Veronica Mars. S01E05.

"It's a ball!"

"Have you decided which parent you're going to live with after the divorce? And a follow up: What do you think of your father's mistress?"

Without the context, those lines aren't very funny. In context, I was laughing out loud. Perhaps I should have waited to watch the fifth episode at a time when my two roommates weren't asleep. Even though they were down the hall behind closed doors, I felt the need to stifle myself a few times.

What I didn't like was how little build up there'd been to the boyfriend's badness. I mean, if we'd learned about his former wrongdoings in another episode and then saw his actions in this one that would be one thing. But we hadn't had any gothic sub-currents swirling around his character previously (except perhaps the hotel reservations Mr. Mars had cancelled). It was almost as though the actor had pissed off the writers and they decided to throw him out in the span of one episode.

Logan is back to being his old, contemptible self after having had redeeming qualities in the last episode . . . though admittedly he does come off better than the other guys in this episode--not that that's saying much.

The mom is a mystery to me. I don't know why she left and the pictures of Veronica (i.e. fear for her family's safety) don't exactly clear things up. I know they're developing an arc out of it, but so far they haven't given us anything to really hold onto, just more questions. I suppose that's why I'm waiting for episode 14 (or was it 18?). Then the father dating, what's that about? It's been six months since the best friend died therefore the mom couldn't have left more than five months ago. If that's the case, he shouldn't be ready yet, not just Veronica. By all means, go have a social life, but don't call it dating until you've got the divorce in hand. The scene where he and Veronica were fighting about it was a bit disconnected from the rest of the episode stylistically (both in tone and cinematography) but the scene in which the girlfriend comes to the office to "talk about it" with Veronica is wonderfully comedic and realistic.