TV and Sympathy

Ah, young love.

Rob Thomas was kind enough to give all the squeeing Veronica Mars fangirls out there an ending that included Logan and Veronica together once again. With the show's fate up in the air, it's a move that can only be described as merciful. I'll be crushed if the show isn't renewed, especially given the awesome plane-flying, gift-basketing, postcard-writing efforts of some truly dedicated fans. But I'd be more crushed if VM ended with the show's two young stars caught in the middle of another emotionally devastating breakup.

Think of it. The writers could have ended the finale with Logan and Veronica scheduled to have a "talk", and simply left it at that. Fan fiction writers would have gleefully set their keyboards on fire filling in the blanks. ("My darling Logan, I was so wrong! Thank you for saving my life!" "No, it was I that was wrong! I should never have betrayed our epic love! I would be dead without you!" "Kiss me, you jackass!")

But instead, the people at VM showed us that after the harrowing events that night on the roof, there wasn't much left for Veronica and Logan to debate about their relationship. Their issues were resolved, to a degree. Earlier in the season, Logan didn't know whether Veronica felt the same way he did, but then she she came by his hotel room the morning after the anti-prom and confessed her feelings. Of course, after that confession didn't go so well (cough*Kendall*slut*cough), Veronica wasn't sure she could trust Logan with her heart. On the roof that night, and the morning after, she had her answer - she could trust and depend on Logan when she truly needed to. Plot devices be damned--when two people are meant to be together, and the impediments are removed, they're going to be together.

The finale contains so many lovely callbacks to earlier episodes, showing how much the characters have grown and matured. One is heartbreaking: the mirrored Pieta pose. Where Veronica held Logan on her couch in the season premiere, he holds her in the finale. Their positions reversed, Logan takes care of Veronica the same way she did, a way he couldn't possibly have done a year earlier.

Another callback feels like the world has righted itself. In the first episode, Logan jealously mocks a lovey-dovey Veronica and Duncan, saying "Ah, young love," which Veronica ignores mutely. In the finale, Kendall sarcastically tosses the same words at the reunited Veronica and Logan, who then rebuff her with a united front of snark that is delicious to watch.

The reunion of Logan and Veronica, while causing my inner fangirl no end of delight, also makes me wonder - what would the writers have done if Kristen Bell and Jason Dohring hadn't had such amazing chemistry? Their acting is stellar, but I'll get to that in another post (don't think I'm going to go the whole summer without weekly dissection of all things VM). I'm talking purely about the spark between the two characters. As far as I know, when Veronica Mars started, the writers weren't planning for Logan to have as big a role as he grew to have, particularly not the romantic role in Veronica's life. So what would they have done otherwise? Gotten her back together with Duncan? Let Leo have a good long look at her bedroom ceiling? I'm very curious what alternative they were planning.

Frankly, the creators of Veronica Mars lucked out by having two talented leads with such electricity between them. Epic love doesn't come along all that often--onscreen or otherwise. Let's hope their luck continues and Veronica Mars gets renewed for next season.

posted by Veltman @ 2:05 PM