BLU-RAY/DVD REVIEWS

On the verge of becoming a lawyer – former teen sleuth Veronica Mars (Kristen Bell) is lured back to her Neptune hometown where her former beau, the troubled Logan Echolls (Jason Dohring), is accused of murder.

I’m a huge fan of the VERONICA MARS TV show, and I’m in good company. No less than Stephen King used to frequently sing its praises (in his former pop culture column for “Entertainment Weekly”) with people saying it was like HEATHERS crossed with CHINATOWN, which is a perfect way to describe it. Sadly, it aired on the CW. With their commitment to crap back then, it couldn’t possibly last.

Luckily, the fans kept the show alive and once it hit DVD ant Netflix the VERONICA MARS cult grew and grew to the point that series mastermind Rob Thomas has gotten the band back together for a (semi) big-screen sequel to the show – which never really had a good finale.

VERONICA MARS – the feature – was a VOD premiere with some limited theatrical engagements sprinkled in. Being such a fan, I got to see it in theaters (it’s apparently huge in Montreal, with the first screening being sold out) and I was impressed that the movie itself didn’t feel like some kind of cheapjack “Warner Premiere” which the studio used to churn out a few years ago. It felt like a full-fledged movie, albeit a low-key one, a necessity given the mostly Kickstarter-funded budget.

If you haven’t watched the entire run of the show, there’s really no reason for you to watch this as you just won’t get it. The show was always at least as much about the characters as the mystery, and while the main conflict is only occasionally interesting, no one’s missed a beat as far as the cast goes.

Bell was born to play Veronica, and hopefully the film did well enough that this won’t be the last we see of her. That said, I’d love to see VERONICA MARS brought back as a good cable show rather than another movie. As always, her chemistry with Dohring – as bad-boy Logan – is great, although I didn’t buy for a second that Veronica would take up with nice-guy Piz (Chris Lowell). Fan-favorite Ryan Hansen is back as Dick Casablancas, and had most o the best lines. The only real issue is that Enrico Colantoni’s part as Keith Mars is a little small for my liking. The best part of the show was always the father-daughter relationship between Veronica and Keith, and I wish they had more scenes together.

While I'm bummed there's no commentary, the extras here are excellent.

By the Fans: The Making of the Veronica Mars Movie: This is an interesting hour-long long doc tracking the famous Kickstarter campaign through to production, with input from backers, TV critics who championed the series in the first place, and more. It's a very worthwhile extra. It's also nice that it's chapter encoded.

More on-set fun: This is actually a series of short featurettes, with tours around the set, interviews with backers and bit players, and more.

Deleted scenes: Four minutes of cut scenes. Nothing huge here except a cameo by the TMZ gang that was deservedly cut.

Gag reel: Anyone who owns the tv show dvds will be happy to know there's a gag reel. The show always looked like a blast to film, with everyone getting along famously, and you can tell by these that there are no movie star egos here. There's even a mini-montage of Enrico Colantoni crack-ups. Good stuff.

Overall, VERONICA MARS is little more than a feature-length episode, but that’s fine with me (and most fans it seems). Hopefully we’ll get more.