I've never bought Dresden Files books nor even heard of the series before the tv adverts, but Amazon emailed me about the premiere too. I guess it's based on my previous choices in reading material.

I'm really looking forward to the show. There's a talking skull? Awesome. I always wanted one of those.

eta whitefont just in case

What did CE do to make them put him in that horrible fake beard???

A video interview thingy for the Dresden Files intermixed with some scenes: [link]

So they've apparently turned TV Harry into something of a ladies man. I knew they wanted to make him less of a geek, but with everything else we're straying into generic genre lead territory here.

ION, Robert Wolfe just confirmed that TV Murphy has a daughter.

Because apparently in order to be a strong, kick-ass woman on TV you also have to be a single mother, or something. Hmph. (The latter are my words, not his. He hasn't explained their reasoning for why she has a daughter yet.)

My main concern, beyond it being an unnecessary change, is that the daughter's going to end up like so many other TV kids: completely forgotten about whenever they're not directly affecting the main plot.

I'm still hopefull, and anxious to see the show on Sunday, but the changes are feeling more and more like generic Hollywood-ization than necessary adaptations to bring a book to the screen.

Zenkitty, the talking skull was determined to be too expensive, so for the TV series they opted to go with a ghost who lives in the skull, but can manifest as a person when he wants to communicate.

That change, I can understand. On screen, a talking skull would be pretty dull after the initial Whoa! wore off.

They probably gave Murphy a daughter to "humanize" her. Because strong kick-ass women are aliens unless they can prove otherwise by breeding.

I've read a couple of the books, and the talking skull is my favorite character. It's probably best to just wipe the books out of my mind.

I think discussion of that picture/Heroes casting would want to go in Spoilers Lite, am I right? Not that I do not share, well, if not squee, then at least a healthy interest.

I've read a couple of the books, and the talking skull is my favorite character. It's probably best to just wipe the books out of my mind.

Well, supposedly Bob the Ghost is supposed to have the same personality as Bob the Skull, so hopefully he'll still be plenty of fun. And he does get pretty snarky with Harry in those scenes from the interview-thingy I linked above.

But, yeah, at this point I'm concerned I might get so caught up in what's different that I won't be able to judge the series on it's own merits. So forgetting the books, if possible, might be the best way to approach the TV series.

At least I'll still have a dork-tastic, duster-wearing, Blue Beetle-driving, staff-carrying, RPG-playing, movie-quoting Harry in the books, alongside an ass-kicking petite blonde, childless Murphy and a libidinous talking skull Bob.

I'm actually kind of glad there's no plans to have Michael in the series yet ("We already have Morgan. We don't need two guys running around with big swords.") as he's probably my favorite character next to Harry in the books and Michael's faith, and his relationship with God and his own family, is a big part of that. I could easily see them changing him to make him "more relatable" and end up going too saccharin with him or else go the other way and make him "holier than thou".

But, yeah, at this point I'm concerned I might get so caught up in what's different that I won't be able to judge the series on it's own merits.

that's why I only reread Storm Front. Wanted to refamiliarize myself with the characters, but not be so familiar that I really noticed the differences.

I'm looking forward to the series. I read the books but they were always a skim and forget series for me - because I never believed Harry. I think I'll have a much easier time believing a Harry played by Paul Blackthorne than the voice in which the series was written.