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Logan and Veronica: "What Are We Doing?" "I Have No Idea." » Jump to Post
I thought the kiss was a bit jarring, but I think my problem is that I went to the Dawson's Creek School of Telegraphed Longing. In most teen shows, and even a lot of adult dramas, the writers go out of their way to establish that two characters are lusting after each other. There are several 'moments' written into the script: stolen glances, staring, blinking, mouths hanging open, hands accidentally grazing each other... Just read pamie's Young Americans recaps for the definitive guide to the acting cues of the young and aroused.
The VM crew didn't really do any of that. The only suggestive look I ever got off Logan was when he watched Veronica walk away from the poolhouse in AEFC, and then perhaps when Trina dragged him away in 'Ruskie Business' -- but he was so drunk then I don't think it counts. And the only slightly suggestive physical contact was when Veronica leads him by the arm into the classroom in K&A and he doesn't resist at all. So really, I have no idea how long Logan's been attracted to Veronica and vice versa. And maybe that's the whole point -- Logan and Veronica didn't realize it either until something spontaneous happened that took them both by surprise. that is very distinctly what I liked so much about it. not wished for, not thought about. just actually happened.

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I certainly wouldn't expect anyone to watch the pilot and assume from that that Logan was going to be Veronica's love interest. If this was Rob's plan all along, I think he played it pretty close to the vest.
I'm willing to believe that Rob planned all along to put Veronica and Logan together, and I think so even more today after reading that great essay that Francophile linked to a couple pages back...

[p8] francophile: There's a great analysis here examining Rob Thomas's romantic relationships in body of work. I'm not familiar with most of his work, but this brief survey gives me hope that Veronica/Logan will play out in an interesting and thoughtful way.

cadhla: You drive me crazy, so I love you: Rob Thomas, unreliable narration and the couple.:
His sweet girls -- the ones who smile and mean it, who wish you a nice day without barbs underneath it -- are frequently just as deep as his sneaky ones, but they're the ones who get his golden boys, playing out the teen cliche in the background of the story he's really telling. The action is really in the Benedict and Beatrice of his tale, the pair that circles and snarls and threatens vivisection, because those are the ones whose romance doesn't have to end with the kiss; they don't hook up and merge into one unbroken entity. They keep fighting, keep sniping, keep being marginally insane in the name of nothing more important than being themselves. And that keeps them interesting. Hero and Claudio? Their story ends when they get married. Beatrice and Benedict...even though the play is ending, we know they're just getting started.
None of Rob's romantic leads are slow, either mentally or verbally. He has no problem with characters becoming tongue-tied when faced with the object of their affections, but when they're in a non-romantic situation, the barbs fly fast and furious -- which is, I think, part of the attraction of the snarky/sneaky pairing. Nicole and Brad will just stand there being pretty at one another. Ditto Veronica and Duncan, despite Duncan having substantially more in the way of personality than Brad could ever hope to boast. Nicole and Chase, however, or Trevor and Clare, Veronica and Logan, Keith and Rebecca -- even, in a demonstration of philos rather than eros, Keith and Veronica -- they'll always have something to talk about. Rob likes to make his leads talk before he hooks them up, because he wants them to be aware of the full story, not just the idealized parts. Snarky people reveal more of how broken they are than they ever quite realize, and that makes them ideal fodder for the kind of dialogue he likes to write, and the kind of stories he likes to tell.
He enjoys taking two leads who can exchange barbs at an equal pace...

''Fame'?'
'Mm-hmm.'
'You get cable on Mt. Olympus?'
'Omniscience, baby. Look it up.'"

[ Cupid Quotes: "'You ever watch FAME? You know what I have in common with Bruno, Leroy, and Coco? I'm gonna live forever. " - Trevor, Pilot ]

this is pretty good. (I was put off by it being on livejournal. the look of the page, I dislike it. maybe mainly bcs the pics with comments taking up so much scrollbar at the bttm)

No One Ever 'Used' To Be Friends.
Rob Thomas doesn't seem to believe that anyone ever really lets go of the people in their past, even when they want to. There's a strong undercurrent through his work of old relationships: who we were endures, and the people we knew back then never actually stop being a part of us. ...there are very few people in his world who used to be friends -- or perhaps more accurately, there are very few people in his world who ever managed to stop mattering to the people they used to matter to. There are some exceptions to this but even those are arguable, because the people his narrators and heroes wind up moving on from are always those who have abandoned them completely.
Someone who just met you -- Troy and Veronica, Steve and Dub, Cliff and Kelly -- may seem to understand you, but in Rob's work, in the end, they won't, because they lack the context for the looks and the smiles and the random flares of temper. Those are usually the 'transition' relationships, before moving on to something more lasting.

Looking at Rob's tropes, what I'm saying is this:
He wants to tell a story that will interest us, and more importantly, he wants to tell a story that will interest him, because if he loses it, he's just going to wander away, and he's shown too much dedication to Neptune for that to be viable. That means following patterns he knows can hold him -- the snarky and the sneaky, the unreliable narrator, the hidden heroes and the not-so-obvious villains. Right now, my money is on Jake Kane, simply because Celeste is too easy and he cried at the memorial, which puts him into the 'possible saint' category, and thus makes him viable. My money is also on Veronica and Logan winding up together; there are too many sweet and sour couples in Rob's background to avoid it.

Now, here's the thing: all these tropes and tendencies are written out through the books I've referenced, and displayed, to varying degrees of blatancy, in the shows Rob has made. But it still took some mining and some consideration of the themes to find them all, because a lot of his work is still relatively obscure. Which means?
Which means he has, as yet, no reason to be actively writing against type. Fans aren't shrugging and saying 'of course Logan and Veronica will get together; I mean, so and so and so and so did, and also...' -- the tropes are still relatively obscure, and can thus be considered safe for one more use. He got thwarted on 'Cupid'. He has no reason not to go there again.
Logan can't have killed Lilly Kane, for one very simple reason that you have to watch a lot of television and read a lot of books to fully see:
Rob isn't done with him yet.
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