Veronica Mars Re-Watch: Credit Where Credit’s Due (Season 1 Episode 2)

Welcome back to our Veronica Mars re-watch extravaganza! This time, the focus is on the second episode of the series, “Credit Where Credit’s Due.”

Overall, this episode is a great follow-up to the very strong series premiere. It has all of the things you could possibly want in a second episode: development on all major plot lines (particularly the show’s capstone Lily murder mystery), continuing the universe-building, and deepening of new and existing character relationships. All good things!

That said, the episode is not without its flaws.

That’s right, I’m looking at you, Paris Hilton and Paris Hilton’s 2004 bleached blonde fried bangs.

Mystery of the Week

The case-of-the-week is a good one because it ties directly into the stories of several characters that we already know about. The show’s procedural format generally works very well, but there are clear examples of certain cases that are much more engaging than others. On the spectrum of fun and/or plot-relevant crimes du jour, this case falls at about a 6 or 7 out of 10.

The mystery involves the Navarro and Echolls families. Leticia Navarro, grandmother of PCH biker head honcho Weevil and Weevil’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-him cousin/fellow biker Chardo, is arrested on credit card fraud charges. Someone steals pre-approved credit card applications from the Echolls family’s trash and uses the cards to rack up all kinds of charges, buying video games, motorcycle paint jobs, and tattoos.

Total grandma things, am I right?

Leticia is arrested because she works for the Echolls as their housekeeper. This leads to all manner of nasty remarks by the ’09ers, particularly by Logan and Logan’s terrible girlfriend Caitlin Ford (played by the incomparable–HA– Paris Hilton).

Logan’s sexual remark about Weevil’s grandmother, meant to piss the biker off, is particularly heinous. It also leads to Chardo’s sole likable moment: his comeback about Logan going through “a box of tissues a day” on his own. The teenagers, naturally, all guffaw at the masturbation joke (sometimes I forget that the majority of these characters are supposed to be 16-18 years old).

Veronica is brought in on the case when Mars Investigations is hired by affable lawyer Cliff McCormack to prove his client Leticia’s innocence. Pretty much everyone involved (even down to scummy Sheriff Lamb) is assured that Weevil committed the crime and is allowing his grandmother to take the fall.

That’s kind of strange, isn’t it? Everyone suspects Weevil but no one suspects Chardo? What’s up with that? It’s not like Chardo was this innocent random Navarro family member. Leticia says it herself, when she’s trying to convince Veronica that it makes sense to allow Weevil (who is underage) to take the fall for her other grandson — Chardo is 18 and has a record. It always bothers me, logically, that the focus is only on Weevil for the first half of the episode.

Though the case-of-the-week is a pretty good one for character-developing reasons, I absolutely hate both Chardo and Caitlin. HATE. I think we are supposed to mostly dislike Caitlin (until the end, when Veronica shows a twinge of sympathy for the ousted girl) but maybe we are meant to feel a little bit for Chardo?

Regardless, I don’t. At all. The guy is all set to let his sweetheart of a grandmother, and then his cousin, take the fall for his asshat behavior.

The one useful aspect of the Chardo-Caitlin bit of the mystery is that it serves as nice foreshadowing for the later reveal about Lily and Weevil’s hook-up while she and Logan were on a break. Logan just loses girlfriend after girlfriend to these biker guys! I didn’t ever catch that connection until this go-around (reason #394 why this show is just so damn clever!)

Veronica’s Personality

Meanwhile, this episode also serves as a great character-builder for Veronica; we are introduced to a very important aspect of her character.

That is her commitment to justice and fairness, and her resistance to taking the “easy way” out. This is best represented when Wallace questions Veronica about why she is actively working to prove Weevil didn’t commit the credit card fraud, when that’s exactly what Mars Investigations was hired to do.

She manages to overcome her inherent bias (and realize that she’s holding preconceived notions about Weevil in the exact same way that others hold preconceived, false notions about her).

Veronica: I’m just saying with your reputation, you can’t blame McCormack for thinking that —
Weevil: My reputation? Oh, well, then I guess what everybody says about you is true too, huh? That you, you like it a little freaky, don’t you? That you spy on Duncan Kane. That you send him pictures of yourself. Be honest, Veronica. You think you’re this big outsider, but, push comes to shove, you’re still one of them. You still think like one of them. Take off. I don’t want you around here.

This theme is revisited at the end of the episode. Veronica is not interested in forsaking all else for popularity (specifically, she doesn’t want to apologize to her crummy ex-friends just to go to Troy’s 09er party). She’s a “do the right thing” kind of gal, often in the face of incredible odds.

Her commitment to eliminating all other suspects and confirming Weevil’s guilt beyond a shadow of a doubt goes hand in hand with her earlier decision to stand by her father when it meant sacrificing her mother, her social circle, her entire life. She’s stubborn, and smart, and fiercely cool. She’s just kind of the best.

Troy/Veronica (Troyonica? TroVer?)

This episode also serves as the introduction of Troy Vandegraff, who will eventually become Veronica’s first (on-screen) boyfriend. Aaron Ashmore is very charming in the role, and Troy is nice enough (for a while), but in retrospect it’s all too obvious that their short-lived romance would be just that: short-lived.

Troy’s interest in Veronica is really sudden, intense, and makes much of the whole “To hell with what everybody else thinks!” aspect of their romance. On the first go-around, it seems like Troy is just super duper into our spunky blonde heroine.

Now, on the re-watch, knowing that their relationship will soon implode in a terrible, disheartening way for Veronica, the warning signs are all there. Troy “fell” too hard and too fast for the whole thing to have been taken seriously.

Duncan/Veronica (DuVe, I think)

Alongside the introduction of the Troy/Veronica relationship, we get more information on the Duncan/Veronica romance. The exes are (in)conveniently paired together by the newspaper faculty advisor to do a story (Duncan reporting, Veronica using her as-large-as-a-toddler camera to photograph).

This conveniently plotted situation gives way to another Lily flashback: Veronica recalls Lily telling her that Celeste Kane, Duncan and Lily’s overbearing mother, should be watched and that Mrs. Kane would get rid of anyone who Duncan might love more than his mother.

OK, first of all: creepy!

Second of all, I didn’t realize until this re-watch that the scene is also meant to indicate that Celeste also might have been Lily’s killer. The show is pretty forthcoming in setting up both Duncan and Jake Kane as the potential killer, but I never considered that they were also trying to throw suspicion on Celeste, who didn’t seem to particularly like her own daughter.

This (along with his irked reaction to Troy’s Veronica-centric attentions) is also the first inkling of the fact that Duncan may have broken up with Veronica for some larger reason, unrelated to his romantic feelings for her (or lack thereof).

The real reason behind their break-up (the Kanes’ fear that Veronica may have actually been fathered by Jake Kane, thereby making the exes half-siblings) eats up WAY too much time this season. Honestly, I was never much of a fan of that subplot — Keith Mars is up there in best TV dads of all time so I particularly didn’t like the idea that he might not be Veronica’s bio-dad. Basically, the entire Leanne Mars-Jake Kane subplot is very un-engaging. Also Veronica’s mother is totally useless in every way imaginable.

Best TV Dad Ever

Speaking of Veronica’s parents: did I mention that Keith Mars is the best? Keith and Veronica have no shortage of great father-daughter moments throughout the series, but the PI team-up that they do in this episode is on the shortlist of all time greatest. In investigating the credit card fraud, Veronica has the idea to follow a lead for a credit card charge incurred for a honeymoon suite at a hotel.

Naturally, the best way to figure out who actually charged said room (and by extension who committed the credit card fraud) is to pose as a newly-pregnant teenager (Veronica) who needs to figure out the identity of the man she stayed in the honeymoon suite with, and the enraged father making the situation all the more dire (Keith).

That ruse is brilliant, and I love Veronica and Keith discussing whether he was too “over the top” in playing bad cop to Veronica’s scared-pregnant-teenager cop. The Keith-Veronica relationship is fantastic and the father-daughter chemistry between Enrico Colantoni and Kristen Bell is everything.

Lily Kane Murder: Whodunit?!

The big reveal in this episode (as it relates to the larger plot of the season) is that Lily’s established time of death is wrong. When Duncan and Veronica are pulled over, it’s revealed that Lily got a ticket on the day of her death. When Veronica manages to get her hands on the ticket details, it shows a clear photograph of Lily running a red light — HOURS after her supposed death.

Dun dun dun!!

Stray Observations:

• Weevil is one of the best characters on the show. His relationship with Veronica is one of the most interesting ones that she has over the course of the series. This episode marks the beginning of his loyalty to her; he’ll come through for her time and again throughout the course of the show.
• Wallace and Veronica’s relationship is an enduring one and I like it a lot, but he never quite feels fully integrated into the plot. In this episode, though, he’s given a purpose: he’s Veronica’s undercover man! Being relegated to a school office aide gives him access to all kinds of documents that Veronica can use in her investigations. Yay for Wallace having a reason to exist!
• One of the show’s strengths is its ability to reveal important information to the audience in a way that doesn’t feel like exposition. The conversation between Keith and Sheriff Lamb in the diner, for one, works really well for this purpose. The conversation continues to establish Lamb’s general weak-kneed jerkiness and the antagonistic relationship between the two men.
• But, perhaps more importantly, it also manages to reveal exactly how Keith supposedly mucked up the Lily Kane investigation, the crazy suspicious manner in which her “killer” was apprehended (anonymous tip that then failed to collect the reward — cue eyebrow raise), and Keith’s subsequent ousting from his position as Sheriff.
• Related: Lamb sucks. Still. Always.
• “Flat?” “Just as God made me.” Still one of the best Veronicaisms in the history of the series. That, and “Sometimes I’ve even persnicketier” are both in this episode. It is a great hour for Rob Thomas’ dialogue.
• First glimpse of Dick Casablancas in this episode! He is part of Logan’s band of miscreant, Jeep-driving Southern Californians when he went to intercept/beat up Chardo in front of Caitlin’s house.

What did you think of this episode of Veronica Mars? Did it live up to the premiere, in your opinion? Was it a let-down? Share your thoughts with us by commenting below!