Line #187 Headscratchers/VeronicaMars


1	The ending for Season 3. Seriously, it turned almost the whole series into a ShootTheShaggyDog story! Jake Kane is back and once again harming the Mars family, having faced no consequences for his actions in Season 1; because of the leaked video, Veronica is once again the subject of mockery by her peers; it's heavily implied that once again, Neptune will have an incompetent sheriff - and even worse, this one is in cahoots with mobsters! And so on and so forth. Basically, nearly all of the series' development was pointlessly erased.
2	* That's the point. Veronica Mars is a noir show; status quo always has to be restored and unfortunately in noir the status quo means the bad guys win. It brought everything back full circle to season 1.
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4	Throughout Season 1, Veronica occasionally interacts with Lilly Kane's "ghost," but it can safely be assumed these are all figments of Veronica's imagination, since none of them serve as anything more than memory triggers or talks with her own subconscious. They don't tell her anything she doesn't already know, and have no affect on the material world at all. However, in the very first episode of season 2, Veronica sees and hears what appears to be Lilly Kane's ghost once again, who distracts Veronica and lures her around the corner of a building to a surprise encounter with Weevil, who she talks with just long enough to miss getting back on her bus. The bus that later drives off a cliff and explodes. Either that's one ridiculously convenient hallucination... or Lilly's ghost really did appear to save Veronica's life. Either way, this is never mentioned or referred to afterward. Anywhere. W.T.F.
5	* I always thought of it as Veronica barely/subconsciously hearing the motorcycle, and reacting with a Lilly hallucination relating to both Lilly's relationship with Weevil and her predilection for getting into trouble (like abandoning your field trip at a random rest stop). The bus crash survival was indeed a convenient coincidence. But it is a HandWave, for sure.
6	* Veronica had a bad enough reputation as it is. It's hard to tell someone 'Oh yeah, by the way, I've been talking to my best friend's ghost for a while' without sounding mentally unstable at the least. Whoever she told could tell anyone- tell one wrong person and the whole town knows, or tell the right person in the wrong place and the wrong person overhears and tells everyone, and then Veronica's insane as well as a social outcast.
7	* It's not that uncommon for people to attribute things they barely noticed to supernatural warnings. Things like glimpses in our peripheral vision that years of evolution channel straight to "Duck now," people later say "it's like someone whispered in my ear." In reality it's just our animal instincts saving us, but for some reason we convince ourselves it's something else.
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9	Okay; so Aaron Echols managed to bullshit his way to an acquittal for murdering Lilly Kane. Fine. Main/TruthInTelevision. (Except not, because bringing up Veronica's medical records should've been an instant mistrial for several reasons and possibly resulted in Echolls' attorney being disbarred...) So what happened to the charges for kidnapping Veronica, assaulting Keith, and trying to kill them both by setting some guy's house on fire? Did the local prosecutors just forget about HOW they caught Aaron in the first place?
10	* He claimed he got into Veronica's car with her permission, she crashed, and they walked to the guy's house and called for help, after which Keith arrived and attacked him unprovoked. The homeowner, the only uninvolved witness, "mysteriously disappeared" before the trial.
11	** Except any sort of forensic investigation, you know, ''at all'' would have blown huge holes in this story. If Keith attacked unprovoked why are Aaron's fingerprints all over the gas can which started a fire? Why was there a fire in the first place? And it is somewhat unlikely that Veronica would have climbed inside and locked herself into an old refrigerator, and set it on fire. There would certainly be hair and blood inside the fridge from Veronica. There are a lot more things than that too.
12	** I assumed that those were also covered up/lied/bought off, just off screen. It would be boring if we had to sit through the entire court case.
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14	And on the subject: Why the hell wasn't the tape of Aaron having sex with Lilly authenticated and copied?
15	* I thought it was and all the copies were destroyed.
16	** That was a bit of a plot point, IIRC, as far as no copies of the tapes being made to ensure the sex tape didn't leak.
17	*** Because there would be such a huge market for what's essentially stolen child porn.
18	*** On a technical point, Lilly was seventeen which is only considered below the age of consent in about a fourth of the states.
19	*** Except that eighteen is the minimum age for someone to appear in pornography, regardless of the age of consent. Also, eighteen is the age of consent in California, where the show takes place.
20	*** It's a tape of a middle-age married movie star having sex with the teenage daughter of a computer billionaire. It would be big news.
21	*** That might have made a valid and consistent (if gratuitous) shot at Lamb's incompetence had he stated that's the reason there was no copy. But then again, shouldn't the defense have already had a copy via Discovery? I'd hate to think that Echols' lawyer wouldn't want to see the damn thing for himself, if just to look for potential flaws to exploit.
22	Also, if Aaron really did kill Lilly with the ashtray, what was the point of the bloody Oscar statue with Duncan's hair and how did it get that way?
23	* I assume the ashtray is locked away in the evidence room (though it seems quite easily accessible as shown more than once). Aaron wanted it to look like Duncan did it, so he needed Duncan's hair on the murder weapon. Unable to get to the ashtray, the Oscar statue was made to look like the real murder weapon. Coincidentally, the ashtray was found in the pool, so it can be assumed that Lilly's blood was washed away by the pool water. What really bugs me is how Lilly's blood got on the Oscar statue (that's why it was believed to be the murder weapon, right?). It's also a little strange that Veronica and Logan were the only ones who saw the tapes. Didn't anyone else review the tapes at all before they were stolen? What about the people who made copies, if any?
24	** Also, Logan's house got burned down presumably with the Oscar inside. Was there a spare Oscar floating around to use instead? And if there was blood on the Oscar, why didn't the "killer" wash it off? There are so many plot holes the whole thing falls apart.
25	++ It's just occurred to me--this was the favor that Aaron wanted from Kendall Casablancas when she visited him in prison; and why she plucked hairs from Duncan's shower. She must have planted the statue. There was so much going on in Season 2 (too much? though I love the show) that this detail easily slipped through the cracks.
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28	Veronica Mars blatantly uses everyone in the show for her ubiquitous 'favours', never seeming to value people for anything other than what she can use them for. Like half the characters only exist so they can do something for her every now and again. Oh, she almost drives Logan to suicide. How do people put up with this shit?
29	* She's attractive, for one thing, which tends to help when you're looking for "favors" from adolescent males. Plus it's not exactly a selfless act of altruism to do a favor for somebody who's very good at getting people out of bad situations, up to and including murder charges. The person who does most of her favors, meanwhile, is her closest friend; it's an uneven relationship, but there's real affection there.
30	** I'd also toss in, at least as far as Logan is concerned, that there has to be an aspect of Logan feeling remorse/regret for how badly he treated Veronica in the fall-out of Lilly's death as far as why he lets Veronica walk all over him. Especially given the context of Veronica versus Dick Cassablancas, as far as Veronica being the BFF who doesn't mindlessly enable Logan's dark side, whereas Dick seems to exist largely to nudge Logan down the paths of doing bad things without thinking, because they are young and rich.
31	** And as far as Wallace is concerned, the first moment he laid eyes on Veronica, she cut him down from a flagpole someone had taped him buck naked to. Then got the guys who did the taping to leave him alone. Wallace may be asked for favors a lot, but the favors are usually pretty small. The ones she has done for him are generally both large and have an element of danger or illegality. Plus, she baked him cookies. Hell, pretty much everyone Veronica asks for favors asks her at some point for bigger ones, except maybe Mac, who gets paid at least some of the time for her efforts.
32	** In fact, it's a running subplot throughout that her friends start to call her on this. Because it is a side-effect of her general alienation, and it is something she is shown 'working on.'
33	** Let's also notice that, while Veronica does ask people to do her favors, she repays those favors every so often. For example, she springs Weevil from jail in season one and gets him the job at the university in season three.
34	** She actually springs him from jail twice in the first season and gets him two jobs in the third.
35	** Veronica gives as much as she gets (if not more). They use her too. Everyone on the show gets into trouble and then relies on other people to help them out. But despite that, I still agree that this is a bad side to Veronica's relationships with the people she's close to.
36	* As others have explained, it's not as one-sided as you make it out to be. But the quick summary is, her life is complicated, and she's not perfect, but she's trying to do better. And her few friendships are genuine, even if she's not good at showing it. Those who recognize these things are more than happy to be her friends.
37	* Veronica had been friends with the kids of the "millionaires" of Neptune before Lily's death. She noted she wasn't one of them, but as her father was a pretty respectable sheriff, she got a certain respect. Then her best friend is murdered, her boyfriend dumps her suddenly, she sticks by her disgraced father, and her mother turned to alcohol and left. Top it off by getting roofied and raped at a rich kid party she crashed (and then have the new sheriff mock her reporting of it), and she's pretty jaded. Most of her new friends come from the "work for the millionaires" class (Wallace, Mac, Weevil), and it takes the better part of a season for Logan to warm up to her. For the first few seasons, she isn't in a very trusting mood (IIRC, her first words on the show was a claim she was never getting married).
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39	Also, Veronica's a really long name, why doesn't anyone call her Ronnie or Mars?
40	* 1) They do. Well, okay, a few people call her Mars; she only goes by "Ronnie" once or twice. And then..."Veronica Mars". Say it. It has a nice rhythem to it.
41	** As I recall, Weevil calls her 'V' quite often.
42	*** As does the lawyer guy.
43	** Dick is the only one who ever calls her "Ronnie" and she seems to be annoyed by it. (But maybe that's just because it's Dick.)
44	*** Logan also calls her "Ronnie" at least once, in the Pilot. But of course, this was back when he was still the "obligatory psychotic jackass" so it's sort of a given that he used the nickname to annoy her.
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46	What the hell happened to Veronica getting into Stanford? I mean, it was always blatantly obvious from a narrative-convenience standpoint that everyone who wasn't on the run from the law by the end of season 2 was going to [[CaliforniaUniversity Californ...er, Hearst University]], but the writers never bothered to justify it. A season and a half after establishing the Kane Scholarship as Veronica's ticket out of Neptune, and with her race with various {{Jerk Ass}}es for the valedictorian spot being a recurring subplot during senior year, somehow they never get around to telling us whether or not she got it - even in the episode set during her graduation ceremony! And then at the start of season 3, she's perfectly happy sticking close to home for college. Seriously, what the hell?
47	* She threw away her chance at the scholarship when she walked out on her last exam to see the Aaron Echolls verdict. This is led into earlier in the episode when she mentions that she needs to be perfect on all her final exams to have any chance at the scholarship, leading to that episode having a double DownerEnding in one fell stroke.
48	* As for her being "happy" - it's likely that thinking her father died in a plane explosion and then seeing him alive the next day makes her put things in perspective and decide that there are worse things than staying in Neptune.
49	** The episode in question did a saving throw for why Veronica would throw away her chances to get into her dream college; she had learned that Wallace was set to attend Hearst college and that while she was taking her final exam and got word that the Echolls verdict was about to be read via her PDA, she managed to see Wallace fumbling while emptying out his locker. This led to her skipping the exam, under the logic that she'd be content with life at Hearst since at least she'd be near her best friend.
50	** Right before that final exam, Wallace tells Veronica how much being friends with her has meant to him, and she looks like she's realizing for the first time that she'll miss him. Then she gets that text about the verdict being in, and she runs out to be there. I took it as the show saying Veronica's friendship with Wallace and her desire to see bad guys get what's coming to them are her reasons to stay in Neptune.
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52	In "Drinking the Kool-Aid," there's a flashback designed to show what a jerk Casey was before joining the Moon Calf Collective. Problem is, his "jerk" behavior is pointing out that Weevil's poem for class was actually lyrics he stole from a Music/SocialDistortion song. Isn't stopping someone from getting away with plagiarism, you know, kind of a ''good'' thing?
53	* It's a subjective thing, I guess. Maybe the others in the class didn't recognize it, but aside from Casey's girlfriend I didn't see anyone really amused or pleased with the exposure. Given that it seemed to be a love poetry class with all the couples snuggled up with each other, maybe they just didn't want anyone harshing the vibe? Still a bad example when you could probably have him mocking the hell out of somebody to get it across far more easily.
54	* It's 'cause he was a total dick about it. If he'd been angry that Weevil had cheated, that would be one thing, but he seemed smug and amused that he was getting someone into trouble.
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56	* Actually, what was with that bit at the end of 'Drinking the Kool-Aid'? I don't mean the whole getting the test results and shredding them, the bit where Casey gets kidnapped and then they see him at school. What was it meant to mean?
57	** Casey was grabbed by some deprogrammers hired by his parents, they then isolated him and brainwashed him to normal. Which, in his case, was being a selfish, money-obsessed asshole. Hence making an ironic contrast with the start of the episode, when Veronica and the audience assumed the cult was evil.
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59	The kidnapping of Duncan's daughter irks me to no end. Not only can Duncan easily afford the best lawyers in town, but this is the one time where they can get, of all people, Sheriff Lamb as a witness to the grandparents being abusive, and they INSTEAD opt to commit an elaborately executed felony? Just how much do the writers not trust law and order and the legal system in this country?
60	* About as far as their weakest member could throw the fattest lawyer. See the Echolls trial and the complete lack of mistrial for illegally revealing a witness's medical records.
61	* Plus, it's Duncan's ''parents'' who can easily afford the best lawyers in town. He's an emancipated minor with type 4 epilepsy. If he has to resort to selling his mother's jewelry to alledgedly afford a lawyer (but really fund a kidnapping), then chances are that Duncan's parents weren't willing to help him out in the first place.
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63	** This troper found it quite unbelievable that the doting parents who were willing to break the law to protect their now-only son, would refuse to accept to raise their first grandchild. They were risking losing Duncan, and they adored him. Maybe Veronica outsmarting the FBI was a cool plot, but it made little sense. The Kanes had been willing to do everything and anything for Duncan's sake. If Duncan had wanted his dead girlfriend's child, knowing the kid isn't going to starve (it's not like they're dead poor and have the excuse of "she'll be in a better home"), they had few reasons (if any) to refuse his wish. I am not a psychologist, but basic biology states that parents want to protect their children and their grandchildren. To give a granddaughter for adoption after losing a daughter to brutal murder? The child should have been a blessing at the Kane household. Plus, it would drive a wedge between Duncan and Veronica, something Celeste certainly liked.
64	*** Duncan's parents might be the problem - the whole Abel Koontz/obstruction of justice debacle WOULD NOT give a judge a good impression of the Kane family and the child's potential home life; even in America, felony charges can trump money, especially when a child's welfare is involved. Also, Duncan's fictional type of epilepsy and his history of going off his meds would raise questions about his fitness to be a custodial parent - which Meg DID previously tell Duncan her parents were doing when he and Veronica visited her after she woke up from her coma (see "One Angry Veronica").
65	* Lamb wouldn't testify in court. He gave Duncan and Veronica a break, but Lamb didn't do much else. Even when the issue was something he could identify with.
66	** And the fact that it actually would take the other Manning girls to testify against their parents for the abuse - Duncan and Veronica would have to admit to trespassing when they found Grace locked in the closet (doubly damning since Duncan is the other party in the custody case), and Lamb never actually witnessed it period.
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69	From the very beginning, we're supposed to believe that Keith Mars was unjustly removed as sheriff because the people didn't like him accusing Mr. Kane of killing his daughter. But even Keith eventually realizes he didn't kill Lilly; at worst, he covered up evidence to protect Duncan. Regardless of what crimes the Kane's did commit, Keith accused them of MURDER, his accusation was WRONG, and thust the recall vote was JUSTIFIED.
70	* Last I checked, Obstruction Of Justice (or Tampering With Evidence, depending on the jurisdiction) is still a felony. And if you're tampering with evidence, what Sherrif worth the metal his badge is made of isn't going to look long and hard at ''why''?
71	* Also, the Kanes thought Duncan ''was'' guilty, and were behaving like people who were guilty. If you're investigating a murder, and you're certain that someone who's been acting suspiciously also bribed the supposed murderer to confess, and planted false evidence linking him to the crime (all of which the Kanes did), what are you ''supposed'' to think? In short, it's only justified if you have an OmniscientMoralityLicense, which even the Kanes themselves didn't have.
72	** Plus, Keith didn't know for sure that Duncan murdered Lilly, but he knew something was wrong from the way the Kanes had shifted evidence. He was right to dig deeper, and it was just because of Kane's vast wealth that they threw off the investigation. Also, by covering everything up the Kanes prevented the more thorough investigation that could have uncovered the real culprit much earlier.
73	* Keith wasn't removed from office for his actions against the Kane family, even though that did make the people of Neptune doubt his judgment and performance as Sheriff. The recall election was called because the crime scene video of Lilly Kane's body ended up on the internet.
74	** Really the tape leak was more of a pretext. The Kanes and their friends were flexing their muscles to get Keith replaced with someone who would be more tractable (or in Lamb's case, just incompetent enough to buy into their cover-ups).
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76	How could the Hearst University board decide to actually vote on whether or not to ban the fraternities? What is their justification? Not only have none of them been proven to have committed any of the rapes, but the biggest accusations against them were actually frame-jobs organized by '''the very people who want them off campus!''' Kicking the newspaper off campus would actually make more sense.
77	* Colleges can indeed kick fraternities off-campus for major screw-ups, but usually there is a sliding scale of punishment to be had where they would suspend the fraternity first before resorting to banning it. But you are right that the way the plot was handled very badly.
78	* Why ''wouldn't'' they be able to decide to vote on it? It's a private university, the board is perfectly within its rights to determine the rules of its campus. Many colleges and universities have banned the Greek system for merely not being compatible with the image they want to present to the public (and alumni). By comparison, Hearst has ''every'' reason to want the Greeks gone: even though they are innocent of the rapes, they're a magnet for controversy and negative publicity. In recent years, there's an injured and mentally damaged pledge and an pot farm in one of the sorority houses, constant rumors of abuse up to and including rape at the fraternities, and so on. Even without the false claims made by the newspaper, there were plenty of logical reasons for the reform-minded elements of board headed by Selma Hearst Rose to explain why the Greeks would be in the crosshairs.
79	* What I don't get is why Lilith House also didn't get kicked off campus. I mean yes the frats ''could'' be kicked off due to it being a private university, but it was proven that Lilith House interfered with the investigation and should be kicked out if not arrested.
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81	Dick Casablancas; the fact that Veronica and Logan still hang out with him after the events of "A Trip to the Dentist" (which revealed that he set Veronica's rape into motion via his desire to drug/rape Madison) was one major league wallbanger.
82	* Then Veronica putting so much of the blame on getting drugged on Madison. As far as I can tell, she didn't know the drink she gave Veronica was drugged. She might be a bitch, but she's a bitch who was innocent of the worst thing she was blamed for. Especially odd because Logan having sex with Madison is why Veronica breaks up with him for good.
83	** It's Veronica's nature to blame those she hates the most, so she chooses the AlphaBitch instead of the guy who she sees as little more than an annoyance. Remember, this is the same person who immediately assumed Celeste Kane was Trina Echolls' real mother so that she would have something to humiliate Celeste with.
84	* Logan was in on it... he was the one who put GHB in Duncan's drink. It sounds like A LOT of 09ers were in on it-- so it's sad how there wasn't a single consequence for those guys.
85	* After A LOT of headscratching, this troper tried to find a logical explanation for Veronica's lack of reaction. What happened at Shelley Pomroy's party was less of an evil plan done by evil people, and more a series of mean behaviour by extremely stupid and selfish people. Let's recap:
86	+Logan gets drugs, and gives a few of them away. It's reckless and stupid, but not exactly murder.
87	+Dick Casablancas, in a mean gesture, roofies his girfriend's drink (Madison Sinclair). That's evil, but supposedly Mike thought "GHD made you nicer". It's far more evil, but from Mike's expectations, they didn't exactly know what the effects of the drugs would be.
88	+Madison Sinclair spits on her non-diet drink and passes it on to Veronica. It's a mean gesture, but she had no idea the drink was roofied.
89	+Veronica starts acting weird, and everyone assumes she's drunk and horny. They label her a slut "asking for it", which is extremely wrong, but then again, everyone else doesn't seem to be quite sober.
90	+Duncan stops the fun with an almost unconscious Veronica. Logan decides he wants Duncan to have fun, and then again, in an extremely stupid and entitled move, drugs Duncan without telling him.
91	+According to all the male characters who were using Veronica's unconscious body for fun, it was a) someone else (have a good look at the chapter, each one gives the worst sentences to another character); b) Veronica's asking for it. Dick Casablancas, who has no idea Veronica was drugged, takes for granted that she was simply drunk and horny and now regrets her poor choices and is blaming them. Madison Sinclair thinks the same. Veronica does not clarify any of these situations for anyone.
92	+What happened to Veronica was a series of very unfortunate events. In theory, the worse culprit would be Dick Casablancas, but then again, he had no idea Veronica was drugged: in his flashbacks from the party, Veronica seems to be willing to keep Cassidy in her bed. Then again, everyone was apparently drunk and had their inhibitions way down the civilized level. But, are they lying willingly? Are they lying to Veronica, to themselves? Or does each of them really remember the situation as they described it?
93	+Why didn't Veronica confront all those people and told them what they didn't know? To Madison, that the soda was drugged (and that Dick put it in here... mean as Madison can be, she deserves to know that). To all the others, that she got the drug meant for Madison. If she had faced them, maybe she could at least have gotten an apology. But apparently, she chooses the sugar-coated version that she lost her virginity with consensual sex with Duncan.
94	+And at last, but not least... If I am not mistaken, Veronica's prank with Logan's locker in the pilot caused Logan to lose more than the use of his car. I would like to think that maybe she understood that even she could do something simply mean and stupid "oh, well, it's the rich boy, what's gonna happen to him?" that had much more painful results than she had foreseen.
95	++Still, Dick should have gotten a rap for what he did... then again, he's the only one in the interrogation that she actually punishes. She also probably knows she can't go much farther, considering she has no proof.
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97	From ''Ain't No Magic Mountain High Enough'', the whole "Remember Sally?" thing... Who?
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99	* WordofGod claims that it was a past pet of Dick's that "mysteriously" went missing after he messed with Cassidy.
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101	[[spoiler: How did Cassidy get chlamydia? It's not like he was sleeping with a lot of, or any, people other than Veronica who supposedly got it from him.]]
102	* Wasn't it stated that he got it from Woody Goodman?
103	** Doesn't make sense. That requires neither Woody or him to have not had the sort of routine check-up that Veronica got when she found out. Considering the level of health care the rich people in the series should be getting, that's just plain unbelievable.
104	** Well, Woody was actually treated twice - he did get the routine checkups, it just never stayed gone. [[spoiler:Cassidy]] was horribly ashamed of what happened to him, remember, and likely had no symptoms - so a doctor probably wouldn't do that kind of test unless he told them too, and even if they did, he might just ignore it in the frantic attempt to not deal. (Note - I know like nothing about how the medical system works)
105	* The problem is that the chlamydia was treated by the writers as a clue, rather than a disease. It seems like a pretty good way to confirm that [[spoiler: Cassidy]] was molested (and unfortunately, makes it a lot less vague what exactly [[spoiler: Woody]] did to him), connect him with Veronica's rape, and through the revelation that he raped an unconscious girl, reveal his motivation for the murders (his fear of sexual inadequacy caused by the trauma of being molested, and possibly also homosexuality, depending on your interpretation). [[FridgeLogic But then you think about it, and it makes no sense.]] In actuality, if [[spoiler: Cassidy]] got chlamydia when [[spoiler: Woody]] raped him as a child, this means that he'd had it for ''years'' when he raped Veronica. At that point, if it had gone untreated, he would be suffering some serious effects of the disease, not to mention it would probably have been noticed by his doctor if he'd been getting regular check-ups. (And he's rich, so we can probably assume that he had.) Plus, chlamydia is easily treated with antibiotics... did [[spoiler: Cassidy]] really never take antibiotics in the time between his rape and Veronica's? Also, there's the fact that if Veronica got the disease from him, then she also had it when she had sex with [[spoiler: Duncan]] before the events of Season 1 even happened, which means that Veronica should have been concerned that [[spoiler: Duncan, Meg, and ''Meg's baby'']] all could have gotten it. But my guess is that the writers never considered this possibility, since the spread of the disease wasn't addressed again once Veronica finished her treatment.
106	** Not an expert, but it is certainly possible with mild cases of disease to be a carrier (and thus infectious) without having any major symptoms (don't know if that can apply to chlamydia).
107	** [[spoiler: Cassidy]] was on [[spoiler: Woody's]] little league team as recently as 2002, according to the names listed on a team photo in "Not Pictured". Shelly Pomroy's party, when Veronica was raped, was December 2003. [[spoiler: Cassidy]] could reasonably have had chlamydia for that span of time before having it treated.
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110	From "I Am God," one of our hints at what really happens appears to be "Why was [Peter] even on the bus?" But, given the solution, why ''was'' he on the bus? That would make him less likely to go, unless he and Marcos were planning on confronting Woody there - which they didn't. I assume Cassidy said something, but... what?
111	* My guess is they ''did'' talk to Woody, but it wasn't shown - or else they figured that if he saw three of his victims there, it would scare him and cause him to realize they had talked to each other about the abuse and planned to tell the authorities about it. Either scenario seems possible since Woody told Gia not to go back on the bus. He probably didn't want her leaving with any of the victims in case they tried to tell her something.
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113	In "Wichita Linebacker", why did Veronica use the printer in the coach's office instead of just downloading/forwarding the pdf file and printing it later, safely where she wouldn't get caught?
114	* I think she wanted to be in the office for as little time as she could, and printing would have been quicker than doing a file transfer had the printer worked.
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116	When did all those people have time to see Veronica alone in the guest room at Shelly Pomroy's party? In "A Trip to the Dentist," Logan tells Veronica that he gave Duncan the drugged drink, then Duncan left with her. The flashback shows that Duncan didn't leave until the morning.
117	This brings me to my next question, when did Cassidy rape Veronica?
118	* Yeah, that whole plot point really felt like an attempt to make a completely randomly chosen villain even more evil, canon and character continuity be damned.
119	** I assumed that Cassidy raped Veronica and left her alone before Duncan came in ... as for character continuity, we saw that Cassidy had various sexual hangups and other issues, and victims of abuse are more likely to be abusers themselves.
120	*** Not quite, that’s kind of a Hollywood stereotype, according to [[http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/current%20series/tandi/421-440/tandi440.html this]] study made by the Australian government over a 45 years period even when sexual abuse victims are more likely to suffer sexual abuse latter on their lives, they are not more likely to be abusers themselves than the control group (yet they do are more likely to have problems with the law for other kinds of crimes). But I see your point.
121	*** Keep in mind that almost everyone was drunk minus very few people. Not only that, but everyone kept changing their story to suit their personal interest. All we know is that Veronica was raped--not when. Beaver--it's Cassidy--could have easily raped her in five minutes or less and slipped out unnoticed. Then walks in Duncan a few minutes later. As far as Duncan leaving with Veronica sometime during the party, they could have gotten split up while they were together. Also, I don't think many people saw her in the bedroom, but maybe a lot considering it was more than two. It was Dick, Beaver--it's Cassidy-- and some other guy, then I think one of two more people. The story is still plausible, but conflicting POV's borders on discrediting the story.
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123	How in the hell did Cliff get appointed to Logan? If you can afford an attorney, the Court WON'T APPOINT YOU ONE. In addition, what the hell is Cliff's job? At times I think he's the local Public Defender, at others he seems like he has a private practice. Does California not have full-time Public Defenders?
124	* They do have full-time public defenders, but they (the PD's offices) also subcontract work out to private defense attorneys because the caseload is much larger than they can handle. Believe it or not, that's one of the few legal/law-related things they do that's even remotely plausible.
125	* Actually, the court has to appoint you an attorney. Public Defenders tend to be overworked and underpaid, which is why people usually opt for the pricier private option if they can afford it, but even the wealthiest defendants have the right to a court-appointed attorney. The reason you have to be allowed an attorney isn't because the defendant might be poor, it's because the state is always represented by an attorney, regardless, and you shouldn't ''have'' to purchase your own just to defend yourself in a system that (in theory) assumes your innocence.
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127	Just what exactly did Cassidy do to Mac at the end season 2?
128	* WordOfGod is that Cassidy stole Mac's clothes so she couldn't follow him when he went after Veronica. He didn't hurt Mac (physically). The real question is what would he have done had he actually succeeded in killing Veronica?
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130	This has been bugging me for a while. Why is everyone in the same classes? Most prominently, the person competing with Veronica for the Kane Scholarship is in the same class as Wallace (who just wants to pass), Logan (who doesn't give a fuck) and Dick (who makes inappropriate comments the whole time). Shouldn't a school district with really rich people offer AP courses and non-AP courses?
131	* At my school, at least, we had AP classes, but only a couple of them, and they were optional (I can only remember one specifically: AP Calculus). So it's possible that there just wasn't an AP Physics, or whatever that class was. On the other hand, it's possible that the class WAS an AP course and Wallace was just doing poor in it.
132	** The stupid thing is a town with that much money floating about should have a K-12 private school for all the rich kids. It would ruin the show's concept obviously, but there's no chance that a town where there's a billionaire who founded a company that made half the town's people millionaires ''wouldn't'' have a private school for all of them.
133	* I think the bigger question is: Why are they all in the same school? Are you telling me that in a place filled with as many rich people as Neptune, there isn't an expensive private school? I mean, we're shown that Neptune High is a pretty good school, which is to be expected from being in a city with probably high average property taxes, but I find it weird that the majority of the super rich are happy to send their precious children to an okay, but not great, public school with a lot of serious issues.
134	** I live in a town kind of like Neptune where there are a lot of really rich people and then a bunch of middle class people. Not so many poor minorities though. Very few of the really rich people send their kids to private school, at least to my knowledge, because we have such a good public school system. Like at Neptune, it's obviously corrupt though, with the rich kids always getting what they want and everyone else having to slog through the bs of the American education system. But still, I don't think it's that hard to believe that the rich kids go to public school. I go to school with at least three kids whose parents are professional athletes, one of which is Vince Papale's son, the football player who had that movie made about him. Plus, an innumerable number of rich business owners' and doctors'/lawyers' children. I do agree about the fact that the class levels aren't split though. A good school like that, there'd be a lot of levels and AP classes would be separate.
135	** Also Neptune is a pretty small place, after all it's an unincorporated township, so half the population being millionaires doesn't actually translate into a huge number of actual rich people. If they have a population of somewhere around 3,000 (which, if Neptune where much bigger than that, the state would likely require them to incorporate) and the average household size is three, then that's approximately 1,000 households and thus 500 rich households. Now statistically, only about 35% of households have school-age children, so that's only 180 students, spread across all grade levels. Which even with an incredibly generous endowment and some hefty tuition rates, that's just not enough students to keep even a very small private school up and running.
136	*** A more likely scenario would be that the rich half of the town would get their half of the town made into an incorporated town with a mayor and public services while the poor half has to deal with being an unincorporated township or having their own much poorer town.
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138	In the beginning of Season 1, we found out that no one has been claiming the $100,000 reward money for finding Lilly's murderer. Wouldn't Veronica (or her dad) be able to do so after they, you know, found the real murderer? Yet in season 2 Veronica still has to work as a waitress to save money for college, so apparently not. Or is this included in that "promise you will never ask us for money again" agreement?
139
140	* The award money was "awarded", since Abel Koontz had been turned in. It's just that no one claimed the reward for specifically turning him in. The Kanes probably then decided that the $100,000 was a one-time only offer, especially since they had no desire to give the Mars family any money.
141	* Not to mention that the Kanes were behind the anonymous tip themselves. They thought they knew who the real murderer was the whole time, and were trying to cover for him, so they probably never intended to give the reward to anybody.
142
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144	So, Lianne Mars wasn't sure who Veronica's father was. She knew (presumably, for her daughter's whole life) that there was a chance it was Jake Kane, and Jake Kane also had to understand this was a possibility. Yet none of them never had any problem with Veronica dating Duncan back before Lilly's death? Or did their secret mean more for them than a possible BrotherSisterIncest? Even then, they could've terminated the V/D affair back at its start without uncovering anything, probably.
145
146	* We were shown Lianne's reaction when she found out that Veronica and Duncan were dating, and she was horrified -- it's just that we didn't find out until much later why. I think she just figured there wasn't much that she could do about it without revealing her affair with Jake.
147	* It's also possible that this is another reason Celeste was constantly trying to break Duncan and Veronica up and why Jake Kane was visibly uncomfortable around her in the episode four flashbacks.
148	* There's also the simple fact that Lianne remembers being a teenager - even with the so-called 'good kids,' which Duncan and Veronica were considered to be, when a parent tells you 'you can't date this person because I said so,' that's pretty much a cue to do exactly what you've been told not to. Her choices amounted to a) tell Veronica, which likely means Keith finding out as well, damaging her marriage, and possibly Duncan learning as well, damaging the Kanes, so too much collateral damage, b) not tell Veronica, but still demand she break up with Duncan, which likely would involve them staying together in secret, and possibly even engaging in riskier activities like sleeping together, or c) suck it up and stay quiet and hope the teenage relationship runs its course naturally. She opts for choice C.
149
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151	What really Just Bugs Me is how every fan of Sheriff Lamb points to the episode where he doesn't arrest Veronica and Duncan for breaking into the Manning's house as proof that he's really got a heart and that he can do the right thing. Sure, he didn't arrest Veronica, but he also does nothing to stop the abuse the Manning's are dishing out to their children. These people are inflicting serious psychological and (maybe) physical abuse on their kids, Lamb knows, and does nothing. All he did was not stoop to his usual level of assholery.
152	* What could Lamb reasonably have been expected to do? He has no proof of this abuse and the Mannings are powerful people in a town where the rich run things. Unless someone else reports it (and Duncan and Veronica hardly report what they saw) then legally he can't really do anything.
153
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155	After Lianne stole the check from the Kanes at the end of Season 1, why did Keith just let her get away with that instead of having the Kanes stop the check and issue them a new one?
156	* Keith was in the hospital after catching on fire while saving Veronica, and Veronica was handling Logan's murder drama, so it probably wasn't discovered until it was too late. She disappeared pretty well before, and now she has the experience to do it better.
157
158	Why didn't Veronica release the Sherriff Lamb CD from "the beetle" that incriminated Sherrif Lamb? Lamb's clearly an incompetent asshat who (at least up to this point in the series) has not had a single instance of being a decent cop? facepalm You know what's even more hilarious? She chews her father out for not releasing the other piece of evidence (the voice mail) even though his reasons for keeping it hidden are much better. Can you say hypocrisy?
159
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161	How was Aaron's death ruled a suicide when he was ''[[TheCoronerDothProtestTooMuch shot in the back of the head?]]''
162	* It's not actually shown where he was shot; you just see the gun, the blood spatter, then the killer.
163	+ The lawyer is not referring to Aaron's death, rather to the bus bomber's death from throwing himself off of the roof. Recall the life insurance policy and its beneficiary--hence the lawyer stating to the beneficiary that it is a "wash" because the policy doesn't pay out for suicide.
164	** That's the ''real'' headscratcher here: '''was Aaron's death even investigated at all?''' The lack of follow-up seems to imply that it was ruled a suicide even though that was never actually mentioned on the show, but as the troper above mentions, from the blood spatter it's obvious he was shot in the back of the head, which immediately points to homicide. Even if Sheriff Lamb and his team were incompetent enough to not notice that, considering there is an arc about an apparent suicide that turned out to be a murder in the next season, it just reeks of lazy writing. And even if Aaron had managed to turn his head at the last second or something, making it seem more suicide-like, are we supposed to assume that all the main characters, ''including his own son who had already lost one parent recently'', simply bought the suicide explanation, waving it off with nothing more than a "well, he was an asshole, so good riddance"? Surely neither Logan, nor Veronica or even Keith would actually believe Aaron would have a sudden crisis of conscience after all the trash talk and threats he spewed in that very episode after getting away with murder. And what about Kendall? Surely after having sex with Aaron, her presence in the apartment could be discovered easily by a CSI team-- that is, if they had bothered to send one in...
165	** I wouldn't be surprised if Logan did decide to just let it go. Yeah, he was Aaron's own son, but then you realize that there was really no love lost there: Aaron killed Lilly, drove Lynn to suicide, abused Logan for years on end, attempted to kill Veronica, and even as late as that episode had threatened both him and Veronica. He might still have some lingering attachment he can't help but it really was for the best.
166	** Logan I can buy. Keith and Veronica letting it go that easily is a little harder to grasp, but that may just be me. Either way it's strange that they just left it open-ended like that, especially in hindsight with the suicide-or-murder plot in the next season.
167	*** Keith and Veronica letting go the probable execution of the murderer that tried to kill them? I can see them saying he "Got what he had coming" as the only punishment Aaron was likely to receive and leave it at that.
168	** I think they knew that it was probably Duncan's people (or maybe they thought it was Logan's?). Aaron killed Lilly and tried to kill Veronica and Keith. Duncan is not only hiding from the police so good luck finding him but if he is punished for his actions then that just means that the baby would be returned to the super abusive Manning household. If there was ever a reason to look the other way, it was here.
169	** The blood spatter is meaningless. Aaron could simply have turned his head thus causing an entry wound in his temple and making it look like a suicide. The real question is why did no one test his hands for gun shot residue? Or, you know, look for a gun?
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171	How was Keith ever elected Sheriff in the first place? It's clear that the rich run the town but Keith was about as incorruptible as anyone got in Neptune. As such, why was he ever allowed to take the post? From Veronica's fantasy in ''Leave it to Beaver'', it appears that Lamb was around as a Deputy when Keith was Sheriff and we see in S3 that he ''sucks'' at running for office, so why wasn't Lamb "installed" in the first place (from their point of view, better a guy they can bribe to look the other way than a Crusader for Justice). It's not as if Neptune wasn't corrupt before the Lily Kane murder, because it's implied that organisations such as the Tritons (and that other organisation that Jake Kane runs in S3) have been around for years.
172	* I can't remember if it was officially established when Veronica made her friends within the 09-ers. If she was already friends with Lily, Duncan, Logan, and all the other 09-ers when Keith was running for Sheriff, it makes sense that her friends' parents might have given some money and support to Keith, especially because we don't exactly know who he was running against. Sheriff races aren't usually too big, so having a few big name donors (no more than five at the least) would hold a lot of sway. Plus, he was likely able to bring in most of the lower-class votes because they saw him as less corruptible and more on their side than someone who would be easily bought out.
173	* There's some indication that the Neptune police force isn't really systematically corrupted at that point in time. Individual cops might be on the take, but even Sheriff Lamb, for all of his insensitivity and shocking ineptitude, generally is doing the right thing in the end, even if Keith and Veronica basically need to do all of the actual work and hand it to his protesting ass on a platter. The town itself, is a corrupt cesspool right out of Charles Dickens, sure, but the vested interests seem content to leave the sheriff ''mostly'' alone, and simply use their power, deep pockets of money, and influence to make sure the (mostly inept) police never cotton on to their crimes in the first place. In fact, there's a bit of FridgeHorror in the idea that it's the Mars's combination of incorruptibility ''and'' competence that finally destroys the sheriff's office: if he and Veronica had just left the Kane case well enough alone, and not exposed the crimes of two of Neptune's leading families, the status quo might have persisted. But when the wealthy powers-that-be could no longer rely on police incompetence, they just bought them off wholesale.
174
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176	If Lilly's air-vent stash trick was so well known (at least to Duncan, Logan and Veronica), and the tapes were there all along, how did the initial investigation fail to find them?
177	* Keith and the sheriff department wouldn't have known. Since Keith thought it was the family, it wouldn't have mattered what was hiding in her air vent and there was quickly a confession so the investigation stopped.
178	** Also consider who said they knew about the trick - Duncan, her brother, Logan, her boyfriend, and Veronica, her best friend. All of them were close enough to Lilly that she'd share these kinds of secrets with. But her parents? Celeste couldn't find a leash short enough for her, and Jake seemed to view her in a light that made it so he would likely think there weren't any secrets between them. So of course they wouldn't know, and why would anyone at the sheriff's department?
179
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181	Can someone ''please'' explain to me ''[[WhatTheHellHero what]]'' Logan was thinking when he destroyed the evidence that put Lilly Kane's murderer behind bars as opposed to doing everything he can to see him put away?
182	* He was thinking that he loved Lilly and could not bear to think about her having sex with his father let alone see it. He was thinking that it would be everywhere once the trial hit and there would be no way to get rid of it. He was thinking that she deserved better than to be remembered that way and he couldn't stand for that to be her legacy. He was thinking that it mattered more to him to keep the sex tape out of the public eye than to guarantee his father went to prison. He was thinking that they could still win without it.
183	* [[NiceJobBreakingItHero And the killer walked.]] He wasn't thinking rationally at the moment, considering what he had been seeing, but it was still an incredibly stupid move. [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Aaron Echolls got vindicated in the eyes of the public]] and [[DownerEnding Abel Koontz is still in prison and will be for the rest of his life]], courtesy of Logan.
184	** Abel Koontz was long-dead by this point. Logan cared more about what people thought about Lilly than what they thought of his father. He was horrified that his actions probably led to his father walking but Duncan quickly had him killed so it wasn't something he had to worry about for long.
185
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187	Why is Piz so hated? Even on this wiki people seem to hate him fiercely. Just the entry on the "PitbullDatesPuppy" trope is so unfairly negativ, I don't understand it.
188	** An unhealthy mix of DieForOurShip and AllGirlsWantBadBoys. All the fans of nice guys liked Duncan, so they see him as a ReplacementScrappy (even though he doesn't share much in common with Duncan, except being a counterpart to Logan) and all the fans of bad boys hate him because they want Veronica to end up with Logan.
189	** While I agree with this assessment, I think there's more to it than that. Piz is TheScrappy because he's a two-dimensional character who was created purely to [[RomanticFalseLead drive a wedge]] between Logan and Veronica.
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191	What was the deal with Gia's mom? It's implied that she's vaguely abusive towards Gia's brother, but do they ever go more in depth on that?
192	** It's implied that she is, but Gia seemed pretty casual about it, so I always assumed that she might be unstable due to being married to [[RapeIsASpecialKindOfEvil Woody.]]
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194	Who took the video of Lily's Murder scene and who posted it online?
195	* WordOfGod says that the video was leaked by none other than Deputy Don Lamb, in a successful effort to steal Keith's job. I assume the video was originally shot for evidence purposes, similar to crime scene photographs.
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197
198	WordOfGod says that "Remember Sally?" is supposedly a reference to an animal of Dick's that Cassidy/Beaver killed, and Dick seems pretty shaken, at least enough to lay off after Cassidy humiliated him. But Dick also spends the rest of the series mercilessly ripping on Cassidy. So...that reference is enough to shut Dick up then, but apparently never gave him a moment's pause before then?
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200
201	What happened to Logan’s money? In the revival he and Veronica are clearly not wealthy (rent control condo) but Logan is the only biological child of Aaron Echols, a wealthy deceased movie star. Season three established that he blew through his trust fund, but this was money he inherited from his mother’s estate. Even if Aaron’s estate was split between Logan and his adopted sister and various legal fees and debts paid off, it should still be worth millions-plus the movie residuals.
202	** It's entirely possible that in the gap between season three and the movie, Logan pissed away much of it in his self-destructive spiral. That's a period of time that is (understandably) not brought up, but it's clear based even just off of his behavior in season three, where he first gets himself arrested just to go after Mercer, then the beating of Piz, capped off by getting the attention of someone with what are implied to be the Russian mob, Logan spent his early twenties in a very dark place that probably would have led to him having gotten himself killed in not-long order. He could have burned through his cash and sold off the ownership of Aaron's estate in the name of paying off threats - or, potentially, even just outright signed it all over to Trina because he expected he'd be dead soon anyway.
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204

Context Headscratchers / VeronicaMars