Mars 1, Type Face 0

[trinityvixen]

I finally sat down to more than the off episode or two of Veronica Mars last night with darkling1 and feiran. Before bigscary gets too excited, I have to say that I was still right about not liking it especially and yet wrong about it's being utterly worthless.

Why not like it? I hate Veronica. Thought I would from the little I knew of her, watched three episodes and sure enough, I do. I dislike her immensely and I do not like the fact that her oh-so-impossibly-mary-sue-esque tragic life makes me a horrible person for hating her. I'm sorry, but she's run up against caricatures. The new police chief or whoever? The only thing he didn't do was rape her himself (and stomp on a puppy). Ditto the guy who was dating her murdered friend. The biker-dude-with-a-heart-of-gold (well, at least feminism has changed the gender of that stereotype). The out-of-the-blue hottie (who is headed for some kind of last-minute pushy-about-sex boyfriend stereotyping, I can already feel it).

My worst bugaboo about this series is the idea that, at a school like the one she attends, OMG NO ONE WOULD ACT THE WAY THEY DO. They're about one order of magnitude richer than the public high school I went to, but the kids in my high school acted at least as entitled as the bitches on this show and they STILL did not act in the conveniently angst-generating way that people on this show do. When you're a teenager with that kind of entitlement, you certain as shit don't give a fuck what someone's dad did and use that to influence your opinion of them. I GUARAN-FUCKING-TEE IT, okay? I promise, promise, promise that kids raised to be that spoiled don't give a shit if their parents are tarred and feathered so long as they can have the car keys, use of the vacation house in Cabo, and a trip to Europe once a year. THEY. DO. NOT. CARE.

If they'd said that Veronica's family's ensuing poorness was the ENTIRE reason to kick her out of the circle, then I might have believed it. Still, if her "friends" were so shallow, why was this supposedly sassy, smart chick hanging out with them? She could find more stimulating friendship under a bridge at 3 am. Ugh, I hate when adults who felt like they were ostracized in high school write stories about being ostracized in high school. I'm sorry, but life is nothing like television, and this entire set up screams of a bitter wallflower writer raised on too many television-school shows. (90210 wasn't this angsty, and that says something.)

I am reminded of these stupid forums we had in high school where such hard-hitting questions as "Do you feel people treat you worse based on how you dress?" There was this total pot-smoking trashoid who got all weepy about how people treat him like an idiot because they think his choice of hang-out spot (the smoking circle on the edge of campus) and clothing (black and smelling of smoke) meant he was stoner. Clue-in, lame-o, you WERE a stoner. It marked the one and only time I spoke up in forums. I told him, literally, that real life is not like Dawson's Creek (the Veronica Mars of its day), and that there wasn't some rich-bitch cabal to keep him out of the keggers in the rich quadrant of town. They just didn't think of him, period, get used to it. I dunno that being non-existent or unnoticed is better than being actively loathed for HIM, but I'd certainly prefer it to thinking people are taking time out of their day to hate me for absolutely no reason. As long as I can ignore them back, I say live and let live.

I'll be fair, now, and say that Veronica Mars did get slightly better with two or three episodes in, but it's still not tweaking my interest. I can't believe that, after the shit-tacular pilot, this show got picked up. That was the most smarmy, annoying, dead thing I've seen in forever. It's like it was written by some dude trying to approximate all the things that straw-feminists say are awful about men (they are rapists! they let rapists go! they make lousy boyfriends! they're not in touch with their feelings!) in a one-hour period. Fuck that.

Credit where credit is due, it was still better than the documentary Helvetica which I rented for no reason. There's plenty of ways to make a documentary about something obscure with a devoted, geekish following, but this wasn't it. They threw a bunch of graphic designers together and basically just had them wax poetic about how important a font was or was not to them. They did the documentary-requisite "I HATE HELVETICA!" "I LOVE HELVETICA" stuff, and that's all I got out of it.

Comments

[gryphonrose.livejournal.com]

Ah well, we'll have to agree to differ here--I adore Veronica. She's sassy and snarky and resourceful. And her dad rocks. Plus Wallace and Mac (a later addition) are very cool. The best eps are when she gets them and sometimes Weasel to help her pull off a scam.

The only problem I have with her character is that she's not actually all that bright--it always takes her a while to figure out stuff that's right in front of her. That's more pronounced in the later seasons. And in part because, as with many shows built around a strong original story, it had a hard time finding its way with new storylines. I was sad to see it go but at the same time felt it was time--first season is great, second season is decent, and third isn't very good.

Though the plan to make fourth season about her after college and starting out in the FBI was cool.

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

I'm probably going to stick with it through at least the second season, but it's a bit over the top: Veronica's best friend is murdered, her boyfriend dumps her, her dad loses his job, her mom runs off, and she was raped? I see some things to like in the show and I love a good mystery, but I hope it takes things back a notch soon. trinityvixen is right that a lot of these characters are mere stereotypes, and in one episode I could tell the writer is obsessed with The Wizard of Oz: "You need to see the wizard" and "Your little dog too"...which might have worked coming from the same character, but instead came from the sheriff and Weasel, respectively. Not that I don't like some Oz myself...

[gryphonrose.livejournal.com]

There are arc and non-arc episodes, as is often the case with shows like this, and I prefer the non-arc ones because they're self-contained mysteries and often involve those scams and plans I mentioned. And the elements you mentioned aren't as heavily featured in those.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Veronica's best friend is murdered, her boyfriend dumps her, her dad loses his job, her mom runs off, and she was raped?

You forgot to add that she was then humiliated after being raped; she's doing half of her dad's work to keep them afloat financially; she has no friends except other people who are among the Out Caste; she's being forced into extra curriculars; her ex is teasingly still around (and hallucinating AND clinically depressed); and she keeps losing car parts.

Oh, and Paris Hilton apparently goes to her school (a negative in one's life if ever there was one).

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

That's right! Somehow I forgot those. I guess my mind can only retain so many improbabilities at once...

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

And really, not all of those happened in the pilot, so it's unfair to demand you remember half of them, really.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

And, sadly, it's not improbable at all that she would have been slipped a roofie in that crowd (too much entitlement + access to drugs = rape culture) and that she would then be treated like a slut for getting drugged. It's just a little improbable that that unfortunately too common scenario happened on top of all the rest.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I dunno, she just strikes me as wrong. It's hard to write someone who is credibly young and quick-witted enough to make the sort of fearless retorts Veronica does, especially in scenes, like in the pilot, where she's having sexual threats shoved down her throat. Given her negative sexual encounter, I cannot possibly believe she'd be so cavalier with Weasel and his gang threatening her with cock as she is. Not when she then turns around and goes coy on Troy trying to kiss her.

It's hard to write a rape survivor story because there isn't one narrative. There must be women somewhere who become a bit like Veronica--instead of being made to feel powerless, they become fearless (hey, the worst has already happened, right?)--but I can't possibly find a source for her unstoppable confidence. I appreciate that she's not a wreck, but there should be a reason better than, "Well, that's how we wrote the character." Maybe it gets explained later.

I might also add that Kristin Bell is an actress in the mold of Sarah Michelle Geller only with more sociopathic blankness. What I mean is that she does a bare minimum and relies on the story for the charm a lot of the time. Unfortunately, the charm of the story isn't there for me either.

The sociopathy comes in because the story has her bounce from defensive good cheer to utter, unfeeling indifference so fast, it feels like she fakes absolutely every emotion. I don't connect with her character emotionally because she's just not emotionally believable. When she cries, it's like I watching her doing a read-through of the script more than bringing the action to life. It reads; it doesn't play. "Veronica spouts witticism, so-and-so reacts with a harsh rejoinder and leaves. Veronica cries." Aaaaand scene.

[gryphonrose.livejournal.com]

See, I infinitely prefer Bell to Gellar. I've seen Bell in three series now (VM, Heroes, and Deadwood) and liked her in all three. I think anyone could have played Buffy but only a few could have pulled off Veronica. But like I said, we'll just have to differ--both on her and on the show.