Previously: Veronica inadvertently told Duncan how to disappear and then implicitly accused him of murdering Lilly so he up and disappeared. Also Veronica and Logan made out.
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Hot Dogs
Sweeney: We begin in the Mars Investigations Offices with Veronica tutoring Weevil in math. This scene not only gives us some adorable Veronica/Weevil time but also reminds us that the gang leader with the heart of gold is not only sweeter than he lets on, but smarter than the school system gives him credit for. He dismisses a word problem he doesn’t want to answer by giving Bob the fictional Word Problem Guy some financial advice. I’m overselling this – that advice was basically, “Illegal stuff makes a lot of money!”
Sweeney: This scene is also important for expository purposes because Weevil wants more information on Duncan’s disappearance – apparently people know that he skipped town because V accused him. Weevil’s less interested in Duncan’s disappearance than in Veronica’s conviction that Abel Koontz didn’t do it. Keith returns and while we know about Weevil’s goodness, concerned dad isn’t a big fan of his daughter hanging out with the leader of the local motorcycle gang. Weevil sees him out and Veronica leaves shortly thereafter, planning to hang out with Backup instead. A good choice. I just said goodbye to my dog for about six weeks and just thinking about it makes me want to cry.
Democracy Diva: Can you send your dog to me for the next six weeks? This episode gave me so many dog feelings and I just need to cuddle a cute animal right now.
Sweeney: If you promise to send me copious picture messages to verify that he is alive/happy/slobbering-on-everything.
We cut to a nerdy girl we haven’t met before, sitting in a room reading a Judy Blume book. She hears a noise outside and goes to investigate, only to find her dog Chester missing. OH MY GOD THIS EPISODE? NOW? REALLY? I can’t, you guys. Recap over. I quit.
Lor: The number gods knew that you would be traveling and the number gods love when you get emotional in airports/on airplanes.
Sweeney: THEY REALLY DO.
Neptune High School for Murder Accusations. Logan comes to talk to Veronica about Duncan’s disappearance. Celeste called him about Duncan and Logan says he told her the truth – that he has no idea where he went. The bell rings and Veronica Voice Overs about Logan not bringing up their kiss. She’s fine with that because it’s always better to silently ignore awkwardness and sweep it under the rug.
Veronica breaks her reverie when she spots the nerdy girl with the missing dog putting up lost dog signs and sees one of her signs taped to her back. Veronica pulls it off and the girl, who is something of a lost puppy herself, asks if she can hire Veronica and looks very sad and dejected when Veronica (a little snarkily, as always) tells her she doesn’t do lost pets. Because Veronica is, after all, a marshmallow, Lost Puppy’s face falling is enough for her to offer to help hang signs and make a few phone calls.
Lor: The wardrobe people really went the extra obvious mile with Lost Puppy here, giving her pigtails and all.
Diva: Everything about her styling screams, “I need to be rescued just like my dog!”
Sweeney: Quick interruption: Wallace is there to eagerly be the first to tell Veronica some big news. Vice Principal Clemmons (apparently the school’s only administrator!) got a call that morning informing him that Weevil got arrested the previous evening for breaking into Lilly Kane’s bedroom.
COME ON NOW, SUGAR.
After the credits Veronica goes straight to the Sheriff’s Department to see Weevil. She flirts with Deputy Mumbler a little first and cracks jokes about bad boys being “total good girl bait.” He has one of his making-me-root-for-this-in-spite-of-myself moments with his little, “I’m doomed!” comment. Moments that like that sell me on this questionably 19-year-old police officer business. Veronica asks Leo what they found on Weevil when they brought him in, but there’s nothing of note. “The badass standard – seventeen cents, couple condoms, a pen.”
Lor: It may not seem like much, but he could probably trade it for a house!
Diva: True life: I did not pay attention to this scene after I saw Alyson Hannigan’s name in the credits. YAY WILLOW!
Sweeney: A fair reason.
Inside the holding cell, Veronica gets right to business and says that she knows about his relationship with Lilly and the letters. She’s not buying his initial insistence that he just broke in because BAD BOY! given that it happened immediately after he learned that she was still investigating Lilly’s murder. He snaps at her, saying he told her everything and asks if she’ll help. She considers for a moment, but decides that no, she is not. As she’s leaving, he stops her to say that he was trying to steal back a diamond engagement ring that his mom had given and his younger, foolish self gave it to Lilly. He needs her help because the Kanes want the book thrown at him; now that he is 18 the book has gotten a fair bit larger and heavier.
Diva: High school students, please stop proposing to each other. It always seems to end in breaking and entering.
Sweeney: Also, you’re high school students. Just stop it.
Mars Investigations. Lost Puppy explains that she was babysitting when Chester went missing. The 09er family she babysits for let her keep her dog outside when she babysits. Lost Puppy doesn’t live anywhere near there, though, “I’m more like an 02er.” Veronica tells Lost Puppy to take the flyers down to the pound to increase the odds they’ll remember her if Chester comes through.
Echolls Mansion for Redefining Dysfunctional. WILLOW Trina is hanging out with her dad while he reads. She tries to push him to start looking into new jobs, but he’s not having it because he’s just reading a book now that he’s super serious about being there for his family and stuff. (D: It’s Siddhartha, because Aaron is at the emotional reading level of a high school sophomore.) Logan walks in and mocks the whole idea, as is his right after a lifetime of beatings. Trina, unmoved by all of this, pushes a script on him, insisting that there’s an amazing part in the movie her boyfriend is producing. He’d be perfect! Two days of work! He’s not interested.
There’s a doorbell ring and we cut to a bit later where the three of them sit around the table as a man explains that Lisa Rinna updated her will shortly before she died. She cut Aaron out of it entirely – he’s not entirely surprised. With that, Logan gets everything. Trina’s horrified that she was taken out but to compound that insult, Trina was never in it.
Neptune Pound. Veronica comes in with Lost Puppy and one of the guys who works there fanboys to his coworker that Veronica’s the coolest girl at Neptune High, sharing an almost certainly false story about how she nearly got expelled for putting a spy cam in the teacher’s lounge but was let go because of all the dirt she’d amassed. I like these fun reminders that Veronica’s bad blood with her former friends doesn’t spread as universally as she assumes. Throughout life there tends to be a disconnect between what we assume others think of us and what they really think, but as with so many other feelings, high school puts that on steroids.
Lor: Additionally, Veronica is still obsessed with the case and with how it changed her life. I’m sure she can’t well process that others aren’t harboring feelings and resentments and opinions still as well.
Diva: Meanwhile, the Snow totally thought the camera thing was true. Like, maybe she was investigating a crime in the teacher’s lounge and accidentally amassed some dirt and brought it to the principal? She’s done way worse shit than that.
Sweeney: Anyway, Fanboy hasn’t seen Chester but promises to keep an eye out. Veronica confirms to Lost Puppy and us that the spy cam story is false.
Over at the Echolls house, Trina hands Logan a Pop-Tart from the goodness of her heart. She opened the wrapper and put it in the toaster and everything! And then she launches into a thing she needed him to talk about. “Would you look at that? There was a string attached to my Pop-Tart!” is one of my favorite Logan one-liners, which is saying something because he gets a lot of excellent snarky comments. Anyway, Trina wants a loan. Logan taps his watch and says it took twelve hours for her to hit him up for his dead mother’s money. Trina says her boyfriend loaned her twelve grand and she just wants to get him off her back, but Logan, like her father, is not interested.
Neptune High School for Teenagers Being Shitty RIGHT AFTER I Said Maybe Nice Stuff About You God Damn Guys This is Why You Can’t Have Nice Things. (Trademark pending on that totally efficient, catchy name!) Lost Puppy and Veronica walk into school and LP gets a phone call but it’s just somebody prank calling her. Veronica spots the guy in question laughing to his buddies and she’s having none of his shit. She walks up to him to sassily shake his hand. “Congratulations. You’ve been named the world’s biggest cockroach. This award has been given in recognition of your unparalleled lack of decency. Brave. You’re gonna die friendless and alone.” He starts to respond and she cuts him off, telling him to STFU and adding that she’ll ruin his life if he fucks with Lost Puppy again.
Sweeney: After, Lost Puppy says she can’t believe Veronica did that, but V cuts her off too, saying that she can’t believe Lost Puppy didn’t do that. If she wants to be treated with respect she needs to make them. Way harsh, Tai.
Lor: Over-identification much?
Diva: A truth Lost Puppy needed to hear, but way, way more gently. C’mon, V. Feelings: other people have them.
Sweeney: Later, she gets a call from Fanboy at the pound. We cut to her sitting there with Lost Puppy, hearing that Chester got hit by a car and by the time they found him they had to put him down. He saved the collar for LP, though. She cries. NOT THE PUPPY. WORST.
Later, Veronica is taking some time to appreciate her dog by walking him at the beach. She notices a big bulletin board now covered in lost dog signs. VVO tells her that it used to be much more of a catch-all bulletin board, so the uptick in lost dog posters is weird.
She pulls them all down the signs and heads back to Mars Investigations and calls all the numbers to ask if any of these people have gotten their dogs back. VVO explains that only the people who offered high rewards got their dogs back. She wonders if the others are just left by the highway to die and concludes that something must be done about this, as she redoes the low-reward signs with bigger dollar signs attached.
Diva: I know this town has a lot of class warfare issues, but now they’re MURDERING DOGS FOR BEING POOR? I can’t, you guys. I simply cannot.
Sweeney: Her reverie about Operation: Save Every Dog is interrupted when Celeste storms in to ask what she said to Duncan. Celese thinks she knows why he left and potentially where he is. Veronica decides to start with all the things she didn’t tell him, like how his mother threatened to kill her and drove her mother out of town. Celest is taken aback. “I know you think I hate you, but I don’t. I just can’t stand to look at you.” LOL, OK. (L: I’ll have to make sure and use this distinction in the future…) She goes on to say that when she sees Veronica she sees her husband’s infidelity. Not V’s fault, but I suppose that makes some sense. Keith comes in while she’s talking and tells Celeste to get lost. She gets in some Julie Cooper Lite sass, “You don’t scare me, Keith. If you were such a great detective, you would have seen what was going on right under your nose.”
Veronica stops Celeste at the door, out of Keith’s earshot, to say that she might have an idea where Duncan went and will help if Celeste agrees to drop the charges against Weevil.
Lor: This girl. I would’ve been too lost in FEELS to think that quickly on my feet.
Sweeney: Echolls Mansion for Epic Trauma. Logan’s sitting in the kitchen eating when Trina walks in. He makes fun of her, completely oblivious to the fact that she’s wearing sunglasses at night, in the house, and limping. He finally wises up and pulls the sunglasses off to reveal a big black eye. Logan’s shocked and asks if her shitty boyfriend did this. She doesn’t answer, which is solid confirmation. Logan gets ragey on her behalf, but Trina says he made it clear he has no interest in her problems. Not loaning you twelve grand in exchange for a Pop-Tart is hardly the same thing, Trina. She walks off, emboldened by cutting him down, and he’s got a face that says, “I’d like to sneak around a corner with perfect timing and face punch someone again.” (L: A+) (D: 1430)
At school the next day, Weevil breaks their rule by sharing recent gross parental PDA sightings. Veronica gets a phone call about one of the lost dogs and says that she’ll send her brother to meet this person. At the word “brother” Wallace gives her, “HOLD UP, GIRL” eyes. He teases her a little about that and asks where she’s going to get a thousand dollars – if she’s got that, she’s “really been holdin’ out on a brotha.”
Wallace plays his part and “his” dog is brought to him by a Mexican man who doesn’t speak any English and, as such, can’t say where the dog came from. Wallace hands over the cash and that’s that. Except not because Backup comes running out and attacks the guy so Veronica can sneakily get her money back while calling off her dog. She also placed a GPS tracker on him because Veronica’s always walking that fine line between do-gooder and stalker.
She follows him to a construction site and watches as he explains what happened to him to two other guys. He starts demanding the money, along with about a dozen other guys. She corrects that he stole the dog and the guy says, in English, that he didn’t steal, and resumes asking for the money. Veronica pulls out a foghorn because of course Veronica carries a foghorn around in her bag. What self-respecting teen sleuth doesn’t? (L: Probably Nancy Drew, that twit.) Veronica asks where the dog did come from. The dog man. They all start talking excitedly in Spanish about the dog man who probably drives a white van, but they do not know. They then start lewdly gesturing about a large-breasted woman and a cowboy. Veronica decides this whole thing has descended into uselessness, so she leaves.
Diva: Behind a few of these Hispanic dudes is one very, very white man wearing a fake mustache. It’s like almost a hate crime.
Sweeney: Later, Wallace goes to return the puppy to his rightful owner. It’s not the hot young lady he was hoping it would be, but he smiles excitedly all the same when he sees how happy the older lady is to be reunited with her dog.
At school, Veronica’s walking through the parking lot and spots a white van and realizes that it has a busty lady on the tire flaps and a cowboy sticker in the back window. Dog Man!
Lor: Well… that was easy.
Sweeney: A bit later, Dog Man turns out to be Fanboy from before. Veronica’s waiting for him in the back of his van because she’s never thought about how her actions sound when written down. (D: brb I for real just choked because I laughed so hard) She accuses him of stealing 09er dogs and holding them at the pound for big reward, but cutting lose and/or killing the dogs that don’t pay out well enough. He makes a 101 Dalmations joke and tells her to get lost. Veronica asks how old his so we can learn that he is 18 and will be hit with the weight of the very large book.
Diva: I have a shit-ton of law books on my shelf and I can tell you that they are quite literally very large books.
Sweeney: The more you know, ladies and gentlemen. Remember that, adult Traumateers. (i.e., almost all of you)
As soon as she steps out of the van, Weevil spots her. They have a brief exchange about this being her last Get Out of Jail Free card. This is his way of thanking her because he and Veronica both graduated from the same school of being bad at thanking people for seriously huge favors.
Mars Investigations. Logan shows up to ask for Veronica’s help. A girl after our own heart she replies, “Would it be weird for me to start my own drinking game – like I have to do a shot every time someone asks me for help?” This plan is Snark Squad approved. Err, except not until you’re 21, V, because laws and stuff! Logan wants Veronica to track down Trina’s shitty abusive boyfriend so he can return the favor. He only knows that the guy’s name is Dylan and that he’s producing a script, which he hands to Veronica.
Back at home, Trina is putting makeup on and Aaron asks if she’s going out. She says she’s not going out just yet, but needs to be forever ready for the camera’s prying eyes. He does some actual fathering and tells her that she can always talk to him if somethings up. (D: But also some not-fathering by not acknowledging the still-very-visible black eye on her face.) She reluctantly concedes that it’s relationship stuff – she got Dylan’s hopes up about him doing the movie and without him the financing is falling through. Aaron rightly notes that she needs to talk to him before agreeing to stuff like that on his behalf. Trina insists that it’s not even about Dylan because she believes this script is a career-defining moment for him. Aaron says that if it’s that good, he should hear about it and tells Trina to have him come by later. She gives him a big hug and zoomy cameraman shows us that maybe Aaron’s got some other plans.
Speaking of other plans, Veronica’s made some phone calls posing as an agent and she’s finally got a last name. She looks him up on her fancy PI computer and finds that two other women have filed restraining orders against him because he’s a real winner. Logan calls the house and asks for Trina. Aaron jovially says that she’s in the shower because he’s making dinner for them and her boyfriend. Logan sasses him some more about his retirement. Aaron says that he’s helping his family because that’s what dads do. He hangs up before Logan can explain what he knows. Logan tells Veronica about Dylan being on his way to the house.
Segue Magic to Trina introducing Dylan to her father. I don’t know what it is, but Dylan kind of looks like a poor man’s Mark Ruffalo. Very poor. And meth addicted. But still. (L: When you say it like that, I can kind of see it!) Anyway, Dylan says he’s so glad Aaron decided to meet him. Aaron offers him a bit of the meat he’s cooking and asks to hear more about the part. (D: He is inexplicably running like six different giant grills at the same time. To cook dinner for three people.) He’d be playing a strung out hit man with a conscience. Aaron says that it sounds a lot like his father who used to beat him and his mother and then drink the demons away. Aaron goes on about how he’d beat his mom until she passed out. She’d try to hide behind caked on makeup and dark glasses, but he knew. He got the shit kicked out of him when he tried to stand up for her. He tries to show Dylan the remaining scars on his hand. That turns into direct hand-to-face contact which escalates quickly into a brutal, but drawn out ass kicking. Trina tries to stop him and Logan and Veronica arrive just after Aaron has pulled off his belt to beat him with. Aaron asks Logan how school was and then asks Logan to see Dylan to his car.
Lor: I am so uncomfortable right now. No one else in this scene seems to be as uncomfortable as they should be.
Diva: The worst part of this scene was that when the ass-kicking started, “That’s Amore” started playing, like that was supposed to make this scene funny. It did not. It was terrifying, and all the more so because everyone seemed completely chill about it.
Sweeney: I definitely don’t think it was meant to make the scene seem funny – I suspect it was meant to add to the general, “WHAT THE FUCK?” feeling of the scene. It was all-around terrifying.
Outside, after he’s gone, Veronica and Logan exchange WHAT JUST HAPPENED? faces and Logan quickly switches gears to some other realness: he wants to know if Veronica thinks that Weevil loved Lilly. He takes this whole thing very serenely, saying that he loved Lilly but Lilly loved guys, in general. He goes on about how the Kanes worshiped Duncan and merely tolerated her, and how she went out of her way to piss them off if she couldn’t please them. He figures Weevil was perfect for that. Veronica knows that Lilly loved him, but Logan clarifies that it just wasn’t like he loved her. Veronica’s OMG SADS face is much like my own at that line. Logan says it’s OK, though, because it means he doesn’t have to feel guilty about moving on and they do some more making out. Veronica wants them to keep it kind of secret for a bit. He says something about passing secret notes and she gets major IDEA! face.
Neptune Library. Veronica tracked down Lost Puppy to tell her about her theory and asks if she wants to come with to the pound for the big showdown. Veronica says not to get her hopes about Chester being there, though. Lost Puppy gets her game face on, though: she’s in.
Sheriff’s Department. Leo’s excited that Veronica’s finally there to talk to him. Unfortunately, it’s to say she can’t date him because she’s a trainwreck whose dating history includes sending her first love out of the country, a drug dealer, and making out with her dead BFF’s ex-boyfriend. Put that way, the 19-year-old deputy sounds like a good choice. (L: HUH. Maybe that’s why when I finished the series, I remember liking Deputy Leo!) He begrudgingly says he’d be willing to stay friends with her, which is good because she’s following her confession with a favor request. He just laughs. Aw, man, Deputy Leo, I really do like you.
At the pound, Leo bangs on the door, demanding to be let in. Fanboy’s co-worker asks if Leo has a warrant and he laughs at that, saying that this is a county building and they’re both county employees and he’s not about to wake up a judge for that shit. Inside, the guy gets in Lost Puppy’s face about her dog being dead. Wallace happens upon a door which this guy claims is a room for dogs with serious diseases that they’ll all catch if they go in.
Leo says they’ll risk it and in they go. Of course, that room contains all the non-09er dogs because the disease in question was being poor, which is like the grossest disease ever, of course.
Lor: It’s the disease that makes poor people smell bad.
Sweeney: Leo has a little too much fun arresting this shithole. Lost Puppy goes RAGEY when she realizes Chester’s not there. She steals Veronica’s taser and finding Fanboy just outside the door, shouting at him for killing her dog. GET ‘EM. He panics and confesses that Chester’s not dead – they sold him when they couldn’t get a reward.
Diva: This was another moment where I was like, YOU GUYS ARE NOT REACTING ENOUGH TO HOW FUCKED UP THIS IS. Can we please acknowledge that beating someone half to death or tasering someone are not necessarily the most brilliantly thought out moves here? MAYBE LET’S CALL THE COPS ON THE ABUSIVE BOYFRIENDS AND DOG KIDNAPPERS INSTEAD OF HAVING REACTIONS THAT WILL GET OURSELVES ARRESTED.
Sweeney: Your point is completely accurate in the real world. TV show characters are really terrible at basic shit like calling the cops.
After, Veronica thanks Leo and he’s a good guy and says it’s NBD. Veronica’s got another weird question for him – she wants to know if Leo’s sure Weevil got caught with a pen and not a pencil. Leo remembers that it was definitely a pretty girly, big, plastic, pink pen. “So much for your bad boy.”
Mars Apartment. Keith is pulling hairs off Veronica’s brush when she returns. He jokes that even though she doesn’t have a curfew she’s starting to make him look bad. Veronica’s too distracted to even go there. She knows that Keith knew about Weevil stalking Lilly and that he interrogated Weevil about it. She wants to know what convinced Keith that Weevil was innocent. Keith says that they searched him and his alibi was airtight. Keith offers to show her.
In his room he pulls down his brilliant hiding place – a box marked “Playboys” (for real though, his daughter would never look there because ew and stuff) – and shows Veronica Weevil’s time card. Veronica points out, however, that Lilly’s time of death is two hours off, a fact which puts all the alibis in question. Keith’s not budging, though; they know the Kanes covered up Lilly’s death and can’t fathom that they’d do that for someone like Weevil.
Veronica confronts Weevil at school for lying to her about the ring. She says he found exactly what he was looking for. He pulls the pen out of his pocket and says she can have it. She asks if there were, perhaps, any messages from him. “Now if I told you it wouldn’t really be a secret message pen, would it?” End credits.
Diva: I think that line was supposed to be totally serious, but I laughed my ASS off. I mean, I’m still totally intrigued, but that was the silliest possible way to phrase it.
Sweeney: Indeed. It was a silly way to signal: INTENSE STUFF! TWO EPISODES UNTIL THE FINALE!
All other words are spoiler words. To echo Lor’s sentiment from before, there are always new things to spot when you know the end. It’s really cool to see how well it all holds up.
Almost there!
Next time: Some jerk blackmails his ex-girlfriend in Veronica Mars S01 E20 – M.A.D.
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.
