Veronica Mars: Update on the FBI Scenario

Despite some strong rumors to the contrary from USA Today, the CW’s Veronica Mars has not been cancelled… at least not yet. At last word, Mars creator/producer Rob Thomas was preparing a ten minute re-imagined “pilot.” This would show network executives what the series could look like with the show’s storyline fast-forwarded four years into the future with Veronica as an FBI agent.

In a recent interview with the Toronto Star’s Rob Salem, Enrico Colantoni (Veronica’s detective dad Keith Mars) confirmed that the three year old series is still alive and insisted “No one knows anything, but I love how people think they know.”

Though the series has had a very ratings rocky history, network head Dawn Ostroff has long been a show supporter. It seemed initially that the migration from UPN to the new CW network and the show’s pairing with Gilmore Girls would be a good idea. Colantoni says, “We were outside the bubble for the longest time… And then they put us on after the Gilmore Girls. But people weren’t sticking around after Gilmore Girls, because it’s really a whole different audience.”

As well, the third season of Mars hasn’t been a big success creatively and many viewers have complained that the recent storylines haven’t been up to the usual standard. With the possibility of cancellation looming closely, the Mars team came up the “time-shift” idea. Even those who had stopped watching the series were intrigued with the new direction.

Colantoni explains, “Rob [Thomas] and a couple of the other executives said, ‘Let’s make a little showcase pilot of what Veronica could be like in four years.’ They thought Dawn [Ostroff] might latch on to the idea of Veronica as an FBI agent in a kind of sexy workplace environment, ala Grey’s Anatomy, that kind of thing. We shot 10 pages and they saw it and the reaction was, ‘That’s not our show.’ Then they saw the last episode of this season, and it was so on the money… it was like the first two years. And I think the network was very excited about that.”

Thomas counters that while it’s true that network execs loved the season finale, the FBI scenario is still a possibility. He’s says that Ostroff hasn’t even seen the mini-pilot and adds “I have no earthly idea what Enrico is talking about. The network doesn’t see it or hear our pitches for VM College [continuing the existing timeline] or VM FBI until May 2.”

The two-hour season finale airs May 22nd. The new CW Fall schedule will be announced in mid-May and we’ll keep you posted if any new information leaks out before that date. Stay tuned!