"We Used to Be Friends" Re-Watch: "Lord of the Bling" & "Mars vs. Mars"

 Veronica Mars

We are sort of dealing with the good and the bad of "Veronica Mars" with these two episodes. Let's get into it.

"Lord of the Bling"

Wallace Fennel: "Stop staring. It's just hair..."

Veronica Mars: "Resisting the urge to touch..."

Wallace Fennel: "You keep resisting that urge."

A classmate of Veronica's is kidnapped and Keith works with her dad, an infamous hip hop mogul who has a reputation for dealing with his problems with violence. Veronica has an invested interest in this case due to her past friendship with the man's daughter. Meanwhile, the Echolls family deals with their grief and fraught relationships in the wake of Lynn's suicide.

Logan is grieving.

The "Veronica Mars" guest star parade continues with Anthony Anderson showing up as Percy "Bone" Hamilton. You may know Anderson from the "Scary Movie" series or from his seven seasons on "black-ish." 

This is one of those episodes where the case of the week isn't as interesting as the B-plot that is happening and that can be an issue. It's pretty clear that Bone Hamilton is being modeled after infamous Death Row Records president, Suge Knight. Hamilton has been in prison multiple times. He's maybe responsible for a drive-by shooting that crippled his ex-attorney and he dangled a rapper named Dime Bag out of a window to get him to sign a contract. When Bone believes that his daughter, Yolanda, has been kidnapped, these men are on the list of suspects he gives Keith.

This storyline is pretty half cocked. Part of it is the casting of Anderson as Bone Hamilton. I feel like a character like Bone should be both charming and chilling, able to switch on a dime, but Anderson just doesn't have that. He's like a jovial nice guy and I don't buy him as this menacing guy who is threatening folks and ordering hits. It just doesn't come through. It's pretty clear that this episode was written by two white guys because it feels like just a giant caricature of what white people think that hip-hop culture is. The twist that Yolanda actually ran away with the son of the guy that her dad maybe ordered shot is not great. Neither is Bone's son Bryce faking a ransom pick up to prove to his dad that he's not soft.

Veronica has a past with Yolanda. When Yolanda was new in school, she and Lilly took Yolanda under their wing and became friends with her. But that friendship soured when Veronica caught Yolanda making out with Logan at a party Lilly skipped to avoid Logan's jealousy. Logan tells Lilly that Yolanda threw herself at him and even though Yolanda tries to defend herself and say that Logan came onto her, Veronica hangs her out to dry. Veronica kind of agonizes over this the whole episode but when she apologizes to Yolanda at the end of the episode, she is not bothered, so... what's the point?

The more interesting portion of this episode is Logan and Aaron dealing with Lynn's apparent suicide. Aaron continues to be the worst. It feels like he's performing grief in front of his actual grieving son. Aaron tries to bring up a memory of the family going to the zoo, but Logan pours some cold water on it by reminding Aaron that he beat Logan for spilling a drink in the back of the car. Harry Hamlin is great in this role and it's chilling to watch him switch from sad to angry like someone flipping on a light.

The show is really doing it's best to try to make Logan an empathetic character after his absolutely horrendous behavior the majority of the season and its working? It's difficult to not feel bad for a son grieving the loss of his mother and Jason Dohring does some great work in this episode. I could have watched a full 42 minutes of Logan glad handing and mocking the industry people who are just there to get something out of the Echolls rather than actually honor Lynn. The episode ends with Logan showing up at Veronica's wanting him to locate her mother.

There really is no movement on the Lilly Kane murder investigation just Echolls family drama.

Grade: C+

"Mars vs. Mars"

Logan Echolls: "Kay, what are you going to stop me with?"

Veronica Mars: "Force of will? Strength of character? Tenacity? Karate chop?"

When Veronica's favorite teacher, Mr Rooks, is accused of sexual misconduct with a student the Mars Investigation team finds themselves on the opposite side for the first time. Veronica has had some bad interactions with Carrie Bishop, the student accusing and is ready to take her down. At the same time, she's working with Logan to see if Lynn is still alive and trying to figure out what is wrong with Duncan.

A good team?

Now, this is more like it. This is an episode of "Veronica Mars" that is firing on all cylinders and is giving us everything we love about this show.

Adam Scott plays Veronica's history teacher, Mr. Rooks and from that cold open the episode does a great job of showing us why Veronica is willing to go to bat for Mr. Rooks. The show has shown us a lot of terrible teachers at Neptune High, so it's kind of refreshing to see one that from the outside seems to be doing everything right. He's keeping his students engaged and he seems to care about them. So, it's a pretty big shock when Carrie Bishop tells him that she's not actually pregnant and she doesn't need the money he paid her to "take care of it."

Leighton Meester plays Carrie Bishop and she is definitely giving early Blair Waldorf here. She is portrayed as kind of awful. There are flashbacks of her and Susan Knight shit talking Veronica and Duncan in the bathroom not knowing that Veronica is in the bathroom stall. One of the things I like about "Veronica Mars" is how they aren't afraid to kind of make Veronica look like an asshole. There isn't one moment that she entertains that Carrie Bishop might be telling the truth. Veronica trusts her gut and she's already decided that Carrie is a piece of shit, so why wouldn't she do everything she could to bring her down? It's definitely giving big victim blaming and no matter how cool Mr Rooks seems, it's a little disheartening to see Veronica not even try to see the other side.

This leads to Veronica kind of getting foisted on her own petard. After basically getting Mr. Rook cleared she visits him at home and starts seeing and hearing things that coincide with what Carrie was saying. This leads Veronica to meeting up with Susan Knight, the actual girl that Rooks had seduced and gotten pregnant. Here we get what makes Veronica the hero of this series. Once she realizes she fucked up, she works to make things right. She apologizes to Carrie and gets Susan to tell the truth about Rooks who ends up being forced to resign.

My only real complaint with this plot line is that I wanted more of Veronica facing off. There is some sniping and I did enjoy the gag of Keith booby trapping the box in the safe so Veronica gets hit with a dye pack. But, I needed more than this. I really wanted to see them go mano a mano and we really don't get that at all.

The B plot of this episode is Veronica working with Logan to find out what really happened with Lynn. I like this softening of the relationship between Veronica and Logan. You see that Veronica has real compassion for Logan. She is handling him with kid gloves and doing her best to work this case even though she knows that Logan isn't going to like what he finds. The show does a good job of stringing viewers along until the final reveal. When we learn that the witness to Lynn jumping is just a lying opportunist, you think, well maybe she is alive and it's that sliver of hope that really makes the reveal of the actual footage of Lynn jumping a real gut punch.

In the Lilly Kane murder investigation, Veronica decides to ransack the records of Duncan's doctor to find out what ailment he stopped taking medication for. It turns out he was taking medication for a form of epilepsy that could cause violent blackouts and just like that, Veronica's ex/potential half brother is back on the suspect list. Veronica also finds Abel Koontz's medical file and reveals to him that she knows he's dying and that's most likely why he decided to be a patsy for the Kane's. I love Veronica dropping this knowledge and heading out. Revenge for what he did to her and extremely petty which I'm always here for.

Oh, and it looks like Veronica and Deputy Leo are headed for reconciliation.

Grade: A-

Next up, Veronica tracks down who is using Lynn's credit cards and she tries to track down a missing mascot.

What did you all think of these episodes? Were you hoping Rooks would be innocent? Are you softening on Logan? Let me know in the comments.