Normal Is the Watchword
Here's the thing: season 1 is all about Veronica's struggle to find Lilly's killer and recapture the life she lost, right? And she accomplishes just that in the finale: she catches Aaron, the road is clear for her and Duncan, her father is vindicated. Having to throw Lianne out only reinforces the need to return to her old life, really, because she may not be able to get her mother back, but she can have everything else.
And if the show had ended there, it would have been a perfectly good ending because Veronica can ride off into the sunset and the audience is free to make up their own adventures for her. But that didn't happen here, because the show was renewed.
So, the show has spent an entire season getting the audience invested in this character that in the finale can, and wants to, become someone completely different. What to do?
Honestly, to me this is a no-brainer. You set up the character to have the opposite arc. You start her off as normal as can be and then she has the whole season to learn that her life wasn't actually as perfect as she had imagined it to be, and she actually liked the person that she had become.
And NItW sets it all up beautifully. I know some people think it's a sucky episode, and with hindsight I have to agree, but even watching it now I think it sets up the arc exactly how I would have wanted to see it. In fact, the clues are glaringly obvious, at times even anvilous, and I just cannot fathom how you can write an episode like that and not intend to turn the concept of normal on its ear.
Even now I can see the season play out in my head. Veronica feels crushing guilt for being the one responsible for Meg being on the bus and decides that she has to investigate the crash. Duncan doesn't see why she should feel guilty, putting a strain on their relationship when Veronica realizes that he really doesn't understand her now. And then the coma baby could push them apart even further.
Around Christmas, the tension culminates and Veronica breaks it off with Duncan, who moves up to Napa to be with his family (BYE, DUNCAN, DON'T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU IN THE ASS ON YOUR WAY OUT).
After that disappointment, Veronica throws herself into investigating the crash even more, while helping Logan and Weevil solve Felix's murder. In the finale we see Veronica finally coming to terms with the fact that this is who she is and she wouldn't want to change it even if she could.
Doesn't that sound like the kind of story you would expect from season 2? And not in a bad way, not predictable, just how the natural character progression should be. (And in my imaginary season 3, her arc would be learning that she can't use people without suffering the consequences. But that ship has long since sailed. *sigh*)
I think I recall RT saying that he imagines Veronica working at the FBI when she grows up (feel free to correct me on this, it may be me getting my signals crossed), but I have to wonder, how did he think that the Veronica of NItW would ever want to be an FBI agent without her fundamentally changing in some way? Without her growing and learning? After all, in NItW she doesn't "do that anymore", she doesn't take cases, she just hangs out with her boyfriend and works as a barrista. How do you get to the FBI from that point without an arc? And it can't just be her still taking on cases, often against her will, the arc has to be about her reaching the insight that she likes it or else why would she even apply to Quantico?
And yes, that means I capped Normal Is the Watchword, but the uploading is taking forever. I guesstimate another hour to hour-and-a-half before the caps are in the album.
I have five Vox invites if anyone is interested.