VERONICA MARS Recap: Un-American Graffiti

Title: “Un-American Graffiti”
Original Airdate: May 1, 2007
by GMMR

So tonight we had out first new episode of VERONICA MARS in forever! I’ll be honest, I wasn’t missing it as much as I probably should have been. It was a little out of sight, out of mind for me. This happened during the last mini-hiatus as well. But just like earlier this year, within the first few minutes of the show I’m reminded of how much I love it, and why it’s one of the best that TV has to offer. We are just weeks away from learning the fate of the show, and it’s episodes like this that just baffle me…how can more people not love it?

On to an overly verbose recap of tonight’s episode.

As Veronica waits at the end of a long coffee line, her ex-beau (and lobster) Logan Echolls stands in front. Being the doll that he is (albeit it a chemically unbalanced doll) he snags a java for Roni. The two navigate the Hearst cafeteria doing what they do best. NO, not THAT!! I mean witty banter…you pervs.

Veronica: 8AM. Shouldn’t you be in a wet suit somewhere?
Logan: Early Poly Sci.
Veronica: And you’re actually going?
Logan: Yup. And I even bought this amazing pen that accents text in neon colors.
Veronica: Ah, a highlighter!
Logan: Lots of advancements since the last time I buckled down. How about you?
Veronica: Violence in Early Adolescence.
Logan: Need me to autograph your text book?

Love them!

I don’t have much time to bask in the glow of LoVe before Logan invites Veronica to the birthday party that he’s throwing for his new gf Parker at the Neptune Grand. Ugh.

As hard as it may be to believe, all of Veronica’s acquaintances seems to be alive and kicking. Without a murder to solve Veronica has time for other cases. The owner of a local Arabian restaurant, Babylon Gardens, needs help finding out who vandalized their business with rocks and the word “terrorist”. While Veronica is staking out the scene she has an icy encounter with the restaurateurs daughter, Amira, a former Neptune High peer of Veronica’s. Veronica is soon dismissed from her stalking duties by Amira’s father. But no sooner is she fired than she is re-hired when a car drives by and pelts them all with paint guns. Veronica and her super Spidey powers noticed the bumper sticker of the car as it passed. It was one of those cheesy “My kid was honor student of the month at Neptune Middle School” ones. You can guess Veronica’s next stop.

Posing as a guest speaker in the Middle school she quickly identifies the kid whose family shot the painballs. Comes to find out they are Middle Eastern themselves. Hmmm. The teenage son claims (and can prove) that although he was behind the paint balls, he didn’t spray paint “terrorist”. Dead End #1.

The next day Roni checks out the camera footage from the previous night and spies a guy wearing a SNEED BATMEN sweatshirt. Come to find out it was a Hearst student who lives as a Jewish frat. While staking out the frat she sees a peeping Tom in the trees snapping pics. As Mr. Thomas Pervy speeds away on his bike, the door to the frat opens and it’s revealed that the SNEED BATMEN guy is actually Amira’s boyfriend. Ugh, dead end #2.

I think it’s worth taking the time to point out the similarities between Veronica Mars and Dr. Gregory House. On a weekly basis both of these exceptional people are presented with problems to solve. For Veronica it’s a mystery and for House it’s an illness. Depsite being really good at what they do, both always seem to get it wrong at least twice before figuring it all out. And their just as cocky when they are wrong as when they are right. It kind of bugs me, but they are both kick ass so I let it slide.

Ok back to the show: The guy in the tree was Nasir, an employee at Babylon Gardens. He was taking naughty pics of Amir and her man knowing that Amir’s father would be none too pleased to find out she was dating a Jewish guy. Despite Roni’s best efforts, he did find out and he wasn’t pleased.

The next night the Babylon Gardens vandal has struck again, and this time Roni’s managed to catch a visual of the perp (I’m so down with the lingo). Being a smart cookie, she also placed a tracking bug in an Arab scroll she knew the vandal would rip down. Through the device, Roni tracked down Derek Carr and his brother, a solider paralyzed while fighting in Iraq. It seems that Nasir was passing around a cartoon making light of the war in Iraq and as you can imagine Derek wasn’t pleased. His brother tries to rationalize with him but doesn’t seem to get through to Derek.

Rather than press charges, the owners first want to talk to Derek to let them know that they understand what his brother was fighting for in Iraq, and that they aren’t behind the material Nasir was passing out. Derek showed his ignorance by throwing out a few racial slurs and slamming the door in their face. They still decide against pressing charges. They do however inform the authorities that Nasir is in the country on an expired visa. Bye Bye Nasir.

Back at Hearst…wait, what’s this I see? OMG it’s Wallace and Piz. So let me get this straight…Dick, Piz, Mac, Parker and Wallace are all in the same episode. WOW! I’m stunned. I digress – after a hallway run in with Veronica, Wallace tells Piz he needs to get his game on and hit on a woman who actually knows he exists.

Over on the other side on Neptune we see Jerry from RESCUE ME who tonight is the owner of The Break, a local college bar. Jerry gets a drunk frat boy to pay his tab and sends him on his way. Just as Drunky McDrunk leaves the bar he is hit by an oncoming car.The kid is never going to walk again, and Keith questions Jerry as to why a 19 year old was drunk in the bar in the first place. Drunky McDrunk had an ID saying he was 21, but it was easy to tell the ID was bogus – Keith’s none too pleased.

Back at the station, Keith orders his deputies to do surprise checks on all the local college bars. We soon find out that the policemen didn’t find any violations, and Keith is befuddled. Things become a lot clearer when Keith is beckoned back to The Brick where Jerry lets him know that he and Lamb used to have a nice “arrangement” that kept the police out of the bars and the policemen’s fund well taken care of. Uh oh Jerry…Keith is SO not Lamb. Bad move my man.

Just as Keith was leaving the bar he notices Wallace and Piz enjoying some spirits. Of course they have ID – provided by their good friend Veronica Mars. Someone’s going to get a serious time out when her daddy gets a hold of her.

Keith lays the “I’m disappointed in you” speech on Veronica, but just what is the proper punishment for the boys? Well as it turns out, Wallace and Piz’s oops has led them to working for Keith to trap local bars who let them drink despite having ID’s of Jon Bon Jovi and Biggie Smalls. But perhaps nailing the bars is not what Keith it most interested in right now. Soon after Piz and Wallace order their beers, one of Keith’s deputies enters and raids the bar, demanding that everyone show proof of age. Licenses are raised but the deputy pays no attention. He even get s a close look at Wallace and Piz’s fakes before shrugging it off. As he exists he makes sure to let the crowd know that the disruption was courtesy of Sheriff Mars…who of course was listening to the whole thing. In the cliches words of Donald Trump – “You’re fired!”

Later that night, as Veronica enters the Neptune Grand Hellevator on her way to Parker’s party, we get a classic Veronica VO:

VO: Things I’d rather do than attend this party solo: Seven minutes in heaven with Scott Peterson…ride the space elevator with Dick.

Yeah, just today on GMMR we were discussing the fact that elevator should have a name. On THE OFFICE we have the PLoD (Parking Lot of Doom), and the Neptune Grand hasn’t been much kinder to our favorite couple. GMMR reader Mannie named it “The Hellevator” so yeah, I’m going to go with that.

Veronica and Dick share classic bitter banter in The Hellevator.

Veronica: Flies open.
Dick: I know. Party ritual.

At the party, Veronica has to stand by as Logan makes a toast to Parker and I throw up a little in my mouth. He presents her with a cake that has a picture of the two of them on it. After heaving into my toilet I placed a call to Logan and asked him to turn in his dude card..and while he’s at it, he might as well turn in his balls since he won’t be needing them anymore.
Despite Mac telling Veronica that things are going well with her and Bronson, Max and Mac get their mac on during the party (ok they were just talking but I couldn’t avoid the literation of it all). Oh and in case you need a refresher, Max was the guy that hired Veronica to try to track down his Sci Fi girlfriend who turned out to be a hooker hired by his friends.

After downplaying his jealousy, Logan, always the jokester, tries to set Veronica up with some cheeseball. To get out of the situation Veronica enlists Piz to pretend he’s her boyfriend. Yeah, I’ve seen a few sitcoms in my day so I see where this one is going.

Wallace lets Veronica know that Piz has a thing for her and she shouldn’t do this to her. As Veronica is trying to let down Piz down gently he lays one on her. I mean really lays one on her – so much so that it left Veronica speechless, and that’s really saying something. Piz takes off, and a stunned Veronica glances around the room only to find happy couples everywhere which prompts her to go after Piz. She tracks him down and kisses him outside the Hellevator just as it opens to reveal a sad looking Logan. Veronica’s gleeful smile turns quickly into a frown as she watches Logan walk past her. See what I mean about it being The Hellevator…nothing good can happen. But based on the looks exchanged at least we know that Logan and Veronica are still in lurve. These crazy kids will find their way back to each other…they always do.

So that’s that. A pretty damn good episode. I’ll forever be a LoVer but I could be on board with Pizonica (copyright DuckyxDale.com by the way)…until Logan and Veronica decide they can’t live without each other.

Soooo…what did you think? Spill it?