by request: my summary of late S1 Veronica Mars

[jinian]

Okay, I forget where you left off, but Veronica eventually started snogging scary jerk boy (Logan), in some sort of danger/sex thing that turned sort of alarmingly into them liking each other even though he was still a freak and a jerk. Also her dad was dating Wallace's mom, but V doesn't tell him her mom is in rehab.

Duncan finds out Veronica knows about his epilepsy and is conisdering he might have killed Lilly; he is pissed. He runs away from home. Later Keith finds him and brings him back. (Wim and I check to see if you can really find old passports on Ebay; as we thought, the answer in real life is no. At least it is now.) When he eventually demands an explanation from his parents, they say he DID kill Lilly and tell him how he was found clutching her with his face all bloody, like some zombie movie.

There was a great plot in one episode about how this guy is blackmailing his girlfriend to stay with him (freak) with a cell-phone video of her acting naughty. Girlfriend doesn't remember the incident at all, which we later find out is because she got the same drug V got at the same date-rape party. She dumps the jerk, he spreads that video even though they've blackmailed him with trumped-up gay video, and she chooses not to take revenge even though V pushes her. I like that all these moral questions are coming up.

V tracks the date-rape drug at the party as a result of that, and finds out Logan, her new sekrit bf, was the one handing it out. Apparently this GHB can be used for recreation as well as for drugging others into submission, and L swears that's how he meant it to be used. There was a long sordid chain of confusing flashbacks based on what everyone she talked to said. Eventually V finds out that she had sex with her ex Duncan (the broader-faced dumb-looking boy), that he was drugged at the time too (by Logan, so he would loosen up and have fun -- jerk!), and that they both consented as best anyone could tell at the time. He left her alone because he freaked out over having fucked his sister.

Meanwhile, Keith gets his gene test back and does not shred it, thank god; we come to find out V is his kid. Cue the huge relief and hugs. (Can only come up with ugly word 'parentotypical' for this standard horror of unknown consanguinity/ descent.) [I am considering doing a longer essay on this from my peculiar perspective, since knowledge of parentage is turning out to be a big VM theme.] V signed away her child-support money before she knew, demonstrating that she really is a marshmallow.

There was a whole dognapping plot that turned out well overall.

Veronica's mom came home from rehab, and oddly it was a surprise to V. Hmm. Yep, turned out she'd checked herself out early and was stashing vodka in mineral-water bottles in the fridge. Keith broke up with Alicia for this? V kicked her out, go V, but was too beaten up to watch her like a hawk as she went -- the mom took off with $50K they'd gotten in trade for the child-support claim (really for finding Duncan, but it got messy).

Who killed Lilly? Well, V started to put things together when she was making out with Logan in his boathouse (sheesh) and noticed a camera in the ceiling. He went to get a key for the liquor cabinet, so she snooped, of course, and found several cameras trained on the bed. This freaked her out and she ditched Logan for like the third time in their short relationship. Soon it occurred to her that Lilly probably had been in there, and at the same time Logan's alibi was shot to hell. V went to look in Lilly's room's air duct, a known hiding place for secret stuff, and found tapes. Duncan caught her in there, so they watched together and saw Lilly discovering the cameras, and then another tape of Lilly fucking -- Aaron, Logan's DAD, the jerk scary movie star.

So the scenario is that Lilly and Aaron had an affair -- and fucking a movie star totally counts as a big secret like Lilly gloated over -- but she stole the tapes on finding out about them and smarted off enough to him (tabloid threats?) that he belted her one and she hit her head. He took off, Duncan came home and flipped out, the Kanes thought Duncan did it and covered for him, leading to the giant mess.

V zooms home with the critical evidence, calling her dad to tell him all, and in a poorly explained twist Aaron is IN HER CAR (because he psychically knew she'd found the tapes?) carjacking her dudes. She, being awesome, locks her seatbelt and deliberately hits a tree; when she wakes up she can't quite reach her phone, so she flees to a nearby house, hiding tapes as she goes. There is a whole scene with V locked in a fridge that's on fire while Keith beats up Aaron and whatnot. Eventually Aaron is arrested for murder and the Kanes for obstructing justice.

The cliffhanger is that someone knocks on V's door at 3am as she is sleeping, and she answers it with "I was hoping it was you!" and we don't see the person. I am assuming Duncan. [And I was wrong! But the beginning of S2 feels awfully retconnish.]

Also she had this dream of Lilly's spirit leaving her, which was dopey but sad, like, yes, she's still not going to be with you.