Episode Report Card Couch Baron: B- | 4 USERS: B+ YOU GRADE IT Domo Arigato, Donnie Roboto
By Couch Baron | Season 3 | Episode 5 | Aired on 10.30.2006
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Happy Halloween! Let's celebrate by ringing in the return of Cliff! Also, Backup gets loads of screen time! Okay. First, Lucky Tim teaches the criminology class in lieu of the absent Dr. Landry, and tries to show up Veronica by calling on her to give an oral presentation, but Veronica brings in a real-live Weevil to set a theme of the week by talking about having been a criminal and the allure of that lifestyle. Weevil notices that Veronica is wearing a necklace Lilly gave her, and then is aghast to learn that she's dating Logan again. Well, Weevil, you should have asked him to wait for you. Veronica, thinking to score some points with her beau, attends a Halloween party at the campus casino, but before Logan arrives, the party ends up getting robbed, Point Break-style. The thieves steal a lot of money, as well as Veronica's necklace, causing her to accuse Weevil of the crime, because her first instinct has been so on-target so far this season. Weevil and Logan almost revisit days of HoYay past, but Lamb shows up to get in on the action. Read the transcript if you think I'm kidding. He also finds some of the stolen goods from the party in Weevil's car, and arrests Weevil on the spot. Veronica comes to believe that Weevil was framed, though, and soon, it comes to light that the loot was dumped and the guns weren't even real. Veronica catches the real thieves, who were campus security guys. Well, that might explain why there's been so little progress with the rape investigations. Wallace does badly on a Mechanical Engineering test, and considers cheating on the next one. Surprisingly, he goes through with it, but perhaps less surprisingly, he gets caught (or so it seems, anyway). Veronica walks in on Keith in the middle of a consult with Dean Ed Begley and his nubile young wife. Turns out Ed's previously referenced stepson is dying, so Dean Ed hires Keith to track down the kid's deadbeat real dad. The dad is a washed-up voice actor, played by Richard Grieco (um, hee). Dean Ed's wife begs Grieco to give up some bone marrow for their son, but he refuses and then disappears, leaving Keith as the leading suspect in potential foul play. Keith confronts Dean Ed, who confesses that his wife took her son to Mexico without his consent, so they go on a -- say it with me -- ROAD TRIP! Only Ed was totally faking, and he and his wife kidnapped Grieco and stole his bone marrow. Wow, that's...kind of old school. Finally, Veronica talks to Claire, but she's no help about the Asian guy. Veronica does discover, however, that the mysterious Asian guy had a "Camp Waterloo" logo on his shirt, and finally finds out that the guy is...Claire's boyfriend. DUN! Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Veronica's waiting outside a classroom, and when the class therein lets out, she falls into step with Claire, who recognizes her as the girl who cleared the Pi Sigs. Surprisingly, she does not refer to Veronica as she who "got the Pi Sigs off," but rather than signaling a change of ways on the part of the writers, I think it simply shows they wanted Claire to use an expression that actually singled Veronica out. Claire is fairly neutral to Veronica, and Veronica takes advantage of the mild weather to say that she's investigating the rapes because a friend of hers was one of the victims. She goes on that she has the ATM photo, and again, it's pretty unbelievable that the local law hasn't already gotten this far. Then again, given how they handled the investigation into Driver Ed's state of mind last year, maybe asking questions at convenience stores isn't their strong point. In their defense, it's probably distracting being around all those donuts. (Just ask Veronica -- hi-yoooooo!) Claire isn't sure she's ready to see the photo, but relents, saying, "What the hell -- if it saves someone else, right?" Put that in the "filed away for later" folder. Upon seeing the picture, Claire says that she has no idea who the mysterious Asian guy is, but exposits that she withdrew the max from her account that night. "I got raped, and I paid for the privilege." Veronica notices a logo on the Asian guy's shirt, but Claire is similarly no help there.
Criminology class. Lucky Tim informs the students that Dr. Landry has been called as an expert witness in some case that "[he's] sure [they're] all tracking." Talk to me after the rape mystery, dude. I've got enough to follow as it is here. Lucky Tim says that they're going to continue with their oral presentations, making Veronica look slightly worried. Lucky Tim does in fact call on her, and she gets as far as "Actually, I'm not..." before Tim cuts her off and starts marking her down for being unprepared. And given the circumstances of their last encounter, said mark probably looks something like "SQUEEEEEE!" However, the celebration is premature, as Weevil enters the lecture hall, causing Veronica to pipe up that she's ready for the report. Unless she meant that she's ready to give Weevil a look of "You don't work far enough away to be late, chico." Both seem possible at the moment.
Cut to the two of them at the front of the class, where Veronica is giving highlights of Weevil's criminal history, which include almost two years total in juvie, plus current parole for assaulting the PCH leader that replaced him. She doesn't add that Weevil's assault was followed by one involving C4 and tons and tons of concrete, but given that she's trying to paint a picture of a badass here, upstaging him would be counterproductive. Lucky Tim tries to cut in that she's supposed to be giving an oral presentation and not "show and tell," but Veronica counters that Landry told them they could use audiovisual aids, and proves that Weevil is both audio -- since he can talk -- and visual -- since he's visible. Well, by that logic, she could bring a Speak 'n Spell up there to do the whole report for her. It would be against the spirit of the assignment, but that certainly hasn't gotten in her way in this class before. Veronica tells the students that she'll first discuss the socioeconomic conditions that lead to a life of crime, and starts talking about Weevil...