The Dresden Files

The Dresden Files was a short lived SciFi Channel (now named SyFy) series that aired from January to April of 2007. The show was based on the The Dresden Files novel series written by Jim Butcher. The series starred Paul Blackthorne, Valerie Cruz, Terrence Mann and Conrad Coates.


Blackthorne played Harry Dresden, a professional wizard. Not a fictional wizard, but an actual one, living in a world where magic is very real, and often very dangerous. Dresden often helps solve unexplained murders, with the often skeptical Lt. Connie Murphy of the Chicago police. He is aided by Hrothbert "Bob" of Bainbridge, a spirit who he owns, and who can not leave the confines of Dresden's house. Warden of the High Council, Donald Morgan, often helps and hinders Dresden in his attempts at weeding out supernatural killers.

I enjoyed this series greatly. I was unfamiliar with the source material before watching the series, so I can not claim to know how faithful the work was to the original source. The series had some obvious tinkering, where they jammed the pilot episode into the 8th episode, which completely threw me off because the characters not only acted differently, but we were essentially being introduced to them all over again. Oh well.

The assumption through most of the summer after the show ended was that the series had been a success, sadly, disappointed fans found out at the start of August that the series would not be renewed for a second season. It ran 12 episodes.