Spoilers ahead for Barbie.

After months of discourse and anticipation, the Barbie movie has finally hit theaters. Greta Gerwig’s movie broke box office records, and lived up to the hype that surrounded it ahead of the release. Barbie perfectly pivoted between touching moments and comedy, including some unexpected musical moments. At one point Ryan Gosling’s Ken sings the Matchbox 20 song “Push” to hilarious results. Rob Thomas knew that the song would be the “butt of the joke” in Barbie, here’s why he said yes anyway.  

Ryan Gosling got to go back to his Mickey Mouse Club days by performing a few different musical numbers throughout the runtime of Barbie. That includes “I’m Just Ken” and the classic Matchbox 20 song “Push.” Greta Gerwig revealed on the official CinemaBlend podcast ReelBlend that she personally reached out to the band for permission. Rob Thomas share his perspective in a conversation with USA Today, and how the band has been portrayed in the media previously. In his words:

Clearly Thomas knows the way his band has been used/referenced in popular media. The Matchbox 20 poster in the Bring It On scene flashes by rather quickly, but it is featured with one of the most villainous characters of the beloved ‘90s movie. And as such, Rob Thomas was preparing himself when the Barbie talks about “Push” started. 

In that same interview, the Matchbox 20 frontman spoke about how Barbie was pitched to him and his bandmates. While Thomas was preparing for the worst, he was happy to find out that the song and the character Ken both become beloved by the end of Barbie. In his words:

Points were made. Audiences might originally laugh at Ryan Gosling’s performance of “Push”, especially given his strange singing accent. But Ken ends up having a moving redemption arc that shows how the patriarchy negatively affects both men and women. Rob Thomas signed on to let his song be used in this way, particularly because he was a fan of Greta Gerwig. As he shared:

I mean, same. Greta Gerwig is one of the most wildly successful directors of our time, and her work on both Little Women and Lady Bird was universally acclaimed. Ryan Gosling is clearly a fan, and even got starstruck in front of his wife Eva Mendes. And all of this led to his song’s perfect use in the Barbie movie. 

It should be fascinating to see how high Barbie climbs at the box office, and if it ends up being an Awards Season favorite. There are plenty of folks already calling for Ryan Gosling to get a Oscar nom for playing Ken, but it’s going to be a long road to the Academy Awards.

Barbie is in theaters now. Be sure to check out the 2023 movie release dates to plan your next movie experience. 

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’s cast chemistry drives the series. Rob McElhenney, Glenn Howerton, Kaitlin Olson, Danny DeVito, and Charlie Day’s alluring dynamic has helped It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia remain on the air and leave a legacy that continues to grow. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia's supporting cast of recurring characters and actors are equally ridiculous and exciting to watch. The McPoyles, Cricket (David Hornsby), The Lawyer (Brian Unger), Artemis (Artemis Pebdani) and many more have become part of the show’s DNA and its winning formula.

The It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia cast and crew have had a wide range of guest stars over the years . The series has featured comedians, actors, directors, show runners, and musicians. These guest stars have seamlessly inserted themselves into the crazy shenanigans of the gang, as either themselves or some character that makes sense for their real life persona. With so many guest stars, there may have been a few that you’ve forgotten. Here’s a bit of a reminder.

Josh Groban (Season 9, Episode 6)

Josh Groban made his claim to fame with his huge vocal presence, singing classic music, along with adult contemporary, jazz, and soft rock. He has multi-platinum albums, Grammy nominations, and Billboard Music Awards. Josh Groban is also no stranger to acting. He made guest appearances on various different comedy series, like The Crazy Ones and The Office, and he was co-lead on Netflix’s short lived The Good Cop.

Prior to his It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia guest appearance episode, Dee (Kaitlin Olson) and Artemis mentioned that they are huge Josh Groban fans, Grobanites one might say. In It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 9, Episode 6, “The Gang Saves the Day,” the gang hides out during a convenience store robbery. They each begin to imagine what would happen if they actually tried to stop the robbery. In Dee’s vision, she kills everyone, but goes into the witness protection program where she gets a starring role on a TV show as a male British butler. Her new fame brings Josh Groban and her together. They marry, but unfortunately, she divorces Josh Groban to marry Brad Pitt. In his brief cameo, Josh Groban sings a song that references the many insults that Dee hears frequently from the gang.

Sean “P-Diddy” Combs (Season 8, Episode 6)

Sean “P-Diddy” Combs raps, sings, and produces. He’s worked with big names like Usher, Faith Evans, Biggie Smalls, and Mary J. Blige. His most famous hit singles include “I’ll Be Missing You” and “It’s All About the Benjamins.” P-Diddy also appeared on the screen in movies such as Monster’s Ball, Get Him to the Greek, and Muppets Most Wanted.

In It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 8, Episode 6 “Charlie’s Mom Has Cancer,” Diddy plays a shady man claiming to be a doctor. He goes by the name Dr. Jinx. He claims that he can use natural remedies to cure Charlie’s mom's cancer. The episode features a very funny stare-off scene between Dr. Jinx and Dennis (Glenn Howerton). He tries to cure Dennis’ inability to feel emotions by playing him a soulful guitar version of New Kids On the Block’s “You Got It (The Right Stuff).”

Paul Walter Hauser (Season 6, Episode 9)

Last year, Paul Walter Hauser had his breakout role as Richard Jewell in Richard Jewell. He’s also appeared in Cobra Kai, Late Night, Kingdom, and I, Tonya.

Paul Walter Hauser appeared in one of the best episodes of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 6. In Episode 9, “Dee Reynolds: Shaping America’s Youth,” Dee and Charlie (Charlie Day) get jobs working for a high school, Dee as a substitute teacher and Charlie as a janitor. This episode features the gang’s version of Lethal Weapon 5. Charlie bonds with Richie (Paul Walter Hauser), a kid who dresses as a Juggalo, the name for fans of the Insane Clown Posse. After seeing the gang’s Lethal Weapon 5, Richie drops the Juggalo makeup and starts wearing blackface, which of course ends in Dee and Charlie being fired.

Guillermo del Toro (Season 8, Episode 3)

Guillermo del Toro is a filmmaker, best known for Pan’s Labyrinth, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Pacific Rim, Crimson Peak, and the Academy Award winning Best Picture The Shape of Water. Guillermo del Toro worked with Charlie Day on Pacific Rim, which likely led to this inspired It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia cameo.

Guillermo del Toro appeared in two episodes of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. The first in Season 8, Episode 3, “The Maureen Ponderosa Wedding Massacre,” and the second in Season 11, Episode 7, “McPoyle vs. Ponderosa: The Trial of the Century.” In both episodes, he plays Pappy McPoyle, a member of the infamous McPoyle incest loving clan. In “McPoyle vs. Ponderosa: The Trial of the Century,” he plays the key witness that allows Charlie to use bird law and win his case.

Oscar Nunez (Season 9, Episode 3)

The Office fans best recognize Oscar Nunez for his role as Oscar Martinez on the hit NBC series. He’s also made appearances on Mr. Iglesias, 3Below: Tales of Arcadia, and People of Earth. Oscar Nunez movie appearances include Baywatch, The Proposal, and The Italian Job.

Oscar Nunez appeared in It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 9, Episode 3, “The Gang Tries Desperately to Win an Award.” The entire episode is commentary on how It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia gets ignored by major award shows, like the Emmys. In it, Nunez plays the manager of a bar name Sudz, a bar that receives many awards. Oscar Nunez’ appearance is a nod to shows, like The Office, that fit more into the award show standards. It’s a very layered, hilarious, and top-notch episode, which proves why it’s ridiculous that the Emmys ignore the series every year.

Retta (Season 4, Episode 12)

Retta played Donna Meagle on Parks and Recreation for the series’ seven seasons. She also appeared on Girlfriends’ Guide to Divorce for several seasons, and now plays Ruby Hill on Good Girls. She also had a role in the comedy Good Boys.

Retta had a very small role on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 4, Episode 12, “The Gang Gets Extreme: Home Makeover Edition.” The gang kidnaps the Juarez family, and then forces them to participate in an extreme makeover of their lives and home. Retta plays the hardware store clerk that hears Charlie and Dennis discussing their questionable plans for their renovations. She doesn’t say much, but her facial reactions say it all.

David Benioff And D.B. Weiss (Season 12, Episode 2)

David Benioff and D.B Weiss are the showrunners of Game of Thrones. The men are huge fans of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and the It's Always Sunny cast are huge fans of Game of Thrones, which has resulted in the series’ stars doing crossover work. Rob McElhenney appeared on a Game of Thrones episode as an extra, and David Benioff and D.B Weiss wrote It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 9, Episode 8, “Flowers for Charlie.”

D.B Weiss and David Benioff returned to the It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia world in Season 12, Episode 2, “The Gang Goes to a Water Park.” The gang engages in separate disasters: Dennis training a little girl to be a good con artist, Dee and Mac trapped in a water slide, and Charlie and Frank (Danny DeVito) pretend Frank has AIDS to allow them to skip lines. D.B Weiss and David Benioff play two lifeguards who have no interest in actually trying to save lives and stop the gang’s madness. It leads to chaos and death, something we’re sure Benioff and Weiss have become familiar with from Game of Thrones.

Chad L. Coleman (Season 6, Episode 10)

Chad L. Coleman has appeared in the series All American, Interrogation, The Expanse, The Orville, and Arrow. Many know him best for his role on The Walking Dead, where he played Tyreese for a few seasons, and The Wire, where he played Dennis “Cutty” Wise.

Chad L. Coleman plays the recurring character Z on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. His first appearance was in Season 6, Episode 10, “Charlie Kelly: King of the Rats,” and his most recent was in Season 14, Episode 9, “A Woman’s Right to Chop.” Z has appeared in five episodes of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia so far. He's one of Charlie and Frank’s bridge people friends. His funniest moments are when he’s just reacting to the ridiculousness of the gang. He usually responds to their extreme behavior with understanding and amusement.

Sinbad And Rob Thomas (Season 4, Episode 9)

Sinbad is a comedian and actor. His film gigs include Jingle All the Way, Necessary Roughness, First Kid, but not Shazaam. Sinbad has also had television roles in Rel, A Different World, and Steven Universe. Rob Thomas is the front man for Matchbox Twenty. A few of the band’s hits include “3AM,” “Unwell,” “If You’re Gone,” and “Lonely No More.”

Sinbad and Rob Thomas appeared together in It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 4, Episode 9, “Dennis Reynolds: An Erotic Life.” Dennis’ quest to publish an erotic memoir leads to him in a rehab. Rob Thomas and Sinbad, playing themselves, just happen to also be in this rehab and they’re borderline deranged bullies. Rob Thomas and Sinbad are hilarious in this random cameo combination.

Pablo Schreiber (Season 6, Episode 13)

You may know Pablo Schreiber for his roles in The Wire, Law and Order: SVU, Weeds, and Orange is the New Black. He played Pornstache on Orange is the New Black, and serial rapist and killer William Lewis in Law and Order: SVU. Pablo Schreiber also played Mad Sweeney on American Gods. He was recently cast as Master Chief John-117 in the Halo series adaptation. His movie roles include Den of Thieves, First Man, and Skyscraper.

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 6, Episode 13, “A Very Sunny Christmas,” the gang recounts their Christmases. While telling Charlie about his Christmases of the past, Mac realizes that he and his family used to rob other people’s homes on Christmas. Charlie and he try to make it up to Pablo Schreiber’s character Ricky by trying to buy his children the hottest toy of that year. Things go very far off course, leading to an assault on a mall Santa.

The first thirteen seasons of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia are available to stream on Hulu. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season 14 should be available on Hulu in March. Stream it HERE.

Major spoilers for anyone who hasn't yet watched Veronica Mars Season 4. This one is a doozy.

No doubt there were many Veronica Mars fans who went into this weekend ecstatic about Hulu releasing the new season a week earlier than scheduled. There's also little doubt that most of those fans came away completely gobsmacked by the finale, which killed off Jason Dohring's O.G. character Logan Echolls in a late-game twist.

Within the context of the season, Logan's death came as a punctuation mark for Patton Oswalt's murderous pizza delivery driver Penn Epner, who did a pretty convincing job of presenting himself as The Joker surrogate with Veronica Mars' canon. Fans, however, need more of a reason that that for losing such a beloved character, especially so soon after Logan and Veronica got married, a goal that he'd been harboring for all eight episodes.

Show creator Rob Thomas shined some light on the creative reasonings behind killing Jason Dohring's Logan like that, and viewers might be surprised (and more) to learn that this deadly tactic was utilized so that Veronica Mars could have a chance to come back for more episodes of a slightly different nature. In Thomas' words:

Much as fans can be angry while raising pitchforks high in the air, Rob Thomas can't be accused of telling tall tales in the schoolyard or anything. Though Veronica Mars started life with Kirsten Bell's titular character as a high school gumshoe, it's not possible this show (or any others, really) to keep maintaining the exact same tone, sense of humor and approach to its subject matter.

For a core example, Keith and Veronica should not be having the same conversations in 2019's Season 4 that they were having even in the lackluster Season 3 in 2007. Granted, Season 4 has them avoiding using the word "fuck" by replacing it with "cuss," leading to such viewer-created sentences as "Mothercusser, why the cuss did Logan have to cussing die?"

Still, as semi-juvenile as that one concept was, Veronica Mars Season 4 dealt with lots of adult-oriented themes and personal issues that would likely feel a little too weighted and dark for a teen noir. Domestic terrorism via bombings, the subject of rape, quirky hit men, bugging friends' offices. Sure, some of those thing have come up on this series before – and the revival even brought back the Hearst College Rapist Mercer Hayes – but in order for the show to move forward, the creative side needs to leave some of the past in the past.

Even if it means blowing it up while it's trying to move the car for street sweepers.

Rob Thomas was asked by TVLine if Logan's death got any flak or pushback from Hulu or the producers at Warner Bros. Here's how he answered:

You gotta love a TV exec who makes painfully amusing jokes in the heat of such a conversation. Well, I guess "love" is a strong word. It's a word that characters such as Veronica and Logan used whenever they officially tied the knot just minutes before the latter exploded.

And while I would certainly LOVE it if Veronica Mars would get the immediate go-ahead for Season 5 and beyond, it's still going to take a little longer to get over Logan's death. As much as I kinda despised him through much of those early seasons, the character really turned things around and became the most stable pillar in Veronica's life other than her father. And Season 4 had already toyed with viewers' expectations about Keith's health and well-being, making it look like he might be the one to make an unwelcomed exit.

In fact, when Rob Thomas explained the creative decision to have Veronica narrating the season's events in the past tense, he said that it was all part of the plan to keep viewers on their toes.

I truly didn't expect Veronica to take things too far with Leo, but Max Greenfield was rocking 110% charisma and looked like he would have eaten the sand from between Veronica's toes if it meant a return to their more romantic days from seasons past. As such, I wasn't sure if anyone could stop themselves from falling into Leo's arms. Even Logan couldn't claim complete safety...then, or later.

Veronica Mars currently has all four seasons streaming on Hulu. No word yet on what could happen next with this franchise, but like Rob Thomas put it, if both he and Kristen Bell are free, willing and able to tackle another set of mystery-driven episodes that have very little connections to the characters' teenage years, they're down to make it happen.

The last time Veronica Mars was properly airing on our TV screens, it was May 2007, and Hulu was still five months away from being founded. (And somehow, The Big Bang Theory hadn't yet premiered on CBS.) Skip ahead twelve years, and Hulu is now the new home for Rob Thomas and Kristen Bell's mystery dramedy. But just because Veronica and many within the Marshmallow fanbase are all grown adults now, don't expect to hear adult language such as random F-bombs.

That's bad news for anyone hoping to see Veronica Mars tell Ken Marino's Vinnie Van Lowe to go fuck himself, but show creator Rob Thomas explained why he can bet behind Hulu's decision to pull back on that most tantalizing four-letter word. According to Thomas:

That definitely makes a lot of sense, all things considered. While financial stats weren't revealed by way of how much it cost Hulu to score the Season 1-3 streaming rights to Veronica Mars, it wouldn't be the smartest move to try and hook a younger audience with those early episodes only to then create harder-edged content geared for older viewers. (Not that high-schoolers and the like aren't dropping F-bombs on a daily basis, but for the sake of TV ratings.)

10 Hulu TV Highlights Debuting In July 2019

Of course, considering the season is about a bomber targeting Neptune's spring break crowd, one wonders if Kristen Bell saying "fuck" is what really deserved the most pushback for its influential nature. Anything that Ryan Hansen's Dick Casablancas gets up to also deserves to be considered.

Kristen Bell did tell TVLine that Rob Thomas came up with an "incredibly funny scenario" that gives Veronica and Keith the chance to dance around spouting F-bombs left and right. (Having seen the entirety of Season 4, I can vouch for there being a no-fucks gimmick used, though it ends up being hit-or-miss in the humor department.) Plus, the eight-episode season does allow characters to use other explicit language when the time calls for it.

Fans of Kristen Bell will note that Veronica Mars isn't exactly the only current TV series that doesn't allow her to rain F-bombs down on adoring audiences. Her time on NBC's The Good Place, whose heavenly aesthetic turns foul language into edited nonsense, has been peppered with highly amusing phrasings like "Holy shirtballs!" and "What the fork?" Although they'll sadly be coming to an end when The Good Place bows out with Season 4.

For what it's worth, the actress wants everyone to know that she's not the cause of all this language censorship in her career. Here's how Kristen Bell put it:

No one who hires me wants me to swear. And I’m like, ‘Fuck that.’ I have no problem with cursing. I know some people don’t care for it — like my mom — and I fully respect that. But, personally, it only offends you if you let it.

A lot of people are likely going to be screaming curse words at their TVs when Veronica Mars Season 4 comes to a close on Hulu, considering it took twelve years and a crowd-funded feature film to make it happen. But hey, if enough people tune in and Hulu sees a wealth of new subscribers wanting to see Keith and Veronica back together again, then Kristen Bell will likely come back for more, assuming Rob Thomas and others are also down to keep things going with Season 5.

Check out the official trailer for Season 4 below.

With many returning faces on hand – not to mention a few new ones – Veronica Mars Season 4 will debut on Hulu on Friday, July 26, at 12:01 a.m. PT. Tell all your friends to not be a bunch of fork-heads and to be sure and tune in.

Veronica Mars is coming back, and like many shows heading from network television to the land of streaming, changes will be made. As fans of other shows that have made the leap know, there is a certain expectation. That things that fly on a network show can get a bit more adult when a series hits a streamer.

Well, do not worry. Veronica Mars is not going to go too hard on its adult content when the limited series revival hits Hulu. The fan-favorite series will be a lot like the show hardcore Marshmallows remember. Why? Veronica Mars’ creator, Rob Thomas, explained at the ATX Television Festival (via TV Guide), saying:

That makes sense! You do not want to risk alienating the audience that you may be hoping to build. Veronica Mars was going to go sort of heavy on the F-bombs. That is, if they were planning to drop eighteen total incidents of that particular profanity in one episode. If not, then it was not that intense.

There are eight episodes in the upcoming miniseries, which puts it at around two F-bombs per episode on average. Interestingly, another cult series recently acknowledged they faced the same profanity conundrum. Former Fox series, Lucifer, ended up sticking with a similar profanity policy to the one Hulu wanted Veronica Mars to take. Like Netflix, it sounds like Hulu wanted the same type of show it was before.

When Veronica Mars started, the characters were in high school. They were last seen in the movie, which saw all of them having come into adulthood. So, it makes sense for them to potentially use some more adult language in Season 4. However, the show has always been geared to viewers in their mid-teens and up.

Veronica Mars originally aired on UPN, and then moved to The CW, where it finished its run. When Rob Thomas took the characters to the silver screen with a 2014 movie, it got a PG-13 rating by the MPAA, keeping its younger audience intact. When in doubt, leave the profanity out?

The show maintaining its TV-14 friendly rating will not be the only thing it keeps. Veronica Mars will also maintain its edge as a mystery series. Season 4’s case will revolve around a series of bombings that erupt during spring break in Neptune. Veronica and her father will be hired to find the guilty party. Something tells me the father/daughter team will succeed.

The new season will welcome a bevy of big stars, including J.K. Simmons. Fans can also expect to see the return of an original villain and the introduction of a The Good Place star. Original series star Jason Dohring will be back as Veronica’s on-again-off-again love interest Logan. Lots to look forward to, Marshmallows! Just in a TV-14 way.

Veronica Mars premieres this summer, starting July 26 on Hulu.

Movies are being turned into TV series all the time these days, and it's always interesting to see which ones make the leap, and if there are any changes made in the adaptation process. Well, boils and ghouls, the seminal 1980s teen vamp horror The Lost Boys is getting a small-screen remake for The CW that sounds pretty incredible when the long-term details are broken down. So let's dig into what I really hope is Chinese food and get to them.

First, The Lost Boys will make it through TV development via the wonderful imagination of Rob Thomas, creator of fan favorites Veronica Mars and iZombie. Thomas has made a good living writing adventurous and twisty stories for young people - he also created 90210 and the criminally underwatched Party Down - with iZombie proving he's just as good when it comes to making his wit and snark more macabre in nature. So that's great.

Second, Rob Thomas' plans for The Lost Boys are so much more than the film franchise ever hinted at being. The insanely ambitious goal here is to keep The Lost Boys going for at least seven seasons, where each season will be set in a different decade. Season 1, according to Deadline, would be set in San Francisco during 1967, so we'd get to see motorcycle riding vampires mixing it up with free-loving hippies and baby boomers. And while that setting would change, as is the case with the human characters and the seasonal antagonist, the central group of vampires would remain as close to exactly the same as make-up will allow. We've seen immortal characters on TV before, but this could explore that angle like few other scripted projects.

One can only hope Rob Thomas and his producer team put some feelers out to see if anyone from the movie is interested in returning. Jason Patric was recently on Wayward Pines' second season, so he's used to it. Corey Feldman is probably always willing to work, so get him and Jamison Newlander on the phone to come back as the Frog Brothers in some way. And let's not leave out Dianne Wiest, Kiefer Sutherland, Jami Gertz and Alex Winter.

It was only recently announced that The Lost Boys is getting another sequel of sorts in the form of a comic book. It's not surprising that nobody really wants to get back behind another big screen version, since the direct-to-video sequels in 2008 and 2010 didn't exactly light the world on fire. While its potential home on The CW probably means we won't get to see any insanely gory special effects, let's hope the story is good enough to keep me from noticing.

There's no plan in place for when The Lost Boys will officially show up on The CW, considering it's just being put together right now, but know that we will be hanging out underneath the train tracks, ready to catch that hopefully good news when it passes. Until then, you can find everything heading to TV later this year with our fall premiere schedule.

Did anyone ever call a doctor about the revival fever that’s taken over TV in recent months? Or did they just call someone posing as a doctor, and that someone is actually Veronica Mars wearing a doctor costume? For the marshmallows that were hoping that last year’s Kickstarted feature wouldn’t be the last time the Neptune sleuth took the case, it seems as if a continuation could very well be the cards later down the line, and it might involve a jump back to television.

Show creator Rob Thomas was at Comic-Con this past weekend, using his brain to promote his current CW series iZombie, and he and the latter show’s cast spoke with TVLine. When the subject of Veronica Mars came up, Thomas was predictably cagey with his comments, but he opened up the franchise’s future in an interesting way.

Now, did he mean an anthology format, or did he mean Veronica, Weevil, Logan and Keith taking on some perverted murderers with supernatural undertones? I’m sure the True Detective reference was really just a modern day comparison to a meaty and twisty story with sometimes riveting characters. The cast isn’t getting any younger, so I’d have no problem seeing everyone go through more adult situations. Not that the case behind Season 1 wasn’t extremely adult.

It’s of course worth pointing out that Thomas said that no set plans are being made, and nothing is set in stone. Even if the development process officially started right now, Thomas is still busy working on Season 2 of iZombie, while Bell has Season 5 of House of Lies to focus on. A limited series probably wouldn’t go into actual production for another couple of years, and there’s no telling when it would be released. Still, that would serve as a decent amount of downtime, since it was six years after the show’s cancelation to get the movie happening.

Check out the interview clip below, and try to get the concept of more Wallace in your life out of your head.

So, maybe we can expect another Kickstarter campaign starting up in two years or so. Keep your wallets handy.

Good news for everybody who wants a little more Rob Thomas in their lives! (Not Matchbox 20's Rob Thomas, don’t worry.) Two days after the Blu-ray/DVD release of his Kickstarted feature version of Veronica Mars, the CW has announced they’ve put in a series order for Thomas’ next project, the comic book adaptation iZombie. I guess I should have said it’s also good news for anyone who wants more televised zombie fiction.

But this is far from the post-apocalyptic mayhem of The Walking Dead, and undoubtedly features a lot more attractive youngsters. iZombie is a loose adaptation of the comic, from writer Chris Roberson and artist Michael Allred, and it centers on the strange life (or post-death, I guess) of Liv, a med student whose coroner’s office job is more to keep brains on her kitchen table rather than bread and butter. She is a sentient and intelligent zombie, and one who wants to keep everyone from her former life at bay. (In the comic, she was a gravedigger named Gwen.)

The synopsis given leaves a lot of the comic’s supernatural characters by the wayside, and it sounds as if they’re just shooting to make iZombie a hip comedic fantasy with procedural elements. Liv, her coroner boss, and a detective friend all try to solve the homicide cases for each the bodies that come through the doors. It helps their situation that every brain Liv eats gives her access to the deceased’s memories. I know I don’t consider a steak dinner a success until I know how the cow spent its last birthday.

There’s no sign of Ellie, Gwen’s ghostly best friend, or the werewolf Spot; as well, Thomas seems to be leaving out all of the vampire elements, which is strange, considering CW has been obsessed in recent years with these kinds of fantastical beings. Maybe they figured there were already too many vamps and hairy beasts running around their schedule.

Luckily, comic creator Roberson read the iZombie pilot’s script and gave it his approval on a recent Reddit AMA, saying “it seems like it will make for good television,” and that “the core concept is the same as our comic, but they’ve used it as the basis for a new character and situation.” Far be it for me to say the CW marginalizes interesting concepts to fit into their demographic, but I guess the world always needs solid female-fronted TV shows, and who better than Rob Thomas to bring one.

Liv will be played by Rose McIver (Once Upon a Time), whom Thomas hopes will be the next strong female lead that the CW is looking for. Other roles in the show will be filled by Robert Buckley (666 Park Avenue), Malcolm Goodwin (Breakout Kings), Alexandra Krosney (Last Man Standing), Jenna Berman (Motive), David Anders (The Vampire Diaries), Nora Dunn (Entourage) and more.

Stay tuned for more iZombie information – along with more about other new pickups The Flash, The Messengers and Jane the Virgin – once CW gets next week’s upfronts out of the way.

So you've seen the Veronica Mars movie and now you want to know what Rob Thomas had to say about the ending. Or maybe you're curious about how Kristen Bell reacted when she found out she might not be the one to get to say a certain word? We're being careful with our wording here for those of you who may have stumbled into this article without having seen the movie yet. Please be advised, this article is full of spoilers from the movie and is meant for people who've seen it already. If you're looking for the non-spoiler conversations we had with director Rob Thomas and the cast, you'll find that here.

Up ahead, in addition to some not-so-PG-13 language, also find out why the voice-overs had to be rewritten, who might have gotten the sole F-word in the movie (if not Veronica), why Kristen Bell thought viewers might hate her after a certain scene and more spoilery tidbits about the movie!

'Fuck Me Running' was just one of the unused F-word phrases.

PG-13 movies are usually allowed one non-sexual F-word. If you were paying attention during the scene where Veronica's getting hit on at the club, you'll note that the film made good use of that one F-word when Veronica tells Justin Long to "Fuck off" as he's trying to hit on her (or hit on her on behalf of a friend). From what Kristen and Rob told us, it sounds like a fair amount of thought went into not only how the F-word would be used, but also by whom. "When I heard that it might not go to me, that other people were going to get to test it out, I threw a conniption fit," Bell told us. "I said 'No fucking way, Veronica will say the F-word and that is the end of the discussion,' but Rob didn't know how he wanted to use it yet, and he wanted to allow himself options in editing, because he's a smart director."

So how else might the F-word have been worked into the dialogue? For Kristen Bell, an alternative F-word scene would've been when Veronica first sees the Serendipity picture and she realizes that it's a clue to the murder mystery. "She sees the 'Serendipity' on the boat in that photo," Rob Thomas explained. "And originally at that point, she said 'Fuck me running,' and it's a pretty great line delivery."

They may have toyed with the idea of giving the expletive to another character, but Thomas says there was actually no doubt that Veronica would get the sole F-word. But he did have one in there for Krysten Ritter's Gia. "I had to pull this out," he said. "She talks about Cobb and she says, 'He was just this weird kid reading Guns and Ammo and eye-fucking me across the room,' and that had to become 'eye-screwing,' because Kristen Bell was going to get the 'fuck' in the script, and at the end of the day, I just heard her telling Justin Long to fuck off. It made me happy. It was the thing that made me smile."

Us too! Speaking of things that made Rob Thomas happy, he mentioned loving the scene where Max Greenfield's Leo pretends not to recognize Veronica. Thomas said that scene made him very happy.

Rob Thomas started with the ending.

Rob Thomas says when approaching the story, he started from the end of the movie and worked backwards. And the image of Veronica sitting at her father's desk, ready to embrace her destiny was one he thought fans would be united on. "I hear a lot of things from Veronica Mars fans and they are split on so many issues," Thomas told us. "But what I thought would work as a thru-line for the movie, the thing that I felt very confident about going in, was the idea that Veronica had moved away, that she'd given up being a P.I., that her life had gone onto 'bigger and better things,' but that she gets drawn back into her old life."

And that old life is one fans of the series were much more familiar with, as it's a major part of how Veronica is presented to us in the show. "The image of her sitting down in her dad's desk and sort of accepting her destiny," Thomas explained. "This is what's in her blood. This is what she's good at. This is what makes her feel alive, even when it may be the thing that is unhealthy for her, that was the storyline hat I had confidence in would unite almost all Veronica Mars fans."

They had to re-write all the voiceovers to work in the addiction theme.

One of the things we brought up during our chat with Rob Thomas was that great scene during the reunion after-party when Veronica's dancing with her friends and seeming as happy as ever, while inwardly her mind is busy working the case. "Sure it looks like I'm having fun," Veronica's voice-over says. "But even my alcy mom knew how to put on a show to hide her disease." It's one of numerous times throughout the movie where Veronica compares the allure of her work as a private investigator with addiction.

From what Thomas told us, the recurring addiction theme was worked into the film later in production. "We'd landed on the voiceover -- the thematic sort of recovering alcoholic AA stuff at the end," he revealed. "The voiceovers were saying something similar in terms of Veronica's headspace, but we hadn't locked in on this idea of she is being drawn back to being a P.I. like her mom to booze. Like she's the child of an addict and she's recognizing that quality in herself. We literally got down tot the end of the movie and the idea of acceptance, the idea of using the language of AA, the serenity prayer, came to us when we were writing that final voiceover. And we went back and rewrote all of the voiceovers to set up that ending."

Related to that dancing scene, Bell had some interesting insight into Veronica being interesting because she's a permanent paradox. "She is simultaneously vulnerable and confident," Bell said of her character. 'Externally, she's one of the gang, internally completely conflicted, utterly myopic on solving the case. There's nothing funny or interesting about perfection. Conflict is nice to watch. Conflict is interesting, so the fact that Veronica is often conflicted, I think is what makes the show so entertaining."

Logan found order, Piz found confidence.

Logan's in the military and Piz is willing to throw down! That's quite a contrast from bad-boy Logan and nice-guy Piz. If you recall in Season 3, Piz was more a lover than a fighter, but he throws down with the other guys when push comes to violent shove at the reunion. So why the turn around?

Chris Lowell credits Piz's choice to get into the fight this time around to increased confidence. "I think the biggest thing for Piz is his confidence has really grown since he was on the show," Lowell said, going on to talk about how eager Piz was to win Veronica's attention and affection. "The character was so nervous and desperate for her affection and her attention and validation. I think now he's gotten to a place in his life where he knows he's a good guy, he knows he's a successful guy. He's a lot more certain of who he is."

As for Logan's military life, Jason Dohring says that's his character's way of finding discipline and order in his life, which is something he really needed after losing his whole family.

Ryan Hansen did more dancing than you might have realized.

That flask-buckle pelvis thrust wasn't the only dancing Ryan Hansen did for the movie. Last Summer, Rob Thomas revealed to backers that he'd enlisted the help of Ryan Hansen in fulfilling the role of the dancing gorilla on the pier. So the story goes, Thomas kept the fact that it was Ryan in the gorilla suit from Kristen and Ken Marino, who were shooting the scene on the bench while gorilla guy danced. The prank that ensued involved Rob Thomas pretending to get angrier and angrier at the gorilla guy, whom he accused of upstaging the other actors.

We got a quick glimpse of Hansen in the suit during the SDCC preview:

Hansen told us Ken Marino tried to chat him up and check in on him while he was in the suit, not realizing who he was. "I was in that thing for like three hours without taking off my mask because they would've seen me," he said. "Ken even came up to me and was like, 'Hey, you good man? What's up?' You know, trying to talk to me."

Hansen also said there was more to the flask buckle scene, which was cut out. Hopefully that and the gorilla prank will make it onto the DVD!

New York vs. Neptune was set up to be an especially tough choice for Veronica.

It was probably a lot easier for us to want to see Veronica return to Neptune and her old life as a private investigator than it was for Veronica to see herself returning to that life. Rob Thomas says he intentionally created good reasons for Veronica to stay in New York, including a great boyfriend, a great job that would help her pay off her student debts, and support from her father. "I wanted the most important person in her life, Keith, to be pushing her towards New York," Thomas told us. "I wanted to make it very tough, and even at the end, I didn't want it to be like Wayne's World, happy ending. I wanted it to be bittersweet. I wanted to feel the things she was giving up."

Among the things she was giving up was Piz, the good guy who treated her well and probably would've offered her a stable romantic future. Thomas said Kristen Bell thought Chris Lowell's performance in that break-up scene was so good that viewers might hate her for breaking his heart. "You feel his pain," Thomas said. "She said 'Chris is going to make people hate me there,' because he is heartbroken and great in that scene, but I wanted it to be that hard. A lot of romantic comedies would put Bill Pullman sneezing in the kleenex on the other side to make the answer so crystal clear. I wanted it to be hard."

Piz pretty much knew it was over when he left Neptune.

Chris Lowell's final scene in the film has him standing on a sidewalk, breaking up with Veronica over the phone while his parents wait in the background. It's awkward and sad and hard to watch, but it was inevitable, and from what Chris Lowell says, Piz knew it was coming.

"It's all about his fears come true," Lowell told us. "It's kind of that moment where you realize that you may have won the battle but you're never going to win the war. It's a sad moment. It's a bummer. But I think he knows before he even leaves Neptune how it's going to go down for him, but answering that call, it's the nail in the coffin."

Jason Dohring had concerns about revisiting LoVe's iconic moment.

Those familiar with Season 2 of Veronica Mars remember Logan's somewhat inebriated confession to Veronica that he always thought their relationship was epic. It's a classic moment from the series, particularly for those who always wanted to see Logan and Veronica get back together. The movie takes a chance in revisiting that speech near the end of the film, as Logan is preparing to return to the military. Jason Dohring told us he felt a bit concerned about how that scene would play.

"I didn't know if it was going to be cheesy or not to make such a particular reference to a scene that's, I guess when people consider the iconic scene of that relationship, it's sort of that one," Dohring said. "So I didn't know how it would go. It was funny, coming into it as an actor, you knew it was something that really needed to work." Dohring says it was nerve-wracking doing that scene because he knew how private and personal it needed to be. "But those are the scenes that I love with Kristen," he said, adding that he likes being the asshole too. "But I think when you get a private moment like that on film, it's fucking awesome dude. That's what you like to act for, man, the real exchange."

Kristen Bell had a hand in casting.

Watching Bell's real-life husband Dax Shepard wag his tongue and show off his moves for Veronica's pleasure might have tipped you off that Bell had a little something to do with some of the casting for the film. Bell says she desperately wanted Dax to cameo and he very much wanted to be a part of the film, as was the case for Justin Long, whom she describes as a very good friend. "We just all called in favors," Bell said. She also confirmed that she petitioned her You Again co-star Jamie Lee Curtis to play the role of the interviewer at the start of the film. "She was the one I pictured in that role and I was so happy that she wanted to do it," Bell said.

It also worked out really well that so many cast members from the original series were able and willing to return for the film. Not only did we see regulars like Dohring, Lowell, Enrico Colantoni and others, but there were also more supporting players on board, like Max Greenfield and Sam Huntington, the latter of whom reprised his role of Luke. Bell noted that the cast is all still very close, and that played a part in getting people to return for the film. "I think it speaks to how we work well together, all of us. No one would come back if we didn't like each other. But I don't get to see Sam Huntington nearly enough, because he lives in Vancouver all of the time, but I love him. I love his kids. We're all genuinely still close."

Find out what the cast had to say about Kickstarting the film, the start of Veronica and Logan's relationship, the spin-off digital series that's in the works and more here!

Rose McIver seems far too beautiful to be a zombie, and yet she may very well get to play one on TV, as she's been cast in the lead role of Diane Ruggiero and Rob Thomas' pilot adaptation of DC Comics' iZombie. McIver, whom you may recognize for playing Tinker Bell in Once Upon a Time or Vivien Scully in Masters of Sex, is the latest to join the potential series, which would center on a young woman/zombie who takes a job at a coroner's office where she'll have plenty of access to the brains she needs to eat to maintain her humanity.

When we spoke to Veronica Mars creator/director Rob Thomas last week about the feature sequel to his beloved-but-cancelled UPN/CW series, he tipped us off that his iZombie pilot had indeed secured its lead, but he wasn't able to give us any specifics at that time. But word is out today, as Deadline reports that McIver is officially on board to play the role of Olivia "Liv" Moore, the med student-turned-zombie whose steady diet of brains leads her to gaining employment at a coroner's office where she reluctantly feeds on the corpses' brains. As a side effect to that diet includes inheriting the brains' memories, she eventually ends up helping out her medical examiner boss and a police detective solve crimes based on the information she gets.

As mentioned, McIvor's past credits include Once Upon a Time and Masters of Sex. As for what's coming up, as we reported previously, she's set to play the lead role of Cathy in Lifetime's Flowers in the Attic sequel, Petals on the Wind. I'm especially excited to see how she tackles that role, especially if it means seeing her vengeful side. And now we might get to see her zombie side, should things work out for iZombie!

McIver joins previously cast Malcolm Goodwin, Alexandra Krosney and David Anders, as well as One Tree Hill's Robert Buckley. And Deadline recently reported that Nora Dunn had signed on to play a series regular as Eva Moore, a hospital administrator and Liv's mother. So it seems the cast for this pilot is shaping up nicely.

When I talked to Rob Thomas last week, he told me he was "thrilled" about the casting for the lead, and mentioned that he's also directing the pilot. It would be very exciting to have a series from Rob Thomas and Diane Ruggiero on the network, especially in the wake of the big screen Veronica Mars comeback. But it will be up against other pilots in contention at the CW. Thomas did note that CW may be in the market for a show like this, however, saying "They really want another strong female lead on the network and I think iZombie will give them that. I hope."

We hope too!

A year after fans came through (and then some) to make the Veronica Mars movie a reality, the film is finally ready for its audience. Last week, we had the opportunity to talk to director/series creator Rob Thomas and stars Kristen Bell (Veronica Mars), Jason Dohring (Logan), Chris Lowell (Piz), Krysten Ritter (Gia) and Ryan Hansen (Dick) about the film. Because you may not have seen it yet, we've left out all spoiler-chat for this one, but they did have some fascinating things to say about the movie, including what it was almost about, whether or not they thought fans would meet the Kickstarter goal, the digital spinoff that's in the works, and what Veronica's up to these days. And for you LoVe fans, Jason Dohring told us how he and Kristen Bell reacted back during the first season, when they first found out Veronica and Logan were going to kiss.

The Plot Almost Involved The FBI, A Tijuana Drug Cartel And An Assassination

The actual plot of the movie has Veronica on the brink of working as an attorney in New York when she's called back to Neptune to help Logan, who's suspected of murdering his pop star girlfriend. There's also a Neptune High reunion (Go Pirates!), which offers plenty of opportunity for familiar faces to make appearances. But Rob Thomas said that before they went in that direction, there was a whole other plot -- alterna-plot? -- being brainstormed that sounds like it would've linked to Veronica's planned (but unfulfilled) FBI pursuits to her present-day situation.

"I had this whole other plot, that we found her in the FBI and there was a San Diego politician assassinated by what we think is a Tijuana drug cartel," Thomas revealed. "And Veronica is sent there as an FBI agent." But he said trying to get that to dovetail with things going on in Neptune began to feel strained. So they went with the murder mystery, which gave Veronica a reason to return to Neptune, and just in time for the reunion.

Veronica Has Choices To Make

In high school and college, Veronica was a bit ahead of the game, maturity-wise, however the movie picks up nearly a decade later with Veronica about to begin her law career, and Kristen Bell pondered the idea that maybe her character digressed a bit in the years that have passed. "I think, Veronica was wise beyond her years as a teenager and I almost feel like digressed a little bit as an adult," she explained. "I think, it’s a more immature notion to run from who you really should be, ought to be, your true north. She wanted to get rid of all the drama, so she sought out a lifestyle that was simple and stable, away from Neptune, and in the first few moments of the film, it starts to dawn on her that it’s pretty boring and it’s probably not who she’s supposed to be. So, as an adult, she’s kind of run from herself."

So where do we go from here? That's a question Veronica is faced with as the film progresses, because her choice is about more than one thing. Chris Lowell, who plays Veronica's boyfriend Piz, breaks it down pretty well here...

"New York represents this life that she has been really aiming for," Chris Lowell explained. "She finally escapes Neptune. She obviously leaves a lot of things behind that she loves, but she also leaves behind a lot of baggage that she doesn't want to take with her. New York represents a clean slate, and a professional career and a new life and a stable boyfriend, and all these things that she maybe thinks that she wants. And I think Neptune and that other lifestyle and Logan are the risks in her. They bring out the excitement, the unknown, the instinct and the sort of mischief and made it deeper... sexier, steamier, more smoldering... Love."

Jason Dohring, who was sitting next to Lowell during his response, agreed, adding, "She's obviously torn between two lives and what she thinks she should be doing based on 'Now I'm supposed to...' in life, and what drives her as a character, which I think is making things right, solving things, following a passion. Not just some day-job or something like that. As hard as it is to tear her away from Chris, I'm going to try my best."

The Series Wasn't A LoVe Story From The Start

Let's go back to Season 1 for a minute, because the LoVe (LOgan + VEronica) story is one of the things fans are pretty invested in. Veronica and Logan's turbulent relationship became a major arc over the course of the series' run, and it is addressed in the film. That's about as detailed as we're going to get on that front, but let's look back to the beginning of the series, before LoVe became a thing, when Logan was the 'obligatory psychotic jackass' at Neptune High, serving as little more than an antagonist in the form of a super-09er. And then came "Weapons of Class Destruction" and that kiss at the Camelot that seemed to come out of nowhere in a perfectly jaw-dropping, what-just-happened kind of way that changed everything.

So, did Kristen Bell and Jason Dohring know going into the series that their characters would eventually get romantic? According to Dohring, no. He and Bell were thrown for a loop on that one when they first found out.

"I think they told us around Episode 6 or something," Dohring revealed. "'You guys are going to be together.' We both had the same instant reaction, which was 'What the fuck are you talking about. There's no way.' And they're like, 'Yeah, it's just too good. In three episodes, you're going to kiss.' We were like, 'Are you kidding me, how's that going to work?'"

But as LoVe fans would agree, it did work, not only as a twist but as a dramatic new direction for both characters that would be revisited in roller coaster fashion over the duration of the series' run.

"The fact that I think that the guy was never going to wind up with her from the start, it was written like that," Dohring said. "It was so cool when they did because sometimes they lay the seed. 'It's like, here's the antagonistic guy but they kind of share this little thing."

"Yeah, I agree with you," Chris Lowell chimed in. "I think it was really out of left field in the best way."

"So when they kiss, people were just like "What?!"," Dohring went on. "'How could that be,' which is so cool, because those are the moments you're looking for and to lay all the groundwork before it happens so that it really makes it impactful."

Dohring also didn't anticipate the fandom that would develop in support of LoVe. "I don't try to play that people would like him or anything like that," he said. "Because he does all these horrible things..."

"And they just love him," Lowell interjected. "I, on the other hand, play so hard for people to like me and they just hate me, what does that say?"

Sorry Piz.

For reference, because there's only so much that's going to come through in text, Chris Lowell and Jason Dohring are really funny together.

Kristen Bell Knew The Kickstarter Campaign Would Be A Success. (Everyone else was less optimistic.)

For a bit of background history on the Kickstarter campaign, as Ryan Hansen explained it, Rob Thomas and Kristen Bell approached him, Jason Dohring and Enrico Colantoni about doing the video to pitch the Kickstarter idea. They did it, they handed it to Warner Bros. "And Warner Bros. sat on that Kickstarter video for a year," Hansen said. "And then I think someone at Warner Bros. was like, 'Hey, we should give them a shot.' And they did."

Krysten Ritter says she was all for reprising the role of Gia for the film. Rob Thomas asked her about a month before they launched the Kickstarter, just to make sure she was interested. "I was like, I would've done a cameo, I would've done anything because it's so exciting to be a part of history," she said. "The fans wanted it. Kristen wanted it. Her passion for the film is so infectious and beautiful. So yeah, it was about a month before the Kickstarter and we didn't know if it was going to happen or not or if it was going to get made or green lit. And here we are."

So we know some of the cast and Rob Thomas were up for doing the movie and trying to rally the fans' support, but how confident were they that, so many years after the series went off the air, fans would be excited enough for a movie to pay for it out of their own pockets?

According to Kristen Bell, she may have been the sole optimist among the bunch. "I felt very confident that we would make our goal in 30 days, but I’m an optimist," she said. "I think I was the only one that was confident. Rob was terrified. I think everybody else was being polite, saying 'sure that sounds great.'"

Ryan Hansen thought the effort could go either way. "We honestly had no idea. We knew we had a nice solid following, but had no idea what that meant," he said. "Does that mean they're going to give like a hundred dollars total? I don't know. It's just crazy."

Backers put in a lot more than a hundred dollars. "I was slack-jawed when I saw how quickly the fans made it happen," Bell said of the Kickstarter's success. "And I felt like my head was going to explode on day 30 when we’d made 5.7 million dollars." Bell calls the series' fans exceptional, noting that they entrusted them with their money. That includes the backers who shelled out for a set visit incentive. "Some of them paid far, far more than they should have for a regular movie ticket, and some of them got great experiences," Bell said. "We took those experiences very seriously. When they came to set, we wanted to make it a big party. We wanted it to be just everything they’d hoped it would be, and it was a bit nerve-wracking, because they funded our film. They’re our bosses essentially. It ended up being so much fun, because there was such a love on set for this project. It’s a really nice energy to be around."

Did the cliffhangers at the end of Season 3 affect fans' eagerness to see this movie get made?

From what Rob Thomas says, it sounds like he sees a direct connection there.

"When we got cancelled at the end of Season 3, the network came to me and said, you might want to think about tying this all up and give it some sense of conclusion and completion, give her a nice ending moment, and I made the decision that if they were going to cancel us, I wanted to make it hard," he said. "I didn’t want it to be easy and so it has been unsettling for the last seven years that we left her in that bad place, but I think if I wrapped it up in a neat bow, we would not be here today." He went on to outright say that he thinks his decision to leave us hanging with Season 3 led to the eventual success of the Kickstarter campaign. "I think fans would have hated to see the show end, which I’m grateful for, but if I put Veronica in a nice spot at the end and tied up all the loose ends of Veronica Mars, I don’t think there’d be a movie today."

If There's A Sequel, It Probably Won't Be Kickstarted.

Will fans want a sequel after seeing this movie? Kristen Bell may have put it best when she told us, "I think that’s the great thing about Rob’s writing is he dangles a carrot often. He’s a temptress and I like that he writes that way because I always want more."

Without revealing anything specific about the ending of the movie, we will say that the film will leave fans wanting more. But will we get more? Rob Thomas says he's game and he thinks Kristen is game. We confirmed as much when we spoke to her, asking if there was any talk of bringing Veronica back for something else. Her answer was a prompt and enthusiastic, "Yeah, and I'm the one talking about it. I would come back in a heartbeat."

But don't expect it to happen through Kickstarter, at least, not if Bell has anything to say about it. From what she says, fans have done their part. "They put their cash on the table, They put their money where their mouth was and they proved they were an audience that would support this film," she said. "That’s all we needed. So, for me I want to see this made like any other movie, where you don’t have to presell it to your fans, and I would do another incarnation of Veronica in a heartbeat."

Of course, the future for Veronica Mars may very well hinge on how well the film does, but Jason Dohring says they already consider the film a success. "If it makes like ten dollars, I consider it a success because we raised it through the fans, so we don't have to make any money particularly, and if it's good for the fans, then that completes the cycle for me" Chris Lowell added to that, saying, "I think the biggest priority, the fans paid for this film and we're absolutely giving the fans what they want. So that's the success. If it's even a modicum of how successful it could be, I think there's definitely potentially a future for more iterations of the show in some capacity, whether it's in cinemas on TV, or online."

Would the follow-up be another TV show or a movie?

Dohring says they've heard things being thrown around. "I think when it was mentioned to me, Rob sort of talks about films," he said. "Which I think is good because it's maybe easier to get the cast together."

Cast availability is certainly key, and it's something that works really well for this new movie. Expect a lot of familiar faces (and some great newcomers!) As Lowell put it, the movie coming together the way it did was "serendipitous." Well, let's all hope for a bit more serendipity so a sequel can happen!

The Digital Spinoff Series Is Coming Soon(ish)

While we cross our fingers that this film isn't the last we've seen of Veronica Mars, there is the planned spinoff digital series that's in development. That was announced back in January, at which time, Rob Thomas said that the project, which would air on CW's online outlet CW Seed, would center on Ryan Hansen "attempting to put together a Dick Casablancas spinoff of Veronica Mars" and he added that there was no date yet. That still appears to be the case on both fronts.

"This was kind of supposed to be like a little promo for the movie," Hansen told us. "Like, we were going to shoot a little thing. And then it kind of became a bigger thing when CW announced it. And so, Rob was like, 'I'm really focused on my pilot,' and no one really had time to do it before the movie. So we're still going to do it, probably after Rob does his pilot."

Rob Thomas is currently working on an adaptation of the DC comic iZombie for the CW, and it sounds like we'll have to wait until that's wrapped up before he gets to the digital series. But Hansen describes the planned digital series as a spinoff of a spinoff and more in the vein of Party Down than Veronica Mars. "It's more fun," he said. "And all the characters will be in it, but as themselves."

We asked if he'd be channeling a bit of Dick in his portrayal of himself. His response, "Yeah, I'm going to have to. I don't know how else not to. There will be Dick in me."

Veronica Mars arrives in select theaters and Video On Demand on Friday, March 14. We'll have more to share with you from Rob Thomas and the cast about the film after it hits theaters, so be on the lookout for that next week!

Rob Thomas and Diane Ruggiero's iZombie pilot has added another actor to its cast, and it's one that should be familiar to One Tree Hill fans. Robert Buckley, who played Clayton Evans on the CW series, has signed on to play a character with close ties to (and strong feelings for) the lead character in the potential series.

Co-written by Veronica Mars' Rob Thomas and Diane Ruggiero, and based on a DC comic from Chris Roberson and Michael Allred, IZombie centers on Liv, a former med-student who's now a zombie and in need of a steady diet of brains. This leads her to take a job working at a coroner's office, which gives her access to all the brains she needs to stay sane. As a side effect of brain-eating is inheriting the corpses memories, she eventually uses the knowledge to help her boss solve murder cases.

TVLine says Buckley is on board to play Major, "a seemingly perfect former college football player-turned-environmental engineer." The site says he was once engaged to Liv, and he's trying to remain friends with her, despite still being in love with her.

I'm getting the impression that part of Liv's situation might involve keeping her loved ones separate from her zombie condition. Last month, we learned that Alexandra Krosney was set to play Liv's best friend and roommate, who's said to be baffled by her friend's recent behavior and feels like they're drifting apart. Now we're learning that Liv also has a "former" fiancé, which has me wondering if maybe she severed ties with him after she joined the ranks of the undead. From the description of the series, her brainy diet helps her maintain her humanity, so this zombie condition may be something she can manage, but perhaps it's causing her to put some distance between herself and the people she cares about just to be safe. Or maybe the distance is a side effect of her condition. Just a bit of speculation, but some personal conflict would add a nice layer of drama to the story, which also involves crime-solving. Fans of the comic likely have some insight there, so feel free to sound off in the comments if you do!

I'm also curious about the "seemingly" in Major's character description. Is it just there as a "well, nobody's really perfect" reminder? Or is there something more to him that'll be revealed?

In addition to One Tree Hill, Buckley's credits include 666 Park Avenue, an episode of Hart of Dixie, and the role of Kirby Atwood.

Buckley joins Malcolm Goodwin, Alexandra Krosney and David Anders in the pilot, which is in contention at the CW. And he's one more piece to the puzzle, which is still missing its biggest piece. Who will play Liv? We've yet to hear word about that, but hopefully it's coming soon.

In the meantime, here's a really quick rundown of the first issue of the comic, courtesy of YouTuber Shea Koshan...

We all like seeing celebrities. All of us. Last night I was picking up takeout food in Los Feliz when I saw Rider Strong, as in the Rider Strong from Boy Meets World, and it made my night like four percent better. I don’t know why. There’s no scientific reason why seeing Sean Hunter should improve my spirits, but it sure as hell did. Aaron Paul gets my drift. He was at a Kings of Leon concert last night when he just so happened to spot Bill Murray hanging out directly behind him. And that has to be commented on. You can’t just see one of the greatest comedians in the history of Hollywood and not tell people, even if you’re a brilliant actor in your own right. That would be blasphemy. Bill-phemy? Sure, it would be Bill-phemy.

Here’s the truly weird part though. Paul and Murray actually weren’t the only people inside the VIP section. Matchbox 20 lead singer and solo artist Rob Thomas was also hanging out because everyone loves the guys from Kings Of Leon, apparently, except maybe the guys from Kings of Leon. Not surprisingly, Thomas was pretty stoked about seeing the Breaking Bad star and the comedy legend too. So, he did what any reasonable person would do and got both of them into a picture…

Apparently, the men had a pretty good time all hanging out together because Thomas felt the need to issue a follow-up tweet to let his fans know just how cool Paul was during their surprise evening. But then again, who wouldn’t rave about getting to hang out with Jesse Pinkman?

Long story short, if you’re interested in hanging out with celebrities, you really need to start listening to Kings of Leon. Then, in part two of this plan, you need to weasel your way into the VIP section. It’ll probably take a whole lot of work, but to BS with Murray, Paul and Thomas, the hassle will definitely be worth it.

Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas just inched a bit closer to returning to The CW. His adaptation of DC Comics' iZombie is one of a few projects that received a pilot order from the CW. Jane the Virgin and Identity also received pilot orders at the CW.

We'll start with the zombie pilot, which already sounds like a good fit for the CW, not only for its supernatural nature but its ties to DC Comics. Factoring in Smallville, Arrow and the potential Flash and Hourman series, we know CW's no stranger to DC. iZombie is a comic that centers on a zombie womb who works at the coroner's office, which offers her plenty of brains to eat. Eating brains allows her to access the memories of the deceased, which allows her to help out her medical examiner boss and a police detective solve crimes. We learned last fall that Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas was developing the comic, and the latest update indicated that the drama was close to a pilot order. This week, EW confirmed the news, adding that Veronica Mars' Diane Ruggiero is also on board as co-showrunner, should this pilot go to series.

In other CW pilot news, EW says CW is moving forward with Jane the Virgin and Identity, giving both pilot orders. The former involves a religious and presumably virginal young woman who's "accidentally artificially inseminated," which is probably as immaculate a conception as we might see in the modern day world. The story is adapted from a Venezuelan telenovela called Juana la Virgen. EW says the original series' lead character was a 17-year-old who is impregnated due to a hospital error. The baby's biological father learns the news and falls in love with her… despite being married. Drama! Of course, we don't know how closely the CW drama would follow its source material, but it sounds like the basic set-up of accidental insemination is there. Jennie Snyder Urman is penning this one.

And then there's Identity, which is being written by Corinne Brikerhoff and executive produced by Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, among others. The story has a complicated plot involving a woman needing an organ transplant and a powerful family that might have ties to some kind of domestic terrorist plot. At some point, the woman who needs the organ is faced with possibly testifying against the family that saved her life. Like I said, it sounds complicated, and a little bit outside of CW's current wheelhouse, but it could work.

With pilot orders for all three projects a go, we should hopefully be hearing casting news in the coming weeks. It'll be particularly interesting to see who's brought on board to play the zombie in iZombie and the pregnant virgin in Jane the Virgin.

A long time ago, we used to be friends. And then the CW cancelled Veronica Mars. Some of us ranted. Most of us moved on. But we were all drawn back to Neptune the moment Rob Thomas gave us hope that we would have our favorite Marshmallow back in movie form if we helped Kickstart it. In a matter of months, Veronica Mars will arrive in theaters, and from what’s being reported, it doesn’t end there. The series will live on through a digital spinoff. What kind of spinoff, you ask? Which character or characters will be involved? Details are vague at the moment.

This news comes out of the CW TCA press tour, as reported by Deadline. The CW announced that they’re giving Veronica Mars a spinoff series, which is “for now online only.” And by “for now,” I like to think that maybe — just maybe — there’s a chance if things worked out really well for it, it would be developed into a full series. But that’s just speculation and probably premature at this point, considering we know almost nothing about the digital series, other than that it’s slated for CW’s online branch CW Seed and that Veronica Mars series creator and movie director Rob Thomas will develop it once he finishes up with the feature film, which is due to arrive in theaters March 14.

In terms of what the spinoff will be or which character(s) it will follow, that may be something Rob Thomas will keep quiet about until after the film releases, assuming the spinoff is too closely linked to the events of the film for Thomas to discuss without spoiling anything. If that’s not the case, perhaps we’ll get some updates between now and the movie release.

UPDATE: Rob Thomas tweeted this tonight, revealing that the digital series is a comedy centered around Ryan Hansen, who plays Dick Casablancas in Veronica Mars:

So... if it became an actual TV series, would it be the Dick series Hansen's trying to get made, or a continuation of the webseries? Not sure what to make of this just yet.

As Deadline points out, Rob Thomas has another project in the works for CW. We learned last fall that Thomas was developing DC’s iZombie for the network. Based on a comic series, the story centers on a med student-turned-zombie who takes a job at a coroner’s office, which offers her all the brains she can eat. As brain consumption gives her access to the deceased’s memories, she uses that perk to help her medical examiner boss and a police detective solve crimes. That last part sounds right up Thomas’ alley, and the supernatural side seems like a great fit for the CW. So it’s not entirely surprising to hear that — according to Deadline’s intel — this project has a good shot at getting a pilot order. So there’s that to cross our fingers for as well.

In the meantime, here’s the trailer for the Veronica Mars movie…

Since the successful Kickstarter campaign for the Veronica Mars movie wrapped up, we’ve known that the film would arrive sometime in 2014, but up until today, we didn’t know the exact date. Ahoy Pirates and Marshmallows alike, set your calendars for March 14, 2014, as that’s when Veronica Mars will be arriving in theaters. That's almost a year to the day from when the Kickstarter campaign launched last March.

EW got the exclusive on the release date news, along with confirmation that the film’s title will be Veronica Mars, matching the title of the TV series on which this story is based. At present, the film will share a release date with racing thriller Need for Speed, Grace Kelly biopic Grace of Monaco and Tyler Perry’s Single Mom’s Club. On the subject of the young adult genre audience, it’s also worth noting that Veronica Mars arrives a week ahead of the feature adaptation of Divergent.

As for the title, I have my issues with it as it relates to the TV series, mainly because — before actually watching the show — I assumed Veronica Mars was some kind of sci-fi teen drama. That was a (partially) incorrect assumption on my part. I’m thinking I’d make the same assumption about the movie if I didn’t know it was based on a TV series about a teen detective. With that said, it’s hard to argue with the logic to stick with the familiar here, as it’s likely that most of the audience for this film will be fans of the series.

From what we know about the film, Veronica Mars will follow up on Kristen Bell’s beloved character as she returns to Neptune years after leaving the Southern California town and her life as a super-sleuth behind to become a hotshot lawyer. It’s her ten year reunion and — wouldn’t you know it? — someone needs her help. And by someone, we mean Logan (Jason Dohring), Veronica’s ex, who always did have a tendency to get himself into trouble. In this case, he’s suspected of murdering his pop star girlfriend. The featurette released back in October suggests Veronica and Logan’s old classmate Sean Friedrich may also be involved in this mystery somehow.

In addition to sharing the date and confirming the title EW also has a clip you can check out, which shows Veronica, Mac (Tina Majorino) and Wallace (Percy Daggs III) begrudgingly eying the Neptune High reunion before Veronica checks in and has a face-to-face with former Neptune High Queen Bee Madison Sinclair (Amanda Noret). From what we see, she’s still a total B.

While fans will get to Veroncia Mars on the big screen come March 13, some backers (depending on the incentives listed in their pledge) should expect to receive a digital version of the movie within "a few days" if it’s theatrical debut. I’ll be interested to see how that affects the film’s box office.

Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas knows a thing or two about smart, witty detectives, but what does he know about zombies? We may find out, as Thomas is reportedly reuniting with VM executive producer Diane Ruggiero for an adaptation of DC’s iZombie. And we can add this to the list of DC properties CW is looking to develop (see also Hourman, Flash, and of course, the currently airing Arrow).

The comic was created by Chris Roberson and Michael Allred, and the potential series would be based on the characters from the story and set up as a supernatural crime procedural that centers on a med student-turned-zombie who gets a job at a coroner’s office, where — as you can imagine — brains are more readily accessible than one might find elsewhere. Given that’s what zombies tend to eat, it’s not hard to understand why this would be such a convenient occupational setting for a zombie. Here’s where the crime procedural factors in, as each brain that the zombie eats allows her to inherit their memories. With the help of her medical examiner boss and a police detective, she’s able to solve homicide cases, which helps to quiet the disturbing voices in her head.

The zombie/supernatural element seems like kind of a leap from Veronica Mars, but factoring in the continuing trend of all things supernatural among young adults, it seems like the right direction for Thomas if he’s looking to get back into the TV business and into the mind of a persnickety female sleuth.

The me from five years ago is simultaneously waving her fist at the CW and urging Rob Thomas to run to another network. But five-years-ago me was still grieving the loss of Veronica Mars and feeling especially bitter over the show’s cancellation. It’s five years later and we’re getting the Veronica Mars movie we’ve all been waiting for, so it’s time to let old grudges go. And the CW’s actually in a better place in terms of its original programming than it was back then, building on their original slate of fan favorites like The Vampire Diaries and Supernatural with comic-themed shows like Arrow and possibly a Flash spinoff. Given the current interest in zombies — The Walking Dead’s success is a prime example — and comic adaptations, the timing probably be couldn’t be better right now.

So we’ll have to see where things go with this project and whether or not it makes it to series. If things work out, it could be a huge starring vehicle for some undiscovered talent. Just look at where things went for Kristen Bell after Veronica Mars.

In addition to the news that USA had greenlit two new comedy series and put one pilot into development, the cable channel announced that they're developing a number of new dramas, which could eventually join the likes of White Collar, Royal Pains, Burn Notice, Covert Affairs, Necessary Roughness and newcomer Graceland at the network.

USA officially announced that they're starting production on Horizon, a period drama from The Walking Dead's Gale Anne Hurd. The project is set at the height of World War II, when women had entered the workforce. A secretary at the FBI starts a secretive investigation into files that have been stamped with the codename "horizon." She discovers that the secret project has something to do with the death of her husband and the disappearance of a young girl. What she doesn't know is that it has aroused the interest of undercover Nazi spies working in the U.S. Sounds like it could make for an interesting series, though the period element is a step away from what we've seen on USA among their dramas in recent years.

Here's what USA has on the drama slate, which includes a project from Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas, and one executive produced by John Legend.

That's quite a diverse collection of programming in the works at the network. From arranged marriages to medical dramas, law enforcement and legal stories and even a restaurant-set drama with an excellent title ("Hungry"? Love it), it looks like USA really is looking to branch out, not only by adding comedies to their line-up, but by developing dramas that appeal to different audiences and explore different topics and even time periods.

In case you haven't already noticed, people seem to be pretty damn excited by the idea of a Veronica Mars movie. When the project was first brought to Kickstarter last month it immediately shattered records, collecting over $1 million - half of its goal - in just five hours. Since then we've seen plenty of exciting things about the project pop up, from a plot description to plans for San Diego Comic Con, but today we have more good news about the hotly-anticipated feature.

Show creator Rob Thomas has revealed on his Twitter feed that Veronica Mars now has more backers than any other project in Kickstarter history. While the previous record was previously held by the video game Double Fine Adventure with 87,142, at the time I am writing this post the movie has reached 88, 190 backers who have donated a total of $5,547,190.

Said Thomas after the record was broken, "We did it! We did it! This is amazing! You all are amazing! My phone is vibrating non-stop. This is so much fun!" The showrunner then joked to fans that he may stop the Kickstarter when it reaches 90909 backers (a reference to the fictional zip code that the rich kid characters of the show reside in) and sent out a message to the former record holder.

This is actually the last day that fans can donate to the Veronica Mars Kickstarter campaign, as it will all come to a close at 11:00pm EDT tonight. So if you want to give money to the project and become eligible for some pretty cool rewards, donate now!

When a film is in its earliest stages of development, especially when it's just a script. filmmakers will try their hardest to keep the details to themselves. But now that we're all investors in the Veronica Mars movie, we may be getting regular updates-- call them quarterly reports, but for a movie instead of a corporation.

The newest batch of details went straight to the Kickstarter backers, and shared with the rest of us at Entertainment Weekly. With a week left to go in the original Kickstarter campaign, there's already $4.6 million in the pot, smashing the record for the most money raised through the site. But Thomas has set his sights even higher, aiming to set the record for the most backers for any Kickstarter campaign. They're 23,000 away from passing the 87,142 who funded The Double Fine Adventure video game, and Thomas has set up a $1 campaign minimum to encourage as many people as possible to donate. So if you haven't gotten on board yet, make another one of Rob Thomas's dreams come true! Pitch in that single dollar!

In his update for the backers he explained why the $4.5 million-- more than twice the original $2 million goal-- is still not exactly a ton for a movie, and how every little extra will help them make something that's closer to the dream Veronica Mars movie fans have been anticipating. Here's how he laid it out:

The myriad details that go into making a film mean that every little bit really does count, form allowing for more extras or more expensive locations to being able to write entire extra scenes made possible by a few extra thousand dollars. Thomas has put himself in a position where he has to be accountable to a lot of people for how he spends his money, and at his point it's pretty easy-- the film exists only as a script that he's in complete control over. But as Veronica Mars gets closer to becoming a reality, a whole lot more people-- and a whole lot more decisions-- are going to get involved. If the Kickstarter backers don't like his choice of an actor or a shooting locations, is Thomas going to have to come out and apologize for it?

It's going to be a fascinating process to watch, and so far the general goodwill around the project seems to suggest smooth sailing. If more updates like this keep coming, we'll have lots of insight into how it happens-- the good and the bad.

Rob Thomas is already making good on his promise to keep the momentum going as the Veronica Mars movie Kickstarter campaign continues well past its $2 million goal. The above video gives us a behind-the-scenes look at what March 13 was like for the series creator and some of the cast of the show as Thomas nervously launched the Kickstarter page and then celebrated the first pledge, and many more to follow. While fans are providing the budget for the film, which continues to inch toward the $4 million mark, Warner Bros. will market, promote and distribute the film, which will hopefully arrive next year.

The campaign to get a post-series Veronica Mars movie made has already proven to be a game-changer in the way it swiftly rallied fans and piled up cash to ensure a greenlight for a film that might otherwise not have had a chance. Watching the video above is one more reason to love this whole project and celebrate its success. Getting to see the reactions of Rob Thomas, Kristen Bell (looking adorably rumpled having just woken up), Enrico Colantoni and Ryan Hansen as the number ticked higher is a real treat for fans who were among those contributing money for this anticipated project, and maybe not the first one, either. Thomas has already said they're documenting the making of the movie, so we should hope to see more behind-the-scenes snippets chronicling Veronica Mars' return to the spotlight ahead of the film's expected release next year.

We've already heard some exciting spoilers about what's planned for the plot of the movie, but from his recent Tweet, it sounds like Thomas is still open to ideas and predictions:

Here's another update from Thomas, which he posted on March 21:

It would be the ultimate dream for a lot of people to be able to log into a website and see a rising total of money being donated to you from thousands upon thousands of people. And for the rest of us, we’re glad that distinction belongs to Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas, whose record breaking campaign is currently topping out at over $3.6 million in donations put up in just six days. With 24 days left, we may end up getting a sequel out of this. Or maybe he’ll just try for a Cupid TV series for a third time.

But in the meantime, Thomas spoke with The Hollywood Reporter about how he plans on using the well-deserved funds both before and during the film’s June-July production shoot. Promises were made for an open shoot with tweets and photos coming out on a regular basis, and everyone here at Cinema Blend unwittingly clicked our heels together.

"We were built by fans so we’ll try to do our best to keep the momentum going through that," Thomas says. "We’re hoping to go to Comic-Con, maybe have some footage to show at Comic-Con. We have a documentary following the making of the movie." Hopefully with lots of Kristen Bell and Percy Daggs III blowing people minds by still being adorable together over 30.

But fear not, the excess funds aren’t only going towards rampant promotional materials. The film’s murdery-mystery plot is also being reworked as the electronic dollar bills come rolling in.

"The movie is outlined but frankly, I needed to know how we were doing to figure out how to model the script and how to write it. There are very specific things that are going to be affected by what our budget is," Thomas explains. "There’s an altercation [at a high school reunion in the film] and how much money we raise affects whether that is having terse words exchanged or a full on brawl.” He also wants a sunny Southern California shoot, where Neptune was originally set. And if he wants a time machine in order to bring the cast back in time to film in the exact time and places they originally filmed, so be it.

Thomas, amidst his defense of using Kickstarter to fund a non-miniscule budget feature, also shared a few hopeful words about the future of episodic television. "There are more and more markets and more networks, more places you can put shows on, the mandate becomes more and more 'Give us something that two million people love rather than attempt something that 20 million people like,'" he says. "The big networks are struggling to stay in that old model of a little something for everyone."

And then you think, “Say, didn’t you have that other really hilarious Rob Thomas show that wasn’t on any of the big networks? Starz, I think it played on.” And then you look at Dick Casablancas and remember that he was also in it, and that it had its own share of rumors. Catering companies of the world, unite!

With the Veronica Mars film surpassing its $2 million Kickstarter goal and currently approaching $3.5 million from fans of the short-lived series, the movie is a go. The fans are still coming through with their financial contributions, which will go toward production costs. Warner Bros. Digital Distribution will be taking care of the marketing, promotion and distribution of the planned film, which will hopefully arrive early next year. That leaves us to speculate over what series creator Rob Thomas has planned for Veronica Mars and the other characters. Some additional details about what's planned for the plot of the film have been revealed, and - semi-spoiler alert - it involves murder!

"Murder" isn't a huge spoiler, as it was a recurring theme on Veronica Mars, with the UPN series' first season focusing on the murder of Kristen Bell's character's best friend Lilly Kane (Amanda Seyfried). And from what Entertainment Weekly published in their latest issue, which discusses the Kickstarter campaign for the movie, murder is the planned focus for the film.

(More specific plot spoilers ahead)

EW says the plot will be set a decade after the show's third season and will have Veronica returning to Neptune, California after Logan (Jason Dohring) seeks her help in investigating the murder of his pop-star girlfriend. He's apparently the prime suspect, which doesn't sound all that unfamiliar when we look back at Season 1 of the series.

We also know from what Thomas has said on the Kickstarter page that there may be a 10 year high school reunion at Neptune High, which would certainly provide an excuse to bring some of Veronica's old friends back into the picture. Go pirates!

EW's article mentions that Veronica got her bachelor's at Stanford and went on to Columbia Law School, which I guess means she left Hearst. Also, it sounds like she decided to stick with the legal system, professionally, though in a different field, assuming she's using her law degree. If that's the case, that legal expertise may prove to be especially useful to Logan, considering his predicament. Of course, there's the possibility that this plot could change once it comes time to start shooting, which will hopefully begin in June, but from what's been reported, it sounds like an interesting place to bring the characters back together.

Also mentioned in the article is Rob Thomas and Kristen Bell's hope to bring some footage of the film to Comic Con this year. If they do manage to get the film started in June, they might have something finished to show Veronica Mars fans at SDCC in July. It would be pretty fantastic if they can make that happen.

EW's full article about the Veronica Mars movie Kickstarter campaign can be read in EW's "News and Notes" column on page 13 of the March 22, 2013 issue (with the Game of Thrones cover).

The long-running radio show This American Life has already received the TV treatment once, with a Showtime series that debuted back in 2007. Now it looks like a new adaptation of the radio show is in the works, this time for HBO. This one will focus on on particular story told on the series back in 2010, and Veronica Mars’ Rob Thomas is among those attached to bring it to the small screen.

Variety reports that Rob Thomas, Ira Glass and Owen Wilson are set to develop a drama inspired by a segment of This American Life titled “Midlife Cowboy.” The story follows James Spring, a former meth struggler who's working in advertising. While in his late thirties, he finds himself compelled to head down to Mexico to search for two girls who were kidnapped. Per Variety, Thomas is going pen the script for the project, which is tentatively titled Thrillsville. Thomas, Glass and Wilson will executive produce the drama.

Thomas’ previous TV work includes creating Veronica Mars and Starz’ Party Down, and developing the CW reboot of 90210. The investigation angle of this story seems to line up somewhat with Thomas' writing on Veronica Mars, which focused on a teen detective, who was also the daughter of a private detective.

It’ll be interesting to see how things go as the project develops. I’d also be particularly interested in seeing who’s cast as the lead. For some reason, when I thought about the casting, Michael Raymond-James (Terriers, True Blood) came to mind, though he might be a bit on the young side for playing a man approaching forty.

For those interested in hearing the story on which this drama is being based, check it out below:

(Image via FusedFilm.com)

Welcome back to FlixWorthy, your weekly guide to Netflix streaming. Yet again we're bringing you a handful of new or notable selections from Netflix's streaming catalogue. Some will be classics, some will be little-seen gems, some will be shows you might have missed, and some...some will be crap so awful they simply has to be seen to be believed. Here's what's FlixWorthy this week, kids.

Party Down: Season 1

(2009, Not Rated, 10 episodes)

From Veronica Mars mastermind Rob Thomas, the Starz series Party Down is a half-hour comedy about a Los Angeles catering company. The show plays on the notion that everyone you meet in L.A., regardless of profession, is actually trying to break into showbiz. The Party Down catering crew is a motley assortment of one-hit wonders (Adam Scott), part-time actors (Ryan Hansen), disgruntled writers (Martin Starr), and aspiring stand-up comics (Lizzy Caplan). For all of them, this whole catering thing is just “something to pay the bills” until they hit the big-time, and Party Down gets a lot of mileage out of the notion of wannabe artists realizing that every paycheck puts that much more distance between them and their dreams. Each episode is set against the backdrop of a different event, from bar mitzvahs to high-dollar celebrity soirees, and the season finds an arc of sorts in the budding non-romance between Henry Pollard (Scott) and Casey Klein (Caplan). Rob Thomas fans will find plenty of the same snappy dialogue and sharp characters that made Veronica Mars so much fun, lashed to a liberal dose of stinging Hollywood satire. It’s not to be missed.

Double-Feature It With...

Party Down: Season 2

(2010, TV-MA, 1 episode available so far)

The second season premiered on Starz last week, so now is the perfect time to race through the freshman year and catch up. Netflix uploads the new episodes in short order, so if you don’t have a Starz subscription, this is a great way to catch one of the funniest shows around. This year has seen the loss of series regular Jane Lynch, who’s busy getting her Glee on these days, but Will & Grace's Megan Mullally has stepped forward to fill the gap capably.

It Might Get Loud

(2008, Rated PG, 97 min.)

Our own Nick Venable gave It Might Get Loud four stars when he reviewed this film on DVD a while back, so I recommend checking out what he had to say right here. An Inconvenient Truth director David Guggenheim turns his attentions from glaciers to guitar gods, profiling Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page, U2's The Edge, and The White Stripes' Jack White. Musicians will probably dig the insights they'll get into each performer's style and techniques, while fans will just appreciate getting to see these three jam, although apparently they don't do as much actual playing as you might expect. As Nick puts it, "I consider this almost a must-see. It's not annual holiday viewing or anything, but if you play guitar, you're going to have one in your hands by the time the credits are rolling."

Double-Feature It With...

Buena Vista Social Club

(1999, Rated G, 105 min.)

Why not pair It Might Get Loud up with another acclaimed music documentary -- an Oscar-nominated one, no less? Director Wim Wenders' 1999's Buena Vista Social Club follows American guitarist Ry Cooder and a group of Cuban folk musicians who team up to record a Grammy-winning CD down in Havana.

Fargo

(1996, Rated R, 98 min.)

I realize this column has been rather Coen-heavy of late, but that’s only because so many of the Brothers’ films are available on demand. Given the choice between a movie where Steve Buscemi is fed through a wood chipper or, say, one of The Asylum’s thinly veiled knock-offs such as Paranormal Entity, this ain’t exactly Sophie’s Choice. Plus, despite my recommendations skewing Coen these past few weeks, it seems a damn shame not to spend a little time in Fargo. Frances McDormand stars as mild-mannered, heavily pregnant North Dakota police chief Marge Gunderson, who finds her way right into the middle of a criminal scheme involving several crooks (Buscemi and Peter Stormare), a nervous car salesman (William H. Macy), and a fake kidnapping scheme that becomes all too real. And did I mention Buscemi and the wood chipper?

Double-Feature It With:

Monsters, Inc.

(2001, Rated G, 93 min.)

An odd pairing at first, I know. But why not shake up the tone a bit and six-degree yourself over to Buscemi’s performance as slithery villain Randall Boggs, alongside fellow Coen alum John Goodman and Billy Crystal. With a 2012 Monsters sequel recently confirmed, that’s as good an excuse as any to take another look at Pixar’s exploration of the world of monsters on the other side every child’s closet door. It’s one of Pixar’s more brilliant concepts, and it’s available to stream right now.

Archer: Season 1

(2010, Not Rated, 10 episodes)

FX dips a toe into the animated world with this spy satire from Adult Swim alumni Adam Reed and Matt Thompson (Sealab 2021, Space Ghost Coast to Coast). The pair bring the same twisted sense of humor to the adventures of suave superspy Sterling Archer (voiced by H. Jon Benjamin) and his fellow agents of the International Secret Intelligence Service (ISIS). Episodes revolve around field missions as well as bickering back in the home office, with Archer and his compatriots often more concerned with petty personal squabbles than with rooting out moles or assassinating enemies of the state. Aisha Tyler voices Archer's ex, fellow spy Lana Kane, who's now involved with compulsively insecure desk jockey Cyril Figgis (Chris Parnell). Archer's mother (Arrested Development's Jessica Walter) is in charge of the outfit, and divides her time between cleaning up Archer's messes and engaging in phone sex with her counterpart in Russian intelligence. It's twisted, hilarious, and often deeply, deeply wrong.

Double-Feature It With:

Casino Royale

(1967, Not Rated, 137 min.)

No, not the gritty Daniel Craig reboot. I mean the inexplicable 1967 satirical version starring David Niven as Bond, James Bond. This is a movie with a cast including Ursula Andress, Woody Allen, Peter Sellers, and Orson Freakin' Welles as the villainous Le Chiffre, all wrapped up in a Burt Bacharach score. Watch this and try to imagine a world where Dr. No never happened and this movie became the template for the four decades of Bond films that followed...

Lord, Save Us From Your Followers

(2008, Rated PG-13, 101 min.)

Regardless where you fall on the spectrum between fundamentalism and secularism, there's no question that this conflict is integral to the world we're living in right now. Not a day goes by in our 24/7 news cycle where we aren't barraged with stories detailing the so-called "culture war" in America, to say nothing of more violent variations unfolding around the globe. Thankfully, filmmaker Dan Merchant's documentary isn't looking to be as heavy or as vitriolic as, say, Bill Maher's Religulous. Instead, this documentary speaks to folks on all sides of faith (or lack thereof) with the simple mission to try and determine why we can't be civil to each other, regardless of our beliefs. Faith being what it is, don't expect this one to change your mind on any of the big issues, but it might just make you give more thought to whichever side you consider "the opposition."

Double-Feature It With:

Hell House

(2001, Not Rated, 85 min.)

I considered suggesting the Oscar-nominated Jesus Camp, but that film is enormously tough to watch, and might make for a real downer after LSUFYF. Instead we'll keep things ever so slightly more light-hearted with this look at the so-called "Hell House" phenomenon -- Halloween events run by evangelical churches with the goal of scaring the Hell out of you via dramatic presentations of wayward sinners paying the price for premarital sex, being gay, wearing skirts above the knee, etc.

To read the FlixWorthy archives, click here!

We already knew Jane Lynch was too busy with Glee to return for the second season of Rob Thomas’ hilarious Starz catering comedy Party Down, but until now we hadn’t confirmed who was going to be taking her place. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Emmy-winning actress Megan Mullaly will be joining PD as a middle-aged mother who moves to Hollywood so her 13-year-old daughter Escapade – yes, Escapade – can become an actress. Given that Party Down is all about working a crap job while your aspirations dwindle further and further away, I hope they didn’t pay too much for Escapade’s head shots.

Mullaly will be joining a rock-solid cast that already includes Adam Scott, Ken Marino, Ryan Hansen (Dick Casablancas from Veronica Mars), Lizzy Caplan (Jason Stackhouse’s often-nude hippie girlfriend from the first season of True Blood), and Martin “Freakin’” Starr. The show should be returning sometime around April of 2010. Incidentally, if you’re set up for Netflix streaming, I know the show is available via that service, and it’s well worth checking out if you missed the first season.

The upcoming 90210 spinoff just became a little less awesome. Rob Thomas, creator of the dearly (oh so dearly) departed Veronica Mars, has announced that he is stepping down as show runner of the new series. Thomas, who in addition to the 90210 pilot on The CW, has two other pilots in development at ABC, is citing a time crunch as the reason for his departure, saying, “I'd do the additional pass [of the pilot script], but I'm swamped with the two other projects and ABC has me in first position.”

Although Thomas is leaving his show runner position, sources say he will continue to be involved in the project as a consultant. Production, however, has been pushed back until summer while the network looks for a replacement.

Thomas’ two pilots for ABC are a remake of his short-lived 1998 series Cupid and an as-yet-untitled dramedy about a family of thieves. Veronica Mars star Kristen Bell has mentioned that there have been talks of her appearing on the latter show, but Thomas further breaks our hearts by basically telling us that’s not going to happen: “Kristen wants to pursue movie interests, though we'd love to work with each other again.”

Talk about a double disappointment. I wasn’t really a fan of the original 90210 back in the day, but a Rob Thomas-produced version definitely had my interest peaked. I’ll probably still give it a chance, but my hopes for it aren’t nearly as high at this point. It’s also a shame about Kristen Bell not appearing on the ABC show. She’s apparently only signed on for a few more episodes of Heroes, and while I’m excited to see her on the big screen (I can’t wait to see Forgetting Sarah Marshall), I kind of feel like she belongs on television. Preferably on an ongoing, weekly basis.

With the success of The CW's Gossip Girl, it's no real surprise that the network is working on another primetime teen soap opera. New details about the Beverly Hills, 90210 spin-off (or rip-off - however you want to look at it) have emerged.

E! Online's Kristin Dos Santos got the latest scoop on the developing project. Her sources at the CW said that Rob Thomas (the mastermind behind Veronica Mars) has already delivered the outline for the show and the pilot script should be in by Monday, the latest. Dos Santos reports that Mark Piznarski, who directed the pilot episode of Veronica Mars, is set to direct the pilot episode of this new series. It's been nearly a year since Veronica Mars was cancelled and I'm still bitter over it. As much as Thomas and Piznarski's involvement in this series intrigues me, I'm still dubious of this networks' ability to properly market a series and refuse to get my hopes up about this show. Even if it does turn out to be as great as Mars was, it will fall on the network to target the right audience and give the series a chance to grow. If anything, calling it a spin-off of 90210 and maybe bringing in one or two of the old cast members from the original series might entice people who were once hooked on the Aaron Spelling series to tune in.

E! Online also has some info on the characters. The parents in the show are Harry and Celia Mills. Harrys a teacher and Celia's a personal trainer. The kids are Annie, an aspiring actress and Dixon, an adopted kid who's been with the Mills family four six years. Annie becomes best friends with Daphne Silver, a video-blogging girl who has a crush on Dixon. Then there's Navid, a persion kid who runs the high school TV station. And finally there's Ethan Ward, a popular guy whose reputation gets ruined by his bitchy girlfriend, Naomi.