When I wrote the cold open for the "Veronica Mars" pilot script, I had two missions. First, make it scream noir. I wanted to get as many genre-defining elements into the opening as possible: a night scene, neon reflecting off wet pavement, a seedy location, a world-weary misanthropic Raymond Chandler–esque voiceover, disjointed time, a private detective at the center of the show.

My second mission was to define Veronica. I wanted people to realize that this 17-year-old had seen some real ****. We wouldn’t know she’d been raped or that her best friend had been murdered until later in the episode, but it was important to me that she sounded like someone you don’t mess with. I wanted to get as far away from Nancy Drew as possible.





The director of the pilot, Mark Piznarski, shot the hell out of this opening sequence. It was everything I wanted it to be, but well into the editing process of the pilot, the word came down from the network that “a high school show should open on the high school,” so instead of this opening, we ended up with a shot of Veronica driving up to a high school and getting out of her car.

I had about 10 seconds of footage to distill the concept of the show, so instead of the Raymond Chandler–esque voiceover I’d originally written, Veronica said something like, “This is where I go to school. Other kids work at the Gap and Taco Bell. Not me. I’m a private eye.”



Lopping off that opening hurt me badly. If there’s any comfort, I did get to use my original opening on the DVDs and digital downloads.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/jarettwieselman/the-write-stuff#.mfgXNnGBY