Veronica Mars is an American teen drama/mystery neo-noir series created by Rob Thomas. It premiered on UPN on September 22, 2004 and ended on May 22, 2007. It aired for 2 seasons on the now defunct UPN network, then moved for its final season to The CW Television Network when UPN merged with the WB. The show starred Kristen Bell as the title character: a student who progressed from high school to college during the series while moonlighting as a private investigator under the wing of her detective father. Said to be "a little bit Buffy and a little bit Bogart", the show balanced murder mystery, high school and college drama, and social commentary with sarcasm and off-beat humor.

The lead character was originally going to be in a novel written by show creator, Rob Thomas (II).

The theme song is "We Used to be Friends" by the The Dandy Warhols.

In the original project notes and the original pilot script for the show, there were some name changes. Lilly's name was Samantha, Lianne Mars's was Rebecca, then Abbie, Wallace's last name was Collier, Logan's last name was Hewitt and the last name of the Kane's was Cain, then Caine.

The character of Meg was created specifically for Alona Tal. She auditioned for Veronica, and was Rob Thomas (II)'s second choice for the role. He liked her so much he made a recurring role for her.

Amanda Seyfried initially auditioned for the role of Veronica Mars.

UPN, the network that airs Veronica Mars, were concerned during early episodes that viewers would confuse Teddy Dunn (II) and Jason Dohring, who play Duncan and Logan, respectively. A color code was created where Dunn wore blues, and Dohring wore earth tones (greens, browns, etc). The color code still stands today.

The only two actresses considered for the role of Kendall Casablancas were Heather Graham (I) and Charisma Carpenter. Graham was working on "Emily's Reasons Why Not" (2006), and Carpenter was an actual fan of "Veronica Mars", so she ended up being cast in the role.

Jason Dohring initially auditioned for the role of Duncan while Teddy Dunn initially auditioned for the role of Logan.

The car that Veronica drives for seasons one and two is a convertible Chrysler LeBaron. In season three, she drives a silver Saturn VUE.

Concepts included in the original project notes for the show that were later dropped include Veronica being 13 when Lilly was murdered, Keith being fired because of evidence disappearing from the police station, with hints that Don Lamb was behind it, Strom Jenkins, a character who called in the Abel Koontz tip, and Veronica finding that Strom Jenkins, Don Lamb, and Jake Kane were part of a larger conspiracy to cover up Lilly's death.

Logan drives a yellow Nissan XTerra S for seasons one and two. He drives a black Range Rover for season three.

SPOILER: Originally, according to creator Rob Thomas, Veronica and Duncan were going to be related. After it got picked up by UPN, a network channel, and not by HBO, Showtime, or FX, they decided not to push it into ""Twin Peaks" (1990) territory".

After the second season, the show was picked up by The CW because UPN merged with The WB to form The CW.

Amanda Noret, the actress who plays Madison Sinclair, has a real-life cousin named Shelly Pomroy, which is also the name of the character at whose party Veronica is drugged.

Both Sam Huntington (Luke) and Aaron Ashmore (Troy) went on to play the character "Jimmy Olsen" in different adaptations of the Superman comics. Huntington portrayed Olsen in the feature film Superman Returns (2006) while Ashmore took over the role of Olsen on the small screen in "Smallville" (2001).