Time Travel Tuesday: Veronica Mars

Veronica Mars
3 seasons, from 2004 to 2007
Originally aired on UPN/CW
Starring Kristen Bell, Percy Daggs III, Jason Dohring, Francis Capra, and Enrico Colantoni


I know this Time Travel Tuesday isn't exactly a long trip down Memory Lane. It's more of a jog across the street. But Veronica Mars was a fantastic show that deserves a ten-year run and five feature films, so the least I can do is give it an epic blog post.

Veronica Mars is a show about the teenage daughter of a private investigator that inherited Daddy's awesome detective skills. The show is set in the fictional town of Neptune, California. While Neptune is a relatively small town, it is rife with big city drama. There is conflict between the upper class residents of Neptune (called the "09ers") and their lower-class counterparts. There are rival gangs (the Hispanic biker gang "The PCHers" and the Irish clan "The Fitzpatricks"). There are sex scandals and murders and racial tension and hazing rituals and rape and political sabotage...OH MY! There is never a dull moment in Neptune, and Veronica Mars makes it her business to help people solve mysteries and to do the job of the inept sheriff's department.

I absolutely LOVE this show. I was not a fan while it was on the air, but I didn't watch much TV then, so that's not my fault. I got into it this past August when I noticed all three seasons were on Instant Watch on Netflix. The show it witty, suspenseful and addictive. Veronica Mars perfectly showcased Kristen Bell's comedic and dramatic talent, which is more than can be said for the techno-horror crapfest that was Pulse (though Pulse wasn't all bad...Ian Somerhalder was in it and he is DELICIOUS).

Veronica Mars had a super-solid supporting cast in Percy Daggs III, Jason Dohring, Francis Capra and Enrico Colantoni. Dohring played the love/hate Logan Echolls and went back and forth from love interest to suspect with style. Another favorite for me was Veronica's dad Keith Mars, played by Colantoni. He was sweet and endearing, but could kick a$$ if necessary. And all of the awesomeness was ushered in with the epic Dandy Warhols theme song, which can be heard in it's remixed form in the video at the beginning of the post.

A really great thing about watching Veronica Mars now is that we can see what I call "Actor Easter Eggs" scattered throughout the show. In season one, Veronica's murdered best friend is played by Amanda Seyfried. Buffy fans will appreciate the genius in casting Cordelia (Charisma Carpenter) as gold-digger Kendall Casablancas. Other nuggets of actor awesome include Alyson Hannigan as Logan's flighty-actress older sister, Steve Guttenberg as mayor Woody Goodman, Nelsan Ellis (Lafayette from True Blood) and Edi Gathegi (Laurent from Twilight) IN THE SAME EPISODE, and real-life couple Harry Hamlin and Lisa Rinner as the murderous Aaron Echolls and his missing-thought-to-be-dead wife. And that's just a few!

The only thing I didn't like about Veronica Mars was the way it ended. The third season ended rather abruptly with several dangling story lines. The last few episodes of the season seemed like they only dealt with side stories and not enough with the main questions of the show. Several of the plot points from the first two seasons were simply dropped in season three, most likely because of the UPN-WB merger that spawned the CW. On the season three DVD's, there is a teaser pilot of a proposed fourth season. While the teaser looked like it would be an interesting show, it didn't feel like Veronica Mars anymore, especially when you consider that none of the other characters from the first three seasons were in it.

There has been chatter from fans about trying to make a Veronica Mars movie happen. I am SO on board with this! Kristen Bell even said that she would finance the movie herself if she could, which is a great show of her dedication to her debut character. Warner Brothers has said that they do not believe there is enough of a fan base to justify a Veronica Mars movie, but I think they are wrong. The show itself was grossly underrated and the cult fan base is huge now. There's even a website dedicated to making a Veronica Mars movie happen. Check it out here.

If you haven't seen Veronica Mars, I suggest heading over to Netflix and watching the show. It is  hours of solid entertainment. And spread the word so we can get that movie!

Links:
IMDb: Veronica Mars
The WB: Watch full episodes of Veronica Mars (only has 42 of the 64 episodes)
Wikipedia: Veronica Mars
Mars Investigations Fan Site
NeptuneSite
Neptune Rising
Veronica Mars: The Movie Campaign