was all about, but my original question was about Harry working out of what appeared to be a Magic Store. I later learned it just looked like a store front and was his office/living space.
So, yea. I'm sorry for not perusing the forums a bit more and for beating the proverbial dead horse. In my defense, I had never had the chance to watch the show before just recently, so while everyone else's adoration/disdain had dimmed, mine was fresh. I've spent the last few days familiarizing myself with the board and, since I have absolutely zero problems with the novels, I doubt this'll be a repeat problem.
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Darkling:
--- Quote ---I'm not sure what this was all about, but my original question was about Harry working out of what appeared to be a Magic Store. I later learned it just looked like a store front and was his office/living space.
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Whoops, sorry, that was my fault. I misread what you said. I thought you said stone. I thought you were talking about the crystal he used in his tracking spell. And don't let me drive you off. I was in a bad mood when I replied to you. The humidity here was getting to me.
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