Veronica Mars S1 Ep 13: Lord of the Bling

Original airdate: Feb. 8th, 2005

Rewatched: Feb. 8th, 2025

Both Veronica Mars and Buffy have theme songs that underscore key themes in the series. For Buffy, Nerf Herder recorded an instrumental piece specifically for the show. It starts with a few horror movie elements before moving into an 90s alternative roc k instrumental, combining the teen series and horror elements of Buffy. For Veronica Mars, the theme song was not originally written for the series but rather is a song by the Dandy Warhols released in 2003. It is also an alternative song, capturing the importance of this genre in the early 2000s, and puts the focus on Veronica’s past vs. present self with the line “A long time ago, we used to be friends”. In this episode, Veronica even says the line out loud before going into a flashback.

Flashbacks are a mainstay of Veronica Mars, especially in the first season, where so much is about her previous life with Lilly. In this episode, the flashbacks center on how she and Lilly became friends with a new girl at school, Yolanda, who was cool. Then, at Logan’s big drunken high school party, which Lilly did not go to since she and Logan were on a break, Yolanda kissed Logan (or Logan Yolanda). Veronica saw it and told Lilly, and then Yolanda was no longer a friend. It’s interesting to look back and see how much Veronica has changed. In the first episode, she bucked peer pressure and cut Wallace down from the flagpole. In her previous life, she cut off a friend because her other friend wanted her to. Buffy used some flashbacks, for example showing Buffy before she was called, and to explore the backstory of the main vampires, but we don’t often see who Buffy used to be before she became a Slayer. On Veronica Mars, the difference between Veronica before and after losing her best friend is ever present.

This week’s big case centers on Veronica’s former friend Yolanda, whose father, Bone Hamilton, is a gangster rap impresario, owner of Drive-by Records. When Yolanda appears to be kidnapped, Bone hires Keith, since he doesn’t trust the police. Veronica helps her father with the case. In the end, it turns out that Yolanda’s younger brother Bryce staged the kidnapping so he could steal (and return) his father’s very expensive ring, finally proving to his father that he was not soft although he excelled at science and not at sports. Bryce used Yolanda running away to marry her boyfriend for his chance. Yolanda didn’t want to tell her parents about her boyfriend, since he was the son of Bone’s former lawyer who Bone may have had shot.

One theme this episode examines is what people are willing to do for credibility. Bone taking the credit for the shooting that paralyzed his lawyer to up his street cred is one example, Bryce willing to go to great lengths to show his father he can be tough is another. The third is Veronica’s willingness to turn her back on Yolanda. And while Bryce’s stunt had no victims, the choices Bone and Veronica made did cause pain to others. Veronica, at the end of this episode, apologizes to Yolanda, realizing her choice was wrong. Bone is not able to make a decision that would ruin his cred, even if it means getting his daughter back.

This episode also shows Lynn Echoll’s funeral. Logan’s dad is in mourning, but Logan doesn’t seem to be. He is hostile to his dad. He seems to treat the wake like a game, and then later retreats to play video games. When Duncan confronts Logan about his behavior, Logan tells him he doesn’t think his mother is dead. At the end of the episode, he goes to Veronica to enlist her help in tracking Lynn down.