Date of airing: November 23, 2004 (UPN)
Nielsen ratings information: 2.76 million viewers, 1.2/3 with Adults 18-49, 1.8/3 in Households
written by: Aury Wallington
directed by: Guy Norman Bee
In which a purity test is the hottest new thing in high school, because no one can hold themselves back from finding out a numerical value of their attractiveness. Everyone was taking the test, all of the results get leaked online, and all of a sudden, your status as the Virgin Mary is destroyed, and all you can do now is listen to the guys talk about what they think of you when they look at you. Dang, high school is terrible. I can consider myself lucky that I went to school in Germany, so we did not have this oversexed pressure to always keep our chins up and our boobs out, although school was still a horror show every once in a while, although that is the case no matter where you go to school. Still, American high schools seem to be living in this world of cliches, in which you have to deal with your sexuality more than the next exam you get graded on, or the oral presentation you are going to hold tomorrow. That might just be depicted in scripted television, but considering the way high school students are taught about sex in school (are they even?), it is imaginable that the pressure to keep up appearances is high.
This was a solid hour of entertainment, as Veronica put her talents
to the test once more, while dealing with her slow-but-steady advances in the Lilly Kane
murder. That scene with Abel Koontz at the end was certainly creepy, and it
would look like the guy is real crazy, not to be messed with, and might have been able to
kill an innocent girl, but VERONICA MARS would not be a show about an
ongoing murder investigation when it would not prepare a storyline about how Koontz is innocent and why he would be the fall guy for a murder he now sits on death row for. There
will be the day and episode in which Koontz is declared innocent and
the real killer will replace him on death row, but then what happens with the man who seemed very over the top and anxious to make enemies out of everyone? How intriguing that the guy who supposedly killed Lilly has become a real character in the series now, and Veronica (and, to an extent, Keith) have to find a way to prove his innocence. What is going to happen when Koontz really killed Lilly and the Marses wasted their time?
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| Wallace gets a little peep show from his BFF Veronica. |
The story of the purity test was weird to my German mind. As I said, that kind of culture never existed when I was in school, so that bullcrap is way out of my experience. And from what I saw in this episode, the teens in Neptune High were putting way too much stake in the purity tests, and cared way too much about the results. Then again, it was the girls who cared about the results, as they were destroying their reputations, as none of the guys seemed to have had a problem being seen as sexually active. Once again, the white patriarchy wins again, and no one gives a damn about how destroyed some of the girls were after the leaks of the test. None of the teachers decided to step in and deal with this matter, and apparently, the reputation of the entire school was in the hands of Veronica Mars only, who had to do overtime (and make new friends) just to solve this case. Not to mention that the episode did not make clear how many of the tests were fake in the first place. Meg's definitely was, because she "hired" Veronica to solve the case and clear her reputation, but I can imagine that Meg's purity test was not the only fake one, making me wonder how many girls' reputations were ruined because someone decided to leak faked test results
Yes, the purity test story could have maybe focused a little
more on Meg, and how she suffered from the result of the test. First of
all, it seemed convenient that her parents would learn of the test and
punish their daughter accordingly, showcasing that parents have no clue
about their children’s social lives, and should not be opining about
them, just because they had a different experience in school when it
comes to sexuality. It is kind of like punishing your kid for being gay because there were no gay kids when you were a high school student – apart from that being a sign of homophobia. Secondly, the relationship between Meg and her
promiscuous sister seemed to have been played up much throughout the
episode, yet her sister was never front and center within the narrative. That is a shame, because Meg could have been defined more as a
character if the fallout of the public test results had affected
more than just her relationship with her boyfriend (done with in just
one scene), and her audition for a musical (eaten for breakfast within
three scenes). And thirdly, and that may have just been me: Alona Tal looked
like another young version of Linda Cardellini, and that confused me for more than just a couple of minutes. 1999’s Cardellini and 2004’s Tal could have
played sisters in whatever project Hollywood came up with for the two, and no one
would have batted an eye that they were not related at all.
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| What a wonderful morning this is. A newspaper, some coffee, watching an evil tenant move out... |
And finally, Keith’s little moment of awesomeness in Jeremy’s bedroom at six o'clock in the morning gave me joy. Keith was allowed to fly his freak flag once more, and I must say I like that version of Keith – he is friendly, always smiling, but also threatening and screaming at you, making for an unpredictable force of nature who also has a permit to carry a gun. I would have loved to see Keith playing the crazy-guy card a lot more, actually lying in bed with Jeremy when he woke up, with a smile on his face and the words that it is time to move out now. That would have been really nuts, although it would also have been some form of assault and Keith would have landed in jail hours later.
Besides all that, the story was solid enough to put Wallace into the
center of a story for a minute or two, and have his familiar surroundings be introduced.
Almost getting into a fight to protect the honor of his mother makes him
a good person. Not to mention that the writers put a mirror between Keith and Wallace's mother, as he was friendly to Wallace and accepted him in his home as Veronica's friend, while Wallace's mother was weird to Veronica, and did not want her in her house and Wallace's life at all. That tracks with Meg's words about everyone being scared of Veronica because of her weirdness and talents. It looks like the Marses have to work on their public persona a bit to guarantee them a couple of friends in the future.
