“You Can Save Me”
Dreams, Fantasies, and Costume Design on Veronica Mars
Originally published on Letterdrop 11/11/2021
Let’s be honest: most of us probably don’t have the kind of dreams that TV characters have, the kind of dreams that are coherent and symbolic, not a kitchen-sink soup of everything we’ve experienced that day. (Ask me about the time I started dreaming in Gossip Girl!) On a show like Veronica Mars, dreams are storytelling realms, these squishy liminal spaces where Veronica and her ex-boyfriend, Duncan Kane, work out their subconscious thoughts and their most basic understandings of their fellow characters.
Occasionally, they also fantasize in their waking hours. In the first season, Veronica and Duncan see apparitions of Duncan’s sister, Lilly Kane, both when they’re awake and asleep: sometimes she speaks to them, sometimes she is only a flash of motion, but always, she is trying to tell them something.
Veronica in real life (1.3): a white floral blouse over a pink camisole and her usual leather choker and star pendant
Duncan in real life (1.3): a long-sleeve navy-blue shirt
The first dreams and fantasies come in episode 1.3: Veronica has just started dating Troy Vandegraff, but she’s still drawn to Duncan. She runs into him at school and, later that night, dreams about making out with him in the back seat of a car.
Dream Veronica and Duncan in the same clothes as above (1.3)
She’s wearing the same white floral blouse that she wore to school; Duncan in the same navy-blue striped shirt. Their outfits are meant to trick both the viewer and Veronica into thinking the vision is reality—the only clues that it’s a dream are Veronica’s missing camisole and necklaces. She hardly ever takes off her leather choker and star pendant in the first season, not even to shower.
Troy wears a brown ribbed sweater on his date with Veronica (1.3).
Duncan in the same sweater as Troy (1.3)
Duncan, too, is thinking of his ex. A few scenes later, he fantasizes about making out with Veronica in the back seat of a car—while he actually is making out with another girl, his blond date understandably peeved when he calls her “Veronica.” In this fantasy, Veronica is wearing a different pink camisole, this time with her necklaces on. Duncan is wearing the same ribbed sweater that Troy just wore on a date with Veronica. Again, the viewer is briefly deceived by the costumes into thinking the scene is real, that Veronica is kissing either Duncan or Troy.
Dream Lily appears to Duncan in her pep squad uniform (1.3).
Later in the episode, Duncan falls from a school bleacher and injures his head. As he recovers at home, Lilly comes to him in a dream, wearing the same outfit she was wearing when she was murdered: her pep squad T-shirt and green shorts. Fresh blood drips down her forehead as she tells Duncan to question the results of her murder investigation. (Their father’s former employee Abel Koontz confessed to the crime.) “It doesn’t add up,” says Lilly. “You know that deep down inside.”
Of course, this Lilly isn’t really Lilly; I doubt the real Lilly would want to wear her pep squad uniform for eternity. Dream Lilly is a manifestation of Duncan’s doubts about her murder and his family’s role in it, and so she must appear in the last outfit that Duncan saw her in. Her look is as much about her as it is about Duncan, her bloody forehead evoking Duncan’s own head injury.
Dream Lilly appears in Veronica's bedroom in a coral cardigan and tank and an initial necklace, 1.6.
Still, Dream Lilly doesn’t always wear her pep squad uniform. In episode 1.6, Veronica dreams that Lilly is in her bedroom, going through her closet. “You’re like a rocker chick now,” Lilly says, holding Veronica’s black T-shirt. Lilly herself is wearing a coral cardigan and tank, a silver L necklace—her outfit much like the ones we see her wear in flashbacks with Veronica. For this dream is not just about the murder—though Veronica does ask Lilly if Abel Koontz really killed her. No, it’s about a teenage girl who desperately misses her best friend, misses joking around with her and going through each other’s things. By the end of the dream, both girls are on the verge of tears.
Dream Veronica (above) and Lilly (below) both wear pink bikinis but in different styles. Lilly adds a crystal earring and necklace set to hers (1.22).
In the season one finale, Veronica solves Lilly’s murder, and for a brief moment, she can rest. As she sleeps, she dreams that she and Lilly are floating in the Kanes’ pool on two blue inflatables, water lilies (lilies!) strewn in the water; both are wearing pink bikinis. “This is how it’s going to be from now on,” says Veronica, and Lilly looks at her sadly.
“You know how things are going to be now, don’t you?” Lilly asks. “You have to know.”
“Just like this,” Veronica insists, though she knows she is wrong.
Veronica’s dream is a tender vision of what she’s long longed for, but what’s no longer possible: she and her best friend together, happy, at peace. They’re both wearing pink, the color that Veronica often wore when Lilly was alive; Veronica isn’t wearing her necklaces, and Lilly is free from her pep squad uniform, her bloody wound. The pool, which was the scene of Lilly’s murder, is now a place of serenity and beauty and renewal, literally blossoming around them.
Veronica’s investigation was not just about finding justice for Lilly—it was about keeping connected to her friend, keeping her alive. Once the case is solved, Lilly can no longer stay with Veronica, her spirit no longer restless. “Don’t forget about me, Veronica,” Lilly says, and suddenly, Veronica is floating in the pool alone.
“I could never,” she replies.
Soon Veronica must solve another crime: the bus crash that killed one teacher and five students. The lone survivor, Meg Manning, is in a coma and pregnant. She and Duncan dated in season one—and presumably, at some point during their relationship, Meg decided that she no longer wanted to wait until marriage to have sex.
Dream Meg all in white (2.8)
In his dreams, Duncan still sees Meg as a virginal angel—the Madonna to Veronica’s whore. In episode 2.8, Duncan pictures Meg in a white tank top and white jeans, her silver cross around her neck; she sits in a white armchair, white curtains behind her, the room awash in white light. Just as Dream Lilly was a manifestation of his doubts, Dream Meg is a vision of his guilt—how could he leave someone so good and pure and faithful? The mother of his child? “You promised me,” Dream Meg says. “You made promises. You can save me”—seemingly, from her own death, which comes later in the season.
Dream Veronica all in black (2.8)
Dream Veronica stomps onto the screen, dressed in a black fishnet top over a black bra, black jeans with a studded belt, and a black choker. She gags Dream Meg with a black mask, then tells Duncan to “grow up and get over [his relationship with Meg].” She’s Veronica taken to an extreme, both in costume and attitude: hard when Meg is soft, mean when Meg is sweet, and punk when Meg is pure. She is, perhaps, Duncan’s way of reckoning with his guilt—he didn’t want to give up on Meg; Veronica made him by being so sexy and stuff.
These dream outfits remind me of the costumes Meg and Veronica wore to the Valentine’s Day dance in season one: Meg as Andie from Pretty in Pink and Veronica as eighties-era Madonna. That was the dance where Duncan first declared his feelings for Meg—and perhaps where this dichotomy took root in his subconscious.
Dream Meg in her “Baby on Board” T-shirt (2.18)
Still, Duncan isn’t the only character who uses visual shorthand in his dreams. In episode 2.18, Veronica keeps dreaming about the bus crash, imagining that she is on the bus underwater, talking with the victims. At first, the students’ costumes are cheeky, simplistic T-shirts: Meg wears a “Baby on Board” T-shirt.
Dream Meg in her polo shirt, but note Betina Marone in her “I <3 Dick Casablancas” T-shirt and Peter Ferrer in a sequin rainbow T-shirt. Veronica has taken what little information she has about her classmates (Betina slept with Dick; Peter is gay) and extrapolated it into cheesy graphic tees (2.18).
But, as the episode goes on and Veronica fleshes out the caricatures in her mind, they appear in their real clothes. Meg, for example, is shown wearing the same purple-striped polo shirt that she wore the day of the crash.
Dream Veronica in a gray-and-white-striped shirt on the bus (2.18)
Veronica has difficulty separating this dream world from reality; on the bus, she’s almost always wearing the same clothes she was wearing when she went to sleep. At the end of the episode, for example, she falls asleep in a cream-and-gray-striped shirt, and suddenly, she’s wearing it on the bus.
Dream Veronica and her parents the morning of graduation (2.22)
The season again closes with Veronica imagining the life that could’ve been if Lilly hadn’t been murdered (2.22). In her dream, as in real life, Veronica is graduating from high school. But in this dream realm, the Mars family never faced the consequences of Lilly’s murder investigation: Veronica’s parents are still together, her father is still the county sheriff, and they live in a spacious house instead of an apartment. Dream Veronica’s wardrobe looks like the one she wore before Lilly died, like the swimsuits from the pool dream: girly and sweet and pink. The morning of her graduation, she changes from a pink T-shirt and pajama pants into a blue floral halter dress, rhinestone flower earrings, and a rhinestone bracelet.
Dream Wallace in a black T-shirt and glasses (2.22)
Before the ceremony, she receives the wrong cap and gown; the tag says “Wallace Fennell.” In this universe, Veronica and Wallace never became best friends, never even met until graduation. Dream Veronica still hangs with the popular 09ers; she’s the kind of person who thinks high school was “a blast.” Dream Wallace, in contrast, wears a pair of glasses and a black T-shirt—coded as more nerdy, more outcast, more Veronica, than his real-life counterpart.
Dream Veronica with Logan and Duncan (2.22)
Dream Lilly looks at her memorial (2.22).
The only people who look the same in this dream world are Duncan, Lilly, and Logan Echolls. Duncan and Logan are similar pieces but distinct color palettes: Duncan, a light blue button-down and striped tie; Logan, an olive button-down and striped tie. (As I pointed out in my flashbacks post, neither boy’s costume design changes after Lilly’s death because their social standing doesn’t change.) Lilly looks right out of a flashback in her blue cardigan and tan cargo miniskirt; her palette perfectly coordinated with her brother’s and her best friend’s. But even a dream can’t erase the reality of Lilly’s death—Lilly notices a memorial fountain in her name and asks Veronica why it’s there.
Veronica makes a call in her black graduation dress (2.22).
In real life, Veronica picks a simple black halter for graduation; the silhouette is reminiscent of the blue floral dress she wore in her dream, but the color is in line with her current style—mournful, even on a celebratory day, for what was lost and what might’ve been.
[Two weeks from today is Thanksgiving, so the next and last post on Veronica—disguises—will publish on Thursday, 12/2. There will also be a poll on volume three. If there’s a show you’d like me to include, leave it in the comments!]
