Veronica Mars S1 Ep5: You Think You Know Somebody

Original airdate: Oct. 26th, 2004

Rewatched: Oct. 26th, 2024

Relationships are at the heart of this episode. This is often a key theme of teen dramas, including both Veronica Mars and Buffy.

The first relationship is that of Keith Mars and Veronica’s counselor Rebecca James. Veronica discovers their relationship in this episode and is not really pleased. She claims she can accept it, but she can’t. She’s still angry her father refuses to find her mother. She’s angry about being abandoned by her best friend and her mother, and all her other friends. She does not deal well with the relationship, but, although her father tells her she’s being a pill about it, I don’t think she’s as bad as he thinks she is. Instead of giving everything time, he wants to have Rebecca and Veronica start interacting. When it doesn’t work, he breaks up with Rebecca. To be honest, I think Keith went too fast, both into dating and into involving Veronica in his dating life (with her counselor!) and then chickened out, using Veronica’s attitude as an excuse. Because Veronica’s mild snotty attitude should have been an expected hurdle for Keith to deal with. The one thing that Veronica did that was perhaps a bit out of line was a background check on Rebecca. It’s another sign that she can sometimes take being a detective too seriously, and at the expense of trusting others.

Kieth, in response to the background check on Rebecca, does one on Troy. Troy is actually the case of the week. He went to Tijuana with Logan and Luke, and on the way back, his car was stolen along with Luke’s pinata full of steroids. Troy is upset about the car going missing because he wasn’t supposed to take it while his parents were out of town, and he knows he’ll be sent to Catholic school in Albuquerque if they find out. Veronica enlists Weevil’s help to try to track down the missing car, but it doesn’t go well. In the end, Veronica finds out Troy stole the car and the steroids himself, using the money to start a new life with his girlfriend, Shauna. This plot twist kind of comes out of the blue. Troy seemed like an okay guy, more like Duncan than Logan (meaning more good rich kid than bad boy rich kid), and he seemed to really like Veronica. And honestly, if you’re going to pull something like this, maybe don’t date the teen detective with the chops to solve the crime? But there we go. Troy betrayal is another reason for Veronica not to trust people, no matter what.

Finally, Veronica is intent on tracking down her mother, thinking it may hold clues to what is happening. She finds a key to a safety deposit box her mother had and is able to gain access, finding photos threatening Veronica. Although Veronica also mentions her mother’s drinking issues and odd behavior before she left, it seems clear that the photos may have been the ultimate reason for her to get out of Neptune. In a final move, Veronica buys a large number of untraceable cell phones and sends them to her mother’s friends, hoping she’ll reach out to her. Her mother does, but Veronica is listening to music on her headphones and misses the call, allowing the message to go to voicemail.

In the end, this episode shows the breakdown of relationships, with Keith losing a girlfriend, Veronica a boyfriend, and the mystery of why Veronica’s mother left still being unresolved. It also is an episode that shows how Veronica can use her skills to be mean. Her background check on Rebecca is one example, or how she got Logan in trouble in episode one. In this episode, when her mean-girl interview partner in journalism class asks about Troy’s trip to Tijuana, Veronica asks a very mean-spirited question about the girl’s parents’ divorce, showing that while Veronica often only retaliates to others’ mean behavior, her responses are often even meaner. She’s fighting fire with bombs and is not making any friends while doing it. She is in many ways not someone whose attitude can serve as a guide for how to treat others in life, which is a stark contrast to Buffy.