"Veronica Mars," Year Three

Minor spoilers ahead.

Veronica Mars goes off to college, and "Veronica Mars" the show goes through even bigger changes, swapping its usual format of one big season-long mystery for two smaller arcs and assorted one-offs. Two new college buddies for Veronica are added to the cast, Stosh "Piz" Piznarski (Chris Lowell), and Parker Lee (Julie Gonzalo), the new roommates of Wallace and Mac, respectively, at Hearst College. Tina Majorino as Mac and Mike Muhney as Sheriff Lamb are also finally added to the opening credits, though neither of them have any more screentime than in previous seasons. Not many members of the supporting cast appear consistently, and several of them disappear for multiple episodes at a time. Meanwhile, the writers keep trying to strike out in new directions with mixed success.

The consensus is that the third and final season of "Veronica Mars" is the worst, and I have to agree. The stakes are lower than ever, events are starting to feel repetitive, and I wondered a few times if the writers were just stalling for time. However, I still enjoyed watching this season and didn't have any trouble getting through this last batch of episodes. Sure, Wallace and Mac and Weevil don't show up as much, but they all get interesting things to do when they do show up, and I was glad that the writers didn't try to shoehorn them into plots where they didn't belong. Heck, even Dick Casablancas grew on me, becoming the show's most reliable comic relief. And while the year's two big ongoing mysteries don't achieve anything near the level of the epic stories that the show has delivered before, they're still entertaining and well executed.

My biggest complaints boil down to two characters and one relationship: Veronica and Logan. The third season may have multiple mystery arcs, but there is one major storyline that runs through the whole year, and that's the up and down, on again, off again, ever-more-complicated love story between these two crazy kids. After years of flirting and hinting, we finally get to see what Veronica and Logan being together in a real relationship looks like, and then how things between them go downhill fast. I like the pairing and the volatility makes sense. Veronica is paranoid and Logan is a bad boy, and it's no surprise that they would have a heap of issues and mismatching expectations to work out. However, the drama between them is not handled well. Veronica acts like a jerk. Logan acts like an idiot. Reactions don't make sense and events contradict each other. In the end I'm not sure if I want them back together or as far away from each other as possible, to prevent further character warping.

I thought Veronica's transition to college life was handled pretty well otherwise. Things are looking up for her, and she's got new career possibilities, new people in her life, and a whole new institution of higher learning to learn the ins and outs of. I like that she got to grow up, no longer the underdog in a world of 09ers, but on the verge of gaining some real power and authority, and all the responsibilities that come with that. It's nicely mirrored by Keith Mars' shifting roles this season, where he has to balance his professional and private obligations in a few different ways. I called the second season of "Veronica Mars" a transitional one, and the third feels even more so. Then again, maybe this is the natural state of the show. The characters are always in flux, so there's no permanent status quo aside from the fact that Veronica will always have a new mystery to solve every week. It's a rare genre show that embraces this, and I'm glad for it.

The fact that the third season is the last one is a shame. It renders a lot of the character development from this year moot, because it doesn't have any payoff, and the finale isn't nearly as good a capper as either of the two season finales that preceded it. Also, I thought the show finally had all the players positioned in a much better way than at the beginning of the season, and I would have liked to see a fourth year be able to build on that. Logan is interesting again, Mac has fully recovered from last year, and Weevil's finally edging back toward a life of crime. Year three had a lot of rough spots, including two really blatant social justice episodes that were so obvious as to be off-putting. However, I've grown to really enjoy this group of characters, and that's what spurred me to keep watching.

And that's why I'll be keeping an eye out for that Kickstarter-funded movie next year. I'm hoping it'll give the gang a proper sendoff this time, because they deserve one. "Veronica Mars" is one of those shows I'm sorry I didn't start watching a lot earlier, but the upside is that I'll have much shorter time to wait until I get to see more.

Top ten episodes list is forthcoming.
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