Previously: Woody is a pedophile and Aaron was acquitted.
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Not Pictured
Sweeney: The finale kicks us off right where we left off, feeling solidly sick to our stomachs as Aaron Echolls leaves the courthouse a free man with adoring fans. Veronica Voice Over sums it up for us:
“So this is how it is: the innocent suffer, the guilty go free, and truth and fiction are pretty much interchangeable. There is neither a Santa Clause, nor an Easter Bunny, and there are no angels watching over us. Things just happen for no reason and nothing makes any sense.”
After Aaron finishes smarming it up for the cameras, we cut to Mars Investigations where Keith takes the newspaper away from a very upset Veronica, telling her that however unjust things are, they cannot allow themselves to wallow in it.
Marines: There is so much life is unfair sadness here and it’s just a punch in the gut that they cut from Aaron smarming it up, to the Marses needing to go back to work. NOT EVEN SOME WALLOW-NAPPING. Because life is unfair.
Democracy Diva: My unedited notes from this scene: “I so hope hope Aaron is about to get shot in his hideous tan suit. HE GAVE THE NIXON DOUBLE PEACE SIGNS AND EVERYTHING. THAT’S THE ULTIMATE SIGN OF DOUCHERY.”
Sweeney: That’s what Sarah Koenig should really be looking for: someone who gave Nixon Double Peace Signs. The smoking gun her finale was missing…
Keith says that Aaron will get his justice in his own way and assures Veronica that he really believes that, though she catches him doing a wee bit of newspaper brooding of his own in his office. Veronica picks up a fax (LOL. The fax machine never fails to make me giggle. Oh, faxes!) about the Mannings posting a $20,000 reward for the capture of Woody Goodman. Keith acts disinterested because the bigger thing in his life right now is that his daughter’s high school graduation is coming up. Aww, Papa Mars, finales bring out your parenting A game. Non-Negligent Parenting Eyebrows for days, Keith Mars. Eyebrows for days.
Normal is the Watch Word Coffee Shop. It’s now Wallace’s turn to brood over some paper: Jackie’s goodbye and breakup via note. Veronica brings him free cake and encourages him to drown his sorrows in it. Our girl is wise beyond her years. She’s also got case stuff to address: a guy is there, as per her promise of gelato but really she just wanted to confirm that he was on Woody Goodman’s little league team. We cut away before she gets into the awkward, “Did the mayor molest you?” questioning. I hope he at least got his free gelato.
Mari: I would totally try and score a “and cake” upgrade.
Sweeney: Veronica comes home, still staring at the little league photo and the phone rings with a call from Vinnie Vanlowe, because the finale would be incomplete without him. (M: So say we all.) (D: Cosign.)
Cut to Vinnie trying to sell Keith on teaming up to track down Woody. We pan back and see that he’s in a jail cell – he was caught, on video, breaking into Woody’s house. Vinnie says that he managed to grab all of Woody’s personal records. Keith agrees to go in 50/50 if Vinnie’s info pans out and they wait until after the graduation ceremony for any real action. This scene is delightful, mostly because Enrico Colantoni and Ken Marino need to have all the scenes together. All of them. Or, like, all of the scenes that aren’t Keith Mars being a kickass single parent.
Back at Mars Investigations, Keith and Veronica are discovering that the records are kind of a bear to sort through. Keith notices that Woody was treated twice for chlamydia (he specifically says “the clap” and I wish Diva and I were watching together so we could Rocky Horror shout “WHO’S GOT THE CLAP? WHO’S GOT THE CLAP? WHO’S GOT THE CLAP?” but, you know, wishes and dreams) (D: I WISH THIS SO HARD) Veronica gets awkward face about it because she also had chlamydia. Keith’s big discovery, though, is that Woody has a heart condition that requires daily pills, which he’d probably need to get sent to him. Keith has a plan that involves invading Gia’s privacy to have her calls forwarded to them.
We cut to Veronica waking up to her alarm, but she’s got the pink dewy glow of an Instagram filter I can’t identify. Walden, maybe? (M: Closest. It might also be from a lesser photo editing app, for those times when you just need MOAR FILTERS.) Just to confirm that this is a dream sequence, Lianne comes in to wake Veronica up and ask if she can believe the big day is finally here. At the table, Keith is in his Sheriff’s uniform and it’s the second of many FEELS! moments. He and Lianne are flirty and Veronica has some feels of her own that make it seem like she’s semi-aware that she’s in a dream sequence. Lianne tells Veronica not to run off with “that boy” after the ceremony (echoing the season premiere’s vagueness) because they need to take lots of pictures.
Lianne takes a picture which snaps us into school, where Veronica discovers that she was given the wrong cap and gown. She laments about this to her 09er friends – Logan, Duncan (again, finale incomplete otherwise – especially since they had no idea when writing this if they’d live to see season 3), and Dick. She asks if anyone knows “Wallace Fennell,” mispronouncing his name. Major sads. They talk about Wallace working at Sack N Pack and tell her a story about him losing fingers when he got forced into the walk-in freezer. They laugh when Veronica believes this story. Logan gives her a bit of a there-there kiss, saying that he loves her even if she is the most gullible girl he’s ever met. “I’m trusting, sue me,” dream!Veronica laments. Duncan points out Wallace.
Veronica and Wallace exchange their proper graduation regalia. He asks if she’s looking forward to getting out of there and Veronica shrugs that high school was pretty awesome. “Oh, you’re one of those,” Wallace responds. Wallace tells her to have a good life and heads off.
Veronica spots Lilly (!!!) standing at the Lilly Kane Memorial Fountain. She hugs her and asks for details about all the exciting thing happening in Lilly’s first year at Vassar. (This, by the way, is a relevant scene for all past conversations about Lilly/Duncan’s ages.) Lilly says her boyfriend dumped her when she cheated on him with his ex-girlfriend and it’s all very sassy and Lilly and perfect.
Sweeney: SAME.
Veronica says it’s good to see her. Lilly asks what the fountain is, and Veronica seems to resist acknowledging it, but Lilly smells bacon and it’s time for the dream to end and Veronica to wake up for real.
I love this dream sequence. I happen to love all the show’s dream sequences, which can be pretty hit or miss with people, but this one is especially poignant because it’s all such a constructed understanding of what Veronica’s life would be like now if Lilly hadn’t died. It’s Veronica’s own imagining of it. Here are all the things that would be nice and shiny – herself included. I feel like even the silly, gullible girl Veronica dreams she would be is more her own recognition that it’s not particularly healthy to be as jaded and suspicious as she is. It says less about the person Veronica would have actually become than what Veronica finds unsettling about the person she has become. Of course, she never would have met Wallace and her parents’ marriage probably wouldn’t have been the rosy thing she imagined.
I especially love (and get choked up by) the fact that this is what she’s thinking about on the eve of this big symbolic day of transition. She wants desperately to see her mother and her best friend and her first love and all these people who have disappeared from her life. One of the show’s big weaknesses for me is that it never really had the room to dwell on all the trauma Veronica has experienced. This whole sequence gets me because it’s about as close as the show gets to driving home that this is all stuff she’s still thinking about, even as the plot drives on.
Mari: +1 and A+ to all of this. I’d only add that we know that this is Veronica’s imagining of what her life would be like because she’s with Logan. That seems like a pairing that happened specifically because of all the bad crap that happened in V’s life. It seems unlikely to me that they would’ve been thrust together in a Lilly-alive scenario, but dreams are dreams.
Diva: I am always happy when Lilly is on-screen, but even without her, this dream sequence was so fantastic to watch.
Sweeney: Interesting point about Logan/Veronica and one I wholly agree with. Their relationship was birthed by the insanity they lived through – the people they were before might have been friends, but hardly the makings of a couple.
In her real, actual life, her father wakes her up to make breakfast and take us out of this standard just-south-of-ten-minutes Veronica Mars “teaser.”
COME ON NOW, SUGAR!
Keith is staked out watching Woody’s lawyer come to work. He radios to Veronica to get ready. The lawyer’s assistant tells him to return a call to Gia Goodman. He calls and gets Veronica doing her best Gia impression as she tells him that she needs to get in touch with her father because his doctor called about upping his doses. Two things: (1) How fucked up is it that it totally worked out for them that Woody didn’t leave his family any way to contact him? I mean, he’s obviously a shitty human, but this is a little side dish of terrible. (2) That said, they are potentially fucking with the man’s medications, which is also terribly dangerous and not exactly the way you bring someone to justice. This plan seriously unsettles me.
Mari: SAME. And I was left thinking, “…will they notice this too? This is seriously messed up. Are we supposed to notice how messed up this is?” I’m so happy you mentioned it.
Diva: Yeah, he’s a child molester and a monster, BUT YOU DON’T GET TO MURDER HIM VIA MEDICATION.
Sweeney: Yeeeeaaaah. I just can’t get past the fact that this is totally the kind of thing that’s making monsters out of them in order to catch one, you know?
Regardless, Keith continues his fancy technological magic, listening in on the lawyer’s next call. He gets the phone number and everything. Just before the graduation ceremony Keith explains to Veronica that this number was for a stocked hunting ranch just outside of Reno, Nevada, popular with rich businessmen. Keith is heading there immediately after the ceremony. Veronica is worried about him, but he promises he’ll be fine. Veronica looks off into the crowd and watches Weevil’s grandma fawn over him.
Diva: I fully cried on an airplane when Weevil’s grandma straightened his graduation cap. #grandparentfeels
Sweeney: CHECK YOU OUT, BLOGGING ON AIRPLANES AND MAKING FELLOW PASSENGERS UNCOMFORTABLE! It’s a Snark Lady Tradition.
The ceremony for the class of 2006 begins with John Enbom, a random student whose name gets tossed around occasionally as a Random Student when called for. It’s also the name of one of the show’s producers. We still don’t get an actual face for John Enbom. Alicia Fennell gets to make her big finale appearance to cheer on her son. Mac and Veronica are only a couple seats away so Mac can tell V that Cassidy got them a room at the Neptune Grand for the night. Veronica gives her the friendly advice to just relax. As they stand, Weevil, seated in the row behind them, is approached by Lamb and his deputies. IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FUCKING GRADUATION. Weevil is furious and begs the sheiff to allow him to graduate. Probably all the other parents and students wish he would have done them the courtesy of not interrupting their damn ceremony too. This is some epic bullshit, even for you, Lamb. (M: I was so angry.) (D: I CAN’T EVEN.)
Regardless, the arrest continues and my heart breaks as Weevil looks back at his grandma and younger cousins. The ceremony also awkwardly continues. It’s all fucked up and weird. But Keith proud papas adorably as Veronica’s name is read. We listen to a mixture of cheers and jeers from her classmates. Vice Principal Clemmons puts his hand over the mic to give his own quick goodbye to his total favorite student and it’s precious.
Marines: Outside, after the ceremony, Keith gives Veronica an envelope. Kirsten Bell is downright, sloth-levels of adorable as she feels it and sniffs it and excitedly “guesses” that it’s a pony.
Mari: Keith just smiles as she opens the envelope. Keith is gifting her a trip to New York and while she’s excited about SoHo and The MoMA, Keith is all about Yankee and Shea Stadiums. They hug and then Veronica shoos him off to go catch Woody, which is also like a graduation gift. Dick passes by and with an ass slap, tells Veronica to get ready to party. It must be graduation goggles because Veronica gives him playful finger guns and doesn’t pull out, like, an actual gun.
Sweeney: To be fair, a taser is more her style.
Mari: Double points for not whipping out the taser.
Veronica goes to her trusty LeBaron but before she can leave, Alicia stops her. Wallace left a letter on her windshield, telling her about his plans to go to Paris to track Jackie down. V gives a big sigh that takes us to a not!break. When we come back, we’re in Brooklyn, New York. Jackie walks in to a diner with a little boy who excitedly says, “mommy, mommy!” when he enters. Jackie is less excited about being there, especially when her mother who is behind the counter points out that she’s late. Ma gives her a, “you ain’t in Neptune anymore” speech, just so we can really realize what’s going on here.
Jackie gets a call at the diner and it’s Veronica, who of course, says she knew all along that Jackie was lying about her life pre-Neptune and about being headed to the Sorbonne with her 3.1 GPA. And no one bats an eyelash at Veronica Mars knowing someone’s GPA off the top of her head. (S: Like a fucking creep.) Jackie swears she didn’t lie about her feelings for Wallace. That’s cool, but Wallace is on a plane to Paris. Thankfully, he’s got a layover at JFK, so Jackie can go there and spare him the trip.
Neptune Grand. Logan is at the front desk when his dear old dad greets him. Aaron needs a place to stay too. Logan says it might be awkward because none of the other guests have killed anyone. Aaron is unruffled as he tells his son that he’s got the purse strings again, and as his dependent, Logan should work on being a little nicer.
Quail Lodge for Businessmen and Pedophiles. Woody is watching The Dukes of Hazard in his boxers. He goes to the toilet and notices that one of the lodge windows is open. Sure enough, Keith is hiding in the tub. Woody tries to make a getaway which involves throwing a mounted head at Keith (LOL), but Keith easily catches him and tases him. Keith calls information and has the operator patch him through to the local sheriff’s department.
We cut to outside the lodge, where Woody is in handcuffs. Keith says that Woody used him. Someone was blackmailing him so he used Keith to set up the girl-in-a-motel thing and incorporation died. This is a line of dialogue I definitely didn’t notice on first watch and that makes things oddly convoluted. I just always figured Woody was a creepy and that girl in a motel thing happened kind of independently of everything else that went wrong. Huh. (S: It’s one of the season’s weaknesses, I think, that nothing is coincidental.) Woody, the ever-smarmer, insists that he didn’t crash the bus. He could never hurt all those kids. Keith stops him there, saying the welfare of children isn’t high on his list. Woody again says it wasn’t like that. “Those kids,” you know the ones he raped, “needed him.” Their fathers were negligent, but Woody “listened to them” and “cared for them. It’s disgusting, but I have to say that this line of, “I’m a gift to all humanity,” thinking is totally in line with the kind of psycho I think Woody is. (D: Agreed. This was horrific, but only because it felt all too real.) A woman tells Keith that they are ready and he grabs Woody by the arm.
Veronica is looking at a picture of Woody’s old Little League team with all the names filled in. She gets a call from Keith, letting her know that he’s got Woody and they will be on their way back soon. Woody says he didn’t do the bus thing, though, so they need more evidence. Veronica says she thinks she knows how to find out who the third person on the tape was. The pilot shows up so Keith says goodbye.
Veronica goes to Woody’s burger joint and looks on the wall where he’s got a bunch of memorabilia. Veronica finds the little league picture in question and sees that one of the kids is named Derrick Applegate. She wonder out loud where that kid is, all until she sees that Cassidy Casablancas is Not Pictured.
Sweeney: TITLE STAR FOR YOU, RANDOM LITTLE LEAGUE PICTURE!
Mari: After some dramatic music and a cute to black, Veronica makes a frantic call to Mac, who doesn’t pick up. She leaves a message telling her to do whatever she has to do to get away from him. He’s dangerous. That done, Veronica dials information for Hart Hanson’s number. We cut to a party where Dick is egging Beaver one while he chugs a beer. Dick goes off, calling after Enbom, and Beaver asks Mac if she wants to go check out their room. On the way up there, Corny stops them with the news that Keith caught Woody and is bringing him back. Mac and Beaver exchange a long, awkward look.
Diva: The Snow is just confused and doesn’t understand why Beaver is dangerous. WHAT IS HAPPENING?
Mari: Hotel room. There are sex-like movements going on under the covers. A cell phone buzzes on the table nearby and goes unanswered.
Veronica arrives at the party. She’s clearly worried as she asks Logan where Mac and Beaver are. Dick hears her and makes jokes about about them being up in the room either making love or playing D&D or both.
Back in the room, Beaver looks really sad as he stares straight up at the ceiling. Mac tries to assure him that it’s fine. She’s having a good time and they have all night. She’s going to hop in the shower and then they can head back down to the party.
Veronica is at the front desk asking which room Cassidy is in. The lady won’t say and there is a do not disturb on the room, so she won’t call either. V whips out her sidekick again. Beaver hears it and picks it up. He sees the text message that says, “Get away from Beaver. Now. He’s a killer. I’m in the lobby.”
Diva: I still don’t understand what’s going on, but why would Veronica text the “he’s a killer” part if she knew Mac was with him and therefore there was a decent shot of Beaver reading it?
Sweeney: THIS. This part frustrates me because Veronica is smarter than that and it served only to facilitate the next plot movement.
Mari: The font also appears to be Comic Sans. I’d be really upset at Mac’s phone settings if bigger stuff weren’t happening right now. (S: But since you’re bringing it up: LIKE HELL MAC USES COMIC SANS ON HER PHONE. OR ANYWHERE.) Like how when the shot cuts back to Beaver’s face he’s suddenly become like 1000% more murdery looking. For real. Beaver goes into his bag and pulls out a gun. Downstairs, Veronica gets a message from Mac, asking her to meet up on the roof.
Veronica rushes onto an elevator and is so engrossed in her phone, she doesn’t realize that Aaron’s there with her. He greets her and tells her not to look so surprised. It’s a small town and they are bound to run into each other from time to time. Veronica says she’ll have to be more careful about where she goes. He smarms that it’s a free country and being free sure is sweet. Veronica, who you can tell is struggling here, says Lilly liked freedom too, before he murdered her. Aaron gets closer to her. He can see why she and Lilly were such good friends. They are a lot alike, especially in that neither of them were afraid to speak their minds. “You know that might just be the best part about the day I smashed her head in with an ashtray– knowing that once and for all, she would finally shut the hell up.” The elevator dings, Aaron gets off and Veronica exhales. Harry Hamlin was A+ creepy right here and my gosh did I want sweet judgement to rain down from the sky and obliterate him. Sorry. All that violence leaked out of me.
Diva: I was hoping he’d get shot in the first scene, so, no apologies necessary.
Sweeney: Harry Hamlin delivers that smarm so well that I’m pretty much always wishing violent judgment on him.
Mari: ON THAT NOTE, and a little bit early, but I hope she’ll forgive me, I’m passing it to Diva. I think the snow should get to cover this next scene.
Democracy Diva: Good, because my full notes began as soon as the elevator doors close, because I WANTED ME TO RECAP THIS SCENE TOO.
After the world’s worst elevator ride, Veronica arrives on the roof and is greeted by Cassidy. And his gun. He barks at Veronica to hand over her purse, and then asks Veronica what she thinks he did, so that stupid Snows like me can actually understand what’s going on right now.
Sweeney: As an aside, while snippets like this are clearly meant to make sure the audience is on the same page, I actually buy it from Cassidy, given what a megalomanic he is. Wanting to hear just exactly what she’s figured out, to what degree his brilliant plan was uncovered, fits.
Diva: Veronica helpfully exposits that Cassidy was the third boy molested by Woody, the one who didn’t want to come forward about it. When the other boys insisted on taking the story public, Cassidy got some explosives from Curly Moran, his father’s mechanic, and he detonated the bomb on the bus from the limo, murdering those who would have revealed their story and a whole bunch more. Veronica explains that Curly knew Cassidy was the killer, which was why Cassidy had to kill him, too. And Cassidy wrote Veronica’s name on his corpse to… I don’t know, actually. Throw her off the track?
Sweeney: The investigation in general, I think, because V’s easy to draw suspicion to. Logan would have been a better choice, though, because he’s suspicious without all that PI brilliance.
Mari: And to give us that sweet cliffhanger at the end of Driver Ed. Thanks, Beav!
Diva: Veronica also realizes that Cassidy hired her to destroy his father, not figure out his affair or whatever. I’m confused about what this has to do with anything. (S: Setting up that Cassidy has been devious in other ways – in other words, it’s not that a totally normal kid suddenly snapped and killed a half dozen of his classmates.) (D: That’s actually a really helpful point, because thusfar, I really was operating under the impression that a normal-seeming kid lost it, and that was a big part of my confusion.) And then Veronica asks how she got chlamydia, because two people in the same town could not possibly have chlamydia unless they slept with the same individual person, I guess? THEN Veronica accuses Cassidy of raping her during Shelly Pomeroy’s party. Holy shit. I did not see that storyline coming back, and definitely not in this way.
Veronica mentions that Keith knows all about Cassidy’s crimes by now, but Cassidy reminds her that he’s on an airplane with Woody at the moment. And remember how there was a bomb under Woody’s car? Well, Cassidy planted that, and he planted one on the airplane, too. And he can detonate it in an instant and kill Keith right in front of her. Veronica cries and calls Keith, even though, like, why would his cell phone work in the air? (S: No issue of them working – question is whether/how they interact with plane’s comms, and the proportion of people that turn their phones off on private flights is probably infinitely fewer. I know I never do when I fly with my uncle.) (D: You’re so fancy! I don’t know anything about private planes.) But Cassidy just says oh well, presses a button, and something blows up in the fucking sky. For real. We see a little fire ball in the distance and everything. Veronica bursts into tears and falls to the ground.
I should probably mention that I did not even for a moment believe Keith was dead. And not because of spoilers or anything like that – I just straight up found this completely ridiculous and didn’t buy it for a second. I also know that the writers wouldn’t kill one of the main characters off-screen with a little poof in the sky. So that kind of killed some of the SUPREME SUSPENSE that was probably supposed to be happening in my brain right about now.
Sweeney: There’s just a whole LOT going on in this episode (and season) and there are a few moments like this where it’s like, “Yeah, no, there’s no way you’d do that because this is a TV show.” But you get those GOOD AT TV points all the same.
Mari: They only real take-away are Veronica’s beautiful tears. Veronica tears are the worst.
Diva: After the not-break, Cassidy apologizes and asks Veronica for a favor. He doesn’t want to kill her, so she has to do it herself. Somewhere, Logan pulls out his phone and somehow sees the “meet me on the roof” text? I don’t understand why or how, but that’s pretty much been my reaction throughout most of this episode. (S: This is the piece I also never quite worked out.) Anyway, back on the roof, Cassidy tasers Veronica, trying to get her to jump. Suddenly, Logan shows up and Cassidy fires two shots at him. Veronica pounces and knocks Cassidy down. Logan and Cassidy grapple over the gun, but Veronica finally ends up with it, and points that shit right at Beaver’s douchey little face. Logan tells her to put the gun down, but she can’t. She screams that Cassidy killed her father, and murdered everyone on the bus, and raped her. Logan reminds her that she’s not a killer, and he calmly takes the gun and puts an arm around her.
Veronica finally leaves the roof and goes back to the hotel room to find Mac. She’s there, naked and crying, and they hold each other and sob. Nearby, Aaron and Kendall are having sex, and I’m completely disgusted by everything about this. Afterwards, Aaron lights a cigar, like every evil villain in history. He turns on one of his own movies – ugh, he would – and watches it, naked and smoking and drinking. Suddenly, we see a silencer pointing at the back of his head. A moment later, blood splatters the screen as I almost scream out loud on an airplane. The camera pans back, and we see that Clarence Wiedman is the one holding the gun. I FORGOT HE EVEN EXISTED, YOU GUYS. I DON’T EVEN KNOW HOW THIS IS HAPPENING, BUT I AM SO GLAD IT IS. Also, ten points for me for predicting Aaron would get shot exactly three seconds into the episode!
Mari: Between your “what is even happening”s and your correctly predicting some things about to happen, you’re everything a Snow should be.
Diva: Stop it, I’m blushing!
Somewhere in Australia, hanging out with Snark Lady Kirsti, Duncan and his baby girl Faith the Vampire Slayer are at the beach. I’m crying again just at the sight of them. Clarence calls Duncan and tells him that the deed is done. They cast a baby who looks a lot like Duncan, so I’m getting supremely emotional even though there is no emoting happening whatsoever. Because Duncan.
Sweeney: This whole bit is just awesome. Like a lot of things, it tugs a bit at my suspension of disbelief BUT I DON’T FUCKING CARE. This, like the dream sequence, is also really great when you remember that this episode was written with the very real possibility that it might also be the series finale. You’ve got to bring back your key players for that and what a perfect fucking way to do it. Bonus points for having the dream sequence, so anyone who spotted Teddy Dunn’s name in the credits would have assumed that was it.
Diva: At JFK airport, Wallace and Jackie reunite. She starts to explain about all the lies she told. Her mom isn’t a model – she’s a waitress who had a one-night stand with Terrence 18 years ago. Jackie got messed up on drugs and liquor and bad people, but Wallace tells her that it doesn’t matter. Jackie then drops the bomb that she has a son. Jackie’s mom decided to send Jackie to live with her father, and raise her grandchild herself. But Jackie couldn’t live with herself anymore – she needed to go back to New York and she has to stay there. And Wallace has to go back to his life in Neptune. I kind of wish this whole storyline hadn’t been slammed into the finale. It didn’t leave the other (much more interesting) storylines enough room to breathe, and I felt like all of this came out of nowhere. If it had played out slowly over the course of the season, I might have appreciated it more. But maybe it did play out like that, and the Snow just didn’t see any of the signs because she’s a Snow.
Sweeney: No, it was pretty rushed and to the detriment of both this story and the rest of the episode.
Mari: Same. It didn’t belong here at all, and that’s giving it the benefit of the doubt and adding the here. I would’ve been happier if Jackie had just disappeared.
Diva: 3/3 Snark Ladies agree: this episode so did not have time for this shit.
Mars house. Logan has Veronica laying in his lap.
She’s dreaming, until she wakes up and runs out of her bedrooms screaming, “Dad!” But it’s Logan in her kitchen, making bacon. He just tells her he’s sorry, and she cries and cries. Suddenly, Keith shows up, because of course. He explains that he got off the plane at the last minute and drove home. Womp womp.
A lawyer tells Kendall Casablancas that Cassidy’s business was doing great, and she’s going to get all of his money. Back at the Mars house, Keith asks Veronica how Logan is taking his father’s death. GOOD RIDDANCE, I say. Anyway, Veronica and Logan make out and are happy as can be in spite of the insane amounts of trauma that just happened. Kendall shows up and makes fun of them. She also offers Keith a suitcase full of a mysterious item that is probably lots of money, and asks him for a favor.
At the airport, Veronica waits for her father, alone. But Keith doesn’t show, and the episode ends.
Wow. This was action-packed, and as I said, I think the Wallace-Jackie storyline shoved in there did more harm than good. I also still don’t understand how Veronica got from “Woody and I both have chlamydia” to “Cassidy murdered everyone on the bus, and murdered Curly Moran, and raped me.” Even after I understood that Cassidy was the only one of Woody’s victims who didn’t want to come forward, I still couldn’t make the leap to “and so he killed a whole lot of people.” And the “reveal” of Keith being alive was obviously anticlimactic for me.
Mari: It’s a stretch. I mean, she went back to that picture trying to figure out who could possible be the third boy and she found Cassidy’s name. If we got back to the chlamydia thing, Cassidy was also there when she was raped. He was the missing link to her and how she could’ve contracted it, probably unlike most of those other Little League guys. Veronica suspected that he raped her, but that was put to rest by Cassidy (you know, the rapist) swearing that he didn’t. I imagine from there it wasn’t hard for her to consider that Cassidy the liar, rapist was also responsible for the bus crash.
Diva: But honestly, I think having Duncan hire Clarence Wiedman to murder Aaron Echolls was THE GREATEST FUCKING THING ON EARTH. Aaron was more of a supervillain than ever before in this episode, and it was satisfying as all hell to see him get what was coming to him. It was brilliant to bring back Clarence to do it, and very believable that Duncan would 1) not rest until his sister’s killer was brought to some kind of justice, vigilante or otherwise and 2) hire his father’s head of security to get the job done. (S: After everything shady Clarence had done to keep Duncan’s record clean, yeah, he was clearly the man for the job.) That made all my confusion throughout this episode worth it. I won’t say I loved this as much as the Season 1 finale, but that particular plot line was a stroke of genius. And I hope Aaron is burning in all seven hells as we speak.
Next time on Veronica Mars: The gang all goes to college in S03 E01 – Welcome Wagon.
Nicole is the co-captain of Snark Squad and these days she spends most of her time editing podcasts. She spends too much time on Twitter and very occasionally vlogs and blogs. In her day job she's a producer, editor, director, and sometimes host of educational YouTube channels. She loves travel, maps, panda gifs, and semicolons. Writing biographies stresses her out; she crowd sourced this one years ago and has been using a version of it ever since. She would like to thank Twitter for their help.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
I'm a J.D. by day/blogger by night who directs her snark and judgment primarily towards celebrities and their many red carpet mishaps. Blogging from the style capital of the world (just kidding - I live in DC), I rant and rave over the best and worst in fashion and pop culture.
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