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Even though the show wasn't very much like the books, I quite enjoyed The Dresden Fiels show. It was, sadly, cancelled. Why was the show cancelled?

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Dresden ran on SyFy (I think it was SciFi back then) into the spring of 2007 - pilot season for the big networks. I suspect it was because Paul Blackthorne, the star, was given a better vehicle for stardom by becoming part of the show "Big Shots" for NBC (not ABC) that same fall. That show had high hopes for Blackthorne, Michael Vartan (from Alias), Christopher Titus (The Titus Show), Dylan McDermott (The Practice), etc., to become the male "Sex and the City".

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In 2007 Jim Butcher, the author of the novels, announced the cancellation of the TV series on his website and linked to a TV Guide article:

...it's official: The show isn't returning for a second season.

A shame, but hardly a surprise, given the reticence to discuss the matter every time I brought it up to Sci Fi or NBC Universal Cable execs during the recent TCA press tour. In their world, it's all about "running the numbers" (in other words: looking at the ratings and budgets, etc.) and to them, Dresden just didn't seem to measure up.

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This supports my long-running opinion that TV is merely an advertising medium with overhead in the form of interesting stories sprinkled in to keep the audience coming back. – wbogacz Dec 19 '12 at 21:32
@wbogacz Writers, directors, producers, actors, technicians, etc don't work for free. If not enough people are watching the show, advertisers aren't going to want to pay for ads on the show. If they don't do that, how are all those people going to get paid? I'm sure if they all wanted to do it for free, SciFi would have been happy to keep airing it – Kevin Dec 20 '12 at 16:46
@Kevin - You understand me perfectly. Advertisers drive TV. What they buy is airtime. They're not really buying the show - the show fills the airtime surrounding what their product is - the ad. The airtime will be more expensive on a popular show, and they can choose to buy or not buy. This happens regardless of their feeling for the show. – wbogacz Dec 20 '12 at 17:04

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