Monday, July 22, 2013

Veronica Mars 1x19: "Hot Dogs"

The Mystery: Who stole Mandy's dog?

Okay, so the mystery in this episode is pretty lightweight - Veronica's shy, awkward classmate Mandy is babysitting at an Oh-Niner house when her dog Chester is stolen from the front yard. After hours of the girls fruitlessly searching and printing posters, the case seems closed, albeit tragically, when a pound employee name Hans informs Mandy her dog was killed. However, Veronica notices the Neptune billboards are suddenly plastered with missing-dog posters, and she wonders if Mandy's case was an isolated incident or part of a bigger scheme.

But um, that kind of takes a backseat to the fact that Weevil got caught breaking into Lilly's bedroom, Duncan's still missing, and Logan's sister Trish is acting weird

Let's start this in order - now that he's eighteen, Weevil's facing serious jail time for his break in, even though he didn't actually steal anything (Stripper-Cop Leo found nothing but a few condoms and a pen on him). Weevil reveals he'd given Lilly his mother's ring back when he thought they were getting serious (awww....) and he was trying to steal it back, but Veronica's not entirely convinced.

Meanwhile, Duncan and His Stupid Face are MIA, and Celeste confronts Veronica in her father's office, convinced Veronica's to blame for Duncan's disappearance and knows where he is. She insists she doesn't hate Veronica, but our girl V is just such a constant reminder of what a cheating dick her husband is. Keith overhears this part of the argument and Celeste reverts to being a Horrible Person when she calls him on being such a good detective and yet not knowing his wife was an adulterous tramp.

Still, Celeste's accusations aren't entirely baseless. Veronica did accuse Duncan of killing Lilly and she did bait him into fleeing by making sure he overheard a conversation about all the ways Keith's wealthy targets try to disappear. So she offers Celeste a deal - she'll give her tips on how to find Duncan if Celeste will drop the charges against Weevil.

In the Echolls household, Lynn Echolls' lawyer reads out her will - Aaron and Trish get nothing, obvs, while Logan gets the bulk of her $150,000 savings. Almost immediately, Trish hits Logan up for ten grand - she apparently borrowed some cash from her producer boyfriend Dylan, and is having trouble paying it back. Dylan must be leaning on her pretty hard, since she's also pressuring their father Aaron into starring in her BF's indie film.

Both Logan and Aaron refuse - but later that night, Logan spots Trish limping home with a mysteriously-obtained black eye. Logan taps Veronica to find out the deets on this Dylan jerk off, but before they can take action, Aaron comes to his own conclusions and invites the lad over for dinner. First on the menu? A hefty serving of Righteous Ass-Kicking. Logan and Veronica arrive just in time to catch him wailing on Dylan with a belt.

While Logan's escorting Veronica home, he reveals he found out about Lilly and Weevil, but instead of feeling angry, he's relieved, because now he can feel less guilty about his feelings for Veronica. Both L and V are a bit unnerved by their sudden attraction, and agree to keep it on the downlow while they explore their feelings.

Whodunnit: Veronica's classmate Hans, who works at the pound, was running a dognapping scheme - snatching dogs from wealthy neighbourhoods and returning them for the reward money. Dogs whose owners couldn't afford high rewards were sold off and their owners told their pets were dead. Mandy, in a newfound spurt of self-confidence, goes after Hans with a taser (!) to find out where Chester is.

All seems right with the world - until Veronica remembers that Lilly owned a bright pink spy-pen that she used to hide secret messages from her various boyfriends. A bright pink spy-pen that Weevil returns to her, empty, once the charges against him are dropped. Weevil was never suspected of Lilly's murder because he had an airtight alibi - but not for Lilly's real time of death.

Awesome Things:
  • The Definition of Big Pimpin': being so awesomely attractive that your Heartbroken Stripper-Cop Ex-Boyfriend will help you bust a dognapping ring right after you break up with him because you made out with another guy. 
  • Verogan. LoVe. Whichever you call it, the Logan-Veronica ship is sailing full-steam ahead! Hooray!
  • No Duncan and His Stupid Face to ruin things. 
Less-Awesome Things:
  • Celeste. Ugh.
  • Mixed feelings over Aaron Echolls. The weird thing is, without the context of previous episodes, Aaron is pretty fucking awesome in this episode. He sounds so sincere in his desire to retire from acting and spend more time with his family, he spends the whole episode thinking of others, and you learn more about his abusive childhood. And I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel a huge amount of satisfaction watching him take Trish's battering boyfriend to PainTown. And yet - previous episodes make it pretty clear that Aaron is just as abusive as his father was, not to mention superficial, adulterous, and just insane enough to believe his own bullshit. His takedown of Trish's boyfriend is eery and unsettling because the scene is framed as a self-righteous act when  he really has no reason to be portrayed that way. 
  • Keith figuring out Veronica might not be his, and mailing away for a paternity test. Keith, noooo....
The Lilly Kane Case Files
  • Lilly used a cheesy pink spypen to smuggle messages from her various boyfriends. What message could have been important enough for Weevil to risk jail time to make it disappear? 
  • If Weevil killed Lilly, why would the Kanes try to cover it up? 

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