Written by Guest Contributor: Jefferey Pinkos The story is old now. Rob Thomas, creator/director/writer for the cancelled TV show, opened a Kickstarter account in the hopes of creating a cinematic continuance of our favorite teen sleuth and got blanketed with money. Now the movie’s available in VOD and in theaters, for your perusal. To see it, it provides evidence to one of two theories to determine the future of movie financing. (1) We will be buried with the studio system, no matter how innovative we get, no matter how hard we try. (2) “Off with studio execs’ heads!! Bring back Firefly!!” So on, so on.

Because it’s such an intriguing financial model, we here at Comic Bastards interviewed someone integral to the process, a donor, Jefferey Pinkos.

- Hi, Jeff. Hi. - Is it more of the same? Yes. We get a mystery, we get the Neptune regulars — Veronica, Keith, Weevil, Logan, Piz — - Piz? Yeah, I know. At the beginning of the movie they’re together. - But later they aren’t. Well, one, spoilers. Two, duh. But I’ll get back to it in a sec. - Sure. Sorry for interrupting. She’s with Piz, she’s a law school grad on her way to becoming a lawyer, he works for Ira Glass. - For real? Yeah, I know. Anyway, Logan is back in the news, because he’s suspected of killing his pop star girlfriend. She rushes back to Neptune, to get some of that good-good and to, um, publicly exonerate him, too. She finds him changed; he’s a soldier now — forever solidifying his good intentions to her. At that moment, it’s counting down to them boning. - Aww. Yeah, I mean I shipped them on the show, but for different reasons. They could never work. He acted out, she loved and hated it; blah blah blah. Put simply: It was interesting because it could never work out, despite everyone’s best efforts. It helped that every other boyfriend she had was so terribly underwritten. Take Piz — he liked music, he liked Veronica, that’s all we know — even after the movie, where he came off pretty well, I think, he likes NPR and he likes Veronica. Whereas Logan fought and relished in his father’s — by extension his own — fame. He loves Veronica, and he loved Lilly. Here, mere days after his girlfriend’s death, we see him lusting. It feels so inconsequential. That may be because of the format — he could appear brooding for an episode, ten minutes airtime tops, and we get it. The plot’s demands don’t have to upend the emotional reality. - Okay, but do they end up? Sigh. Yes, and it’s awkward. It feels so eventual that when it happens, its muster just dissipates. Everyone’s sure it’s happening. Piz breaks up with her over the phone, like, really anticlimactically. “You like Logan, duh. I have no agency. I am only the nice boyfriend. I have no personality beyond the scope of my archetype. My name’s Piz.” Also, it’s like ten minutes after a truck hits her father and kills Deputy Sacks. - OH WHAT SPOILERS. What? You had me spell out all the entire relationship stuff, but when some tertiary character beefs it, you get weird? - Sorry. Something in my eye. Uh, plot. How’s that? It’s fine? Again, the problems of compressing what would be a season-long plot into, what, two hours, is that it feels rushed. The season-long arc could be brought forefront or relegated to a minor mention in an episode as the plot works. What the show did incredibly well is create a mystery’s effects on the community. Look at season three’s serial rapist plot. It worked because it stuck itself into the firmament of Hearst College and lingered and affected how everyone acted with one another. Here, all we have is the murder plot and Logan/Veronica’s Inevitable Romance. - What else is new? Everyone’s good in their parts. Veronica is Veronica, Keith is Keith, et cetera. No one has changed. Logan slapped on a Navy Uniform of Personality Change which effectively neuters him from his volatile interest. He’s snarky, but there’s no danger. He’s an adult now, which I guess is good. - So any notes for people who want to see it? It’s incomplete. The main plot is resolved, but there are two other plots that begin here when they really shouldn’t. These C- and D-plots (corruption in Neptune constabulary, who hit Keith and Sacks; Weevil got shot and someone forged evidence, why) should have complicated things for Ms. Mars. But she rightly moves them to the back burner, just like Rob Thomas should have. - Boom. Boom. - Thanks for talking to us. Any time.

Score: 2/5

Writer/Director/Creator: Rob Thomas Studio: WB Release Date: 3/14/14