Open Mike Night: Jim Butcher's The Dresden Files - Wild Card #1

Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files: Wild Card #1

​Written by: Jim Butcher and Mark Powers
Pencilled by: Carlo Gomez
Colored by:  Mohan
Lettered by: Bill Tortolini
Cover by: Carlos Gomez and Mohan

Published by: Dynamite
Cover Price: $3.99

Mike Maillaro: The Dresden Files started life as a series of novels about a wizard/private detective named Harry Dresden who lived in modern day Chicago and helped deal with supernatural threats. As I mentioned last week, Weaver was the one who first suggested I check out The Dresden Files.  This was a long time ago...the short-lived TV series hadn’t even debuted yet, so it probably was about ten years ago.  

I enjoyed the books quite a bit, but I did think that in some of the more recent books, Butcher became a little too obsessed with longer story arcs, and the books lost a lot of what I enjoyed.  I barely got through Ghost Story, and I don’t think I ever finished Cold Days.  I had pretty much stopped following the series since then.   

I think part of the problem is that the series has just gotten way too long.  I am not sure any book series, no matter how good, can maintain my interest for more than 10 books.  And yes, I know that might be a little ridiculous to say in a column that is dedicated to comic books...a media which has characters and series that can last for hundreds of issues and many, many decades.  

Mike Weaver: I gave up before you did, and so I was wondering about whether Dresden had just pretty much totally stayed in stasis or if this book took place oddly enough around where I stopped reading.  It honestly felt like the “Previously in” page was all stuff I knew.

The negative mark I’m going to give here is ease of access to newbies.  Knowing the characters and the set-up, I was able to get up to speed quickly.  If I didn’t know anything about Murph or Molly or Thomas, I think it would be hard to understand what was going on with those interactions.  Beyond Harry, Butters was the only person that I felt got a decent lead-in.

Maillaro:  Yeah, this book is set WAY before the most recent books.  Changes (which came out in 2010) really drastically overhauled the status quo, and this series is clearly set before that.  And that to me is the real bizarre part of these comics.  If you don’t follow the books, you’re going to be pretty lost.  If you do follow the books, you’re going to be wondering why these comics are so far behind current continuity for the character.  It seems almost like this book is designed for a very specific audience “people who enjoyed the books, but aren’t up to date with the series.”   And since I fall right in that group, I suspect that is why I enjoy these comics so much.

Wild Card introduces a new threat to Chicago.  Some kind of supernatural creature that is able to suck the life out of people without leaving any traces.  Harry thinks that the White Court of vampires is behind this, so he reaches out to his half brother Thomas for help.  It’s a pretty simple, straightforward story, but I do think that is the best kind of Dresden story.

Weaver: Certainly best for comic adaptation too.  I can understand that more complicated stories might make for good books, but comics is such a fast paced medium (when done right) that it’s best to uncomplicate.  Especially with a miniseries.

So, from the looks of the enemies, I’m guessing the Fairies are going to be involved to some degree, and at that point, it might feel overcrowded.  I thought Dresden was best when it was world-building and not trying to integrate everything into a cohesive plot, so I actually sort of dread that.  

Maillaro: The one thing I did like about the new adversary was that he was pretty clever.  Dresden’s world has a rule that pretty much all supernatural monsters lose their power if they cross a threshold uninvited.  The story starts with him chasing two young women. They run into their house to get away.  So this monster hacked into their phone line, so that when they called the police, he was able to get them to invite him in.   I just thought that was pretty clever.

I tend to agree that there is a huge danger of this mini getting overcrowded like they have done with the novels.  A lot of the more recent Dresden books have been real fairy heavy, and that is one of the many things that made me lose interest.  I liked seeing the wizards at war with vampires, but when they started to add in all these other players it just became overly complicated.

I actually had the same exact problems with Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse novels.  As soon as they added fairies, I lost interest and never finished those books either.  I guess the moral of the story here is if you want to chase me away from a series I love, add fairies...

Weaver: For what it’s worth, Northstar being alleged to be “part fairy” chased me off Alpha Flight too, so...I probably agree with you there.  Although I liked Dresden’s version of Queen Mab.

I want to talk about the art a bit.  Except for Harry, who I pictured much scrawnier, everyone looks almost exactly like I pictured them.  That really elevated this book for me, since I didn’t have to keep wondering who everyone was.  It was pretty clean art except for the adversary, who was pretty deliberately less detailed.  Most adaptations like this use kind of subpar art since the writing is the main selling point, but it’s great here.\

Maillaro: Yeah, that is one of Dynamite’s strong suits.  They pretty much always have terrific art.  

Dresden’s look has always been hard for me to pin down.  I love Paul Blackthorne, but I never thought he had the right look.  And the covers of most of the Dresden books feature him wearing a hat that conceals most of his face (which he never actually wears in the books, to the best of my knowledge).   I have read quite a few of these mini-series at this point, so I kind of accept this as “canon” Harry, though you are right, he doesn’t quite seem to fit some of the descriptions in the books.

I did think the characterizations were strong here.  I never fail to smile when Harry calls his apprentice Molly “padawan.”  And Thomas has long been my favorite Dresden Files character, and his relationship with Harry is pretty spot on, “I know what you have in mind is insane...but let’s do it anyway.”  

I was pretty curious why we got a giant owl monster at the end of this book, which didn’t seem to have any direct connection to the other villain.   But I was kind of impressed that they managed to make a giant owl into a pretty terrifying creature.  So, kudos to them for that.  

Weaver: There’s always room for giant owls.

I’m giving this book a 4/5 on writing, only knocking it for accessibility issues.  And a 5/5 on art, which was damn near perfect.

Maillaro: High scores, but I actually think this book earns them.  I actually will go up to a 4.5 for the writing, though I agree with you, it’s not for new readers.

Clearly these comics are doing well, since they keep popping up every few months.  It’s actually been a pretty long time since the last Dresden Files book came out.  I wonder if Butcher didn’t realize that he might have gone off track with the books some and uses these books to recapture what Dresden was all about.  But I will admit, that could just be my own rationalization.  I have no insider information here.

Maillaro: Next week, we’ll be jumping back in time and doing a few issues of Marvel’s 1993 series Hellstorm: Prince of Lies.

Weaver: Probably one of the better “new” books in the early 90’s, if you ask me.

Maillaro: Sounds good to me, I have a huge love for 90’s comics.  One of the biggest things I regret about comics is that the “supernatural” books Marvel put out in the 90’s didn’t have more longevity.  Oddly enough, the closest thing we have right now is Carnage.  Go figure.

Summary: This book has great art and solid writing, though it’s not particularly accessible for new readers.  And it’s set quite a bit before the most recent Dresden Files novels.  But even if you are a lapsed Dresden reader like the two of us, you might want to give the Dynamite mini-series a look.