Veronica Mars Sequel: "Early Signs are Encouraging," Says Rob Thomas

For years, Rob Thomas, Kristen Bell and anyone else involved with the cult-hit CW mystery series Veronica Mars had to fight off "when will there be a movie?" questions any time they made a public appearance. Last week, a movie was finally released, crowdfunded by rabid fans on Kickstarter. It generated a $2 million opening weekend, apparently the first time a Kickstarter-funded movie had opened in the top ten, and will open in a number of additional locations over the next three weeks. It also opened simultaneously on digital platforms like streaming and on-demand, generating additional revenue streams that won't be made available to the public. The general consensus seemed to be that the film was well-positioned for a sequel, although nobody really knew what Thomas or Warner Bros. were thinking on the subject. In an update e-mail to Kickstarter backers today, Thomas shared his thoughts, first noting that while the movie has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 76% among critics, many of them had a chief complaint that it was inaccessible to neophyte viewers (something our own non-Marshmallow reviewer disagreed with):

Next time, maybe we'll make a movie that's 100% accessible to audiences who have never seen Veronica Mars. Speaking of which: I know that a lot of you have been writing, and posting to ask about a sequel: if it will happen, what number we need to hit, whether we'd fund it through another Kickstarter, and so on. Here's the answer to all of those questions: it's too soon to know. I know that everyone involved would love to keep on going. I hope that we will. But there's no news on that yet, and it might be a while before we know. I'm so happy to get the seven-year "Will there be a Veronica Mars movie?" monkey off my back, that I could use a little time to savor this moment before launching the "Will there beanother Veronica Mars movie?" crusade. Know this: I'd love for it to happen, and early signs are encouraging.