Veronica Mars

[Perkins Cobb]

Lots of Kickstarters get overfunded. They can keep collecting money until the pledge period ends in a month.

Right, but my question was, will it get overfunded? How high could this thing go?

[mfunk9786]

Might want to direct that question to the inventors of the 3Doodler.

[matrixschmatrix]

It seems as though the key to keeping funding going past the minimum is to keep offering new rewards and setting up new things that will happen if you hit a higher goal- at least, that's what happened with a lot of the successful ones I've kept an eye on, like the Order of the Stick one and the Hamlet choose your own adventure one. Otherwise, a lot of them just kind of stall out, like the Rifftrax one has done.

[hearthesilence]

Yeah, I'd say keep collecting money and just put it back into the film. Seriously, $2 million is really stretching their budget, I wouldn't be surprised if they were hoping for a lot more to spend on the film.

[swo17]

Already met the goal. So what did that take, 11 hours?

[flyonthewall2983]

IMDB says 6.

[Mr Sausage]

So should I finally watch this show, then? I remember catching an episode once but I didn't have much of a reaction to it. Can't even remember it now. Worth another shot?

[Professor Wagstaff]

The show really needs to be consumed from the beginning. The first season earns its comparison of being a Nancy Drew book written by Raymond Chandler. Despite the high school setting, the show is rich in atmospheric dread and seediness that's plays genuine as opposed to more generic detective shows that ride on bullshit posturing (like, say, Castle or The Mentalist). Talk of this movie today brought back discussion of another criminally scrapped detective series, Terriers, which boiled over with the same great wit, narrative style, and characters. If you haven't watched either of those shows, I'm envious of you having the chance to dive in for the first time.

[tenia]

The 3rd season is quite a step below in quality and consistency, though, whereas the 2nd season is a pure jewel.

[mfunk9786]

I've only seen the first season and maybe two episodes of Season 2, so that's good to know.

So not speaking on a moral level but on a financial level, how are execs at Warner Bros not having a "Let's start a Kickstarter for a new Batman for $250 million - what could go wrong?" conversation? Because, I mean - it'd hit its goal easily, and Warner gets the public to finance something that they'd be making anyway...

This has been going on in sports, particularly professional football, for a while now. A stadium that's only going to be used for 8 football games a year is built using a ton of tax money, and few complain because so many of them like the resulting product, even though they have no ownership of the team or stadium and still need to pay absurd prices to attend games there. Why wouldn't a mammoth movie company jump on the prospect of funding a big budget movie this way?

[RossyG]

The 3rd season is quite a step below in quality and consistency, though, whereas the 2nd season is a pure jewel.

Apparently the third season was compromised by executives interfering. It was intended to follow the same pattern as seasons one and two, with one arc. Instead, the makers were instructed at the last minute to have three arcs of around eight episodes each so it could be shown with gaps between. This resulted in hurried rewriting. Such a shame as seasons one and two are superb.

[Perkins Cobb]

Apparently the third season was compromised by executives interfering. It was intended to follow the same pattern as seasons one and two, with one arc. Instead, the makers were instructed at the last minute to have three arcs of around eight episodes each so it could be shown with gaps between. This resulted in hurried rewriting. Such a shame as seasons one and two are superb.

And it's still not that bad, just not as good as the previous two seasons. (In fact, I thought the smaller mysteries were a needed correction to the berserk overplotting of Season 2.) The bigger problem was that college should be exactly the environment where a high school outcast like Veronica could flourish, so the premise became strained.

[colinr0380]

This has been going on in sports, particularly professional football, for a while now. A stadium that's only going to be used for 8 football games a year is built using a ton of tax money, and few complain because so many of them like the resulting product, even though they have no ownership of the team or stadium and still need to pay absurd prices to attend games there. Why wouldn't a mammoth movie company jump on the prospect of funding a big budget movie this way?

It could be worse - the football teams could back a national bid for the Olympics in order to have the opportunity of getting a secondhand state-of-the-art stadium for cheap once the dust has settled :-"

Anyway, I've not seen Veronica Mars either - I don't remember it turning up on TV in the UK during the post-Buffy lull years (was it on Sky?), and whenever I read up on it I always remembered having the initial surge of excitement about the interstellar detective series implied by the title (I kept conjuring up stories similar to Peter Hyam's "High Noon in space" film Outland!), only to have them dashed on finding it being set in a high school! It was shallow reasoning but that usually stopped me from investigating further, but at least this discussion has inspired me into finally looking into getting the boxset now!

[swo17]

The 3rd season is quite a step below in quality and consistency, though, whereas the 2nd season is a pure jewel.

I actually had high expectations for the 2nd season which were not quite met (I especially didn't like how they dealt with the Meg character), and low expectations for the 3rd which were exceeded. For whatever that's worth.

[Mr Sausage]

Well, I'm sold. I just got the first season even tho' things are really busy right now and I know have a tendency to drop everything and marathon a series when I like it.

[Perkins Cobb]

More specifics. It continues to sound as if Thomas & Co. have thought this through and have a viable plan.

[Drucker]

Zachary Levi has faith a Chuck movie could happen, now.

[Perkins Cobb]

And thus it took exactly four days to come up with a Kickstarter movie I'd pay them not to make.

[RossyG]

You could always not pay to not watch it.

[Perkins Cobb]

I'd rather be on the safe side.

[domino harvey]

I'm sure all seven Season Three apologists will be glad to hear that Piz has signed on for the film-- but hey, so has Wallace!

[Perkins Cobb]

I'm sure all seven Season Three apologists will be glad to hear that Piz has signed on for the film-- but hey, so has Wallace!

Also Daran Norris, Francis Capra ... Rob Thomas's Jessica Chastain jokes aside, it's not a particularly difficult group to round up during the TV-production hiatus months.

[domino harvey]

Oh man, I love that Daran Norris is coming back. Surely Ken Marino will be there too, right? I don't doubt most if not all of these actors are free to participate, I just wondered how many Rob Thomas wanted in the film

[Perkins Cobb]

And now Tina Majorino.

The one person conspicuously absent from anything Rob Thomas or Kristen Bell has said publicly is Teddy Dunn (Duncan) -- I always had the sense that they minimized his role and then wrote him out because it quickly became apparent that he was a weaker actor than some of the others, especially Dohring and Ryan Hansen. I wouldn't be surprised if Dunn doesn't come back, even though his character is sort of a loose end.

[Perkins Cobb]

Ryan Hansen, Krysten Ritter, more people you don't remember. I hope we end up having as much fun as they are.