Veronica Mars Recap: President Evil

Title: President Evil
Original Airdate: 10/31/2006
Here I was begging all of you to watch Veronica Mars last night, and of course it was, perhaps, the weakest episode of the season. Granted, a weak Veronica Mars is still better than half the nonsense on TV today, but still, I was a little bummed.

To be honest, I felt like there was just a little too much going on last night. Sometimes I just want to bust into the VM writers room wearing a shirt saying “less is more”. Why can’t they just stick with an “A” story and “B” story and be done with it? It would have made for a much better episode.

And while I’m bitching…can someone please explain to me why they bothered to add Piz, Parker, Mac and Lamb as series regulars if we aren’t going to see them week in and week out? There was so much pre-season hype about Piz, yet we’ve hardly seen him. Wallace finally has a storyline this week, albeit a weak one, but at least he made an appearance. Last week Wallace was in one scene – a scene that could have clearly been handled by an extra. Now believe me, I’m not complaining about the on screen time of Veronica, Keith and definitely not Logan, but how are we supposed to get to know these new characters if we hardly get to see them. That is all. I’m done ranting. Oh wait, no I’m not…there was NO Dick Casablancas this week. HMPH!!

I obviously needs some coffee (or Xanax) this morning to shake this cranky mood. But until then, you are going to have to deal with me.

Veronica’s trademark witty banter, that which makes Veronica Mars so fun, was almost non-existant last night. So I’ve decided that if Veronica can’t muster some good tongue-in-cheek, than neither can I. Hence, a dry recap of last night’s episode – “President Evi”

Illegal gambling is bad….
Criminal Science seems to be the only class that Veronica is taking this semester. And in today’s class, it’s Veronica’s turn to give an oral presentation. Unfortunately, Logan has nothing to do with this exercise, but oddly enough, Weevil does. Veronica is kind enough to use Weevil’s life of crime as a case study to share with her class. They go through the ins and outs of how to be a gansta, and the snobby college kids seem to get a real kick out of Weevil’s hard knocked life. Way to exploit him Veronica.

Ok before we continue on, we have to discuss the elephant in the room (pun not originally intended, but it works so I’m going with it). Weevil has put on some serious weight over the summer, and is in dire need for Proactiv. What happened? A few pounds I can understand, but his skin was just awful. Does anyone know if Francis Capra caught the chicken pox or something? Sorry, but I know you all were thinking it, so I had to put it out there. Remember when Weevil was the hot bad boy biker? Those were the days.

Ok back to the show. After using Weevil to satisfy her oral requirement, the two pals catch up in some mindless banter about on campus casinos and Veronica’s love life. Weevil seems bewildered that Roni would be with Logan after the way he treated Lily. First off, Logan dated Lily when they were sophmores in HS, AND shouldn’t Weevil be wondering why Veronica took Logan back after the way he treated her the first few times they dated? Anyway, I’m not going to get down on LoVE, because they aren’t long for this world, and once apart, I will be sad.

Later on that night, Veronica plans on meeting up with Logan for some Halloween fun in the illegal on-campus casino. As she waits for her beau to arrive, two masked gunman rob the casino at gunpoint. Veronica gets all bitchy when the guys steal the necklace that Lily gave her. I know that Veronica is a bad ass and all, but does she really need to sport a major ‘tude about a necklace when there is a gun in her face? Come on now.

A VERY angry Veronica confronts Weevil and accuses him of the robbery. She thinks it’s rather convenient that the casino gets robbed the same day she told him about it. All she cares about is getting the necklace back. Weevil claims to know nothing of the incident, but Veronica isn’t buying it. Her suspicions are furthered when a pizza is delivered to Weevil’s house was bought with on the credit cards stolen from a casino patron. Lamb seeks out Weevil, and on inspection of Weevil’s car, the cops find something (although I couldn’t see exactly what), that somehow links Weevil with the crime and he is arrested.

Veronica visits Weevil in jail and demands to know where the necklace is. He claims that he was framed. And as it turns out, he was. To make a long, and not really interesting story, short – Veronica pieces together many random tidbits to figure out that in the end the casino robbery was committed by two Hearst security guards. She confronts one of the guards, who denies it all but later confesses after Veronica says she has physical proof that she will bring to the police. His confession is caught on tape as Veronica is wired (of course she is). He’s busted, but the cops can’t find her necklace. A distraught Veronica is about to leave when she spies her prized posession around the neck of the robber’s snotty (and creepy) little girl. She snatches it off her neck and rides off into the sunset.

Oh and how does Weevil play into all of this? Well, the security guards have access to all the new employee files, and when they saw that Weevil had dome some time, they figured he was an easy target. The security guards ordered the pizza with the stolen credit card and had it send to Weevil’s house to shine the spotlight on him. Story of his life. That’s what you get when you start your life of crime at 6 years old.

Cheating is bad….
Tonight we’ve got an incredibly boring storyline about Wallace and his inability to pass Mechanical Engineering, which sucks because he’s always wanted to be a Mechanical Engineer. Huh? Anyway, he’s flunking and studying isn’t getting him anywhere, so he takes the advice of a friend and sees “a guy who can help”. Wallace thinks he’s heading to a tutor, but instead finds himself face-to-face with someone who has access to Wallace’s upcoming Mechanical Engineering test – for a fee. Wallace buys the test – as a study guide, but he passes on purchasing the answers, because you know that would be cheating. But after struggling to figure out the answers, Wallace returns with a hand full of cash and he gets his answers.

Wallace gets busted by his professor (although I don’t exactly know how). I guess we will have to wait for next week to see the ramifications of his cheating ways. Then again, Wallace was in a few scenes this week, so it might be December before we see him next.

Richard Grieco was once hot, but now he’s bad……
Veronica’s college life and home life collide when Dean O’Dell and his wife hire Keith to find the biological father of Mrs. O’Dell’s son. It seems the son is dying and his only chance for survival is a bone marrow transplant from Daddy.

Keith being Keith quickly tracks down the guy and scams him into coming to the office where the O’Dells can confront him. It seems that the Dad (played by Richard Grieco who once adorned by teenage bedroom walls) doesn’t want anything to do with his dying son since Mrs. O’Dell kept him at arms length for all these years.

A few days after their initial meeting, Richard Grieco turns up missing. Unfortunately for Keith, he is the lead suspect in the disappearance since he faked his way into Grieco’s apartment the day before he was reported missing.

On a mission to find him, Keith confronts Dean O’Dell who claims to know nothing. But does fess up that his wife brought their son to a hospital in Mexico.

Keith and O’Dell trek all the way to Mexico before it’s revealed that the Dean led Keith on a fools errand. The O’Dell’s kidnapped Grieco and he’s in a hospital back in San Diego. Keith is not too pleased.

In the end, Grieco gave up the bone marrow to save his dying son, and he managed to snag Dean O’Dell’s fancy new Porsche in the deal.

Everything about rape is….you guessed it – bad…
In an effort to remind us of Veronica’s investigation of the Hearst rapes, we see her waiting for the latest victim, Claire, as class lets out. Veronica has the ATM photo from the night Claire was raped. Claire says she doesn’t recognize the guy in the photo – her possible rapist. She doesn’t remember much of that night.

Veronica notices a logo on the guy’s sweatshirt and does her Veronica thing to figure out it was from a camp in West Virigina. Putting on the most adorable Southern accent, Veronica is able to ascertain a roster of all campers for the past 5 years. Of course she did. As it turns out, much like Pi Sig, there was only one Asian guy from SoCal that attended camp during those years, and guess who it was…yup, the guy with Claire in the ATM photo.

Veronica and her backup (being Backup and Logan) head to the guys house to confront him. He’s not home, but Veronica decides to tell his roommate that she needs to find him because he raped someone. Ok, WTF? We know that Veronica is flawed in her self righteous ways, but telling this guy that his roommate raped someone is a little harsh, no? Anyway, she flashes the pic of the Asian guy and Claire, only to discover that – get this – the Asian guy is Claire’s boyfriend. Wah?! Excuse me, but did the Hearst rape storyline ACTUALLY get interesting? Guess, we’ll have to wait to see how this plays out.

Next week: Rough times are ahead for Logan and Veronica…again! Say it ain’t so?! Can’t these two be happy just a bit longer? Please!! Because in the end it all comes back to love

Thanks to vm-caps.com for the screenshots.