Episode Report Card Couch Baron: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Saving Karen...Not So Much
By Couch Baron | Season 3 | Episode 2 | Aired on 10.09.2006
Veronica gets to her car and finds Marjorie, who informs her that they need to talk. She bluntly tells Veronica that Karen has cancer, and that Karen saw Veronica go into the private room, since there's a second camera inside. Veronica confesses that "a friend...someone I know" was raped after she left the house, and that Veronica was looking for clues. Marjorie: "What's behind that door has nothing to do with the rape of Parker Lee." Interesting that she knows the name, but probably Lamb followed up enough on the case to ask questions at the house. Anyway, Marjorie tells Veronica that Karen was so sick from her chemo that all she could do was lie in front of the toilet, so a Botany professor friend of hers gave her some pot seeds, she grew them, and now she uses the stuff medicinally. Leaving aside the question of whether Karen would be able to get the stuff legally for medicinal purposes (an issue over which there's considerable disagreement on the boards), the fact that the room contained enough pot to keep half of Burning Man "chilled out" is perhaps a bit of an issue. Marjorie tells Veronica that Karen would lose not only her job but her insurance if any of this came to light, so to speak, and firmly asks Veronica not to say anything. She leaves, and Veronica looks like she's going to ask Keith for details of his screw-up to make herself feel better by comparison.
Horshack is apologizing to his team when Kinney arrives. Rider Strong triumphantly tells him the wrong address, and Kinney heartily shakes his hand: "Congratulations. You managed to get false information." Kinney just went up a point or two. He sweeps out as quickly as he came, and Rider Strong looks like he's going to bite through his lip as he orders Horshack back to solitary. Horshack once again is all teary, but if he can't figure out that he had the correct address originally, he's too dumb to live. Or at least to go home nine and a half hours early. Rider Strong hisses that he knows Logan was behind the trick, and Logan gleefully smiles at him. As you do in these situations.
Veronica calls Nish and begs her not to run the story, explaining the real situation. Nish says that the article is being published, and that she should be proud. I'm thinking that's a subtle echo of Mac's earlier statement. Veronica winces in abject shame -- I mean, "pride."
At the sorority house, Veronica's on the porch waiting when Karen opens the door. As Marjorie appears, Veronica apologizes, tells Karen about the impending article, and suggests that she get rid of the pot. In a small seaside California town, I'm thinking she won't have much trouble finding it a good home. Marjorie asks, "You want to know the definition of 'ironic'?" It's a pretty good rule of thumb that the answer to that question is going to be "no." She tells Veronica that she was voted in: "We wanted you to be one of us." On the plus side, at least now they've seen Veronica's true colors. Marjorie closes the door, and Veronica breathes raggedly. A lot of people thought Veronica came off as bad as Wanda Varner, Girl Narc in this storyline. I don't completely see that, but she certainly could have made the decision not to report the pot revelation, or at least done some more investigatory work. It's grey, though, in my opinion -- I don't personally think pot should be illegal, but it is, and particularly given the high quantity in question, I'm not sure a black-and-white assessment of the morality of the situation is warranted. Still, I would have liked to know how Veronica weighed her options, but we've got a few other subplots to wrap up.