Obviously, as you note, this brings up complicated questions of ownership. On some level, the Kickstarter is about allowing Thomas and Bell to reclaim their ownership of these characters, to make the movie they would have probably made independent of Warner Bros. if they didn’t have to deal with rights issues. And so I like your choice of redirected or refocused, as this really is taking a general goal—the desire for more Veronica Mars—and giving it a specific outlet, which comes with distinctive consequences we’ll be following as the project evolves.

Thanks for the thought-provoking comment!

I wonder, though, about your language in thinking about fans’ reaction to and involvement in this process as being one of a group of people being awakened as opposed to, I don’t know, redirected, refocused, or something like that. I think the danger in thinking of this as an awakening of fans is that it again characterizes and legitimizes fan activity, especially the impetus of that activity, only when it’s seen as functioning under and directed by industry rules or structures (I realize, too, that my suggestions similarly privilege industry as the manipulating force for fans; I’m just unable to come up with anything to fit my thoughts right now). Along those same lines and in regards to the twitter conversations going around concerning fan involvement and representation in a project like this that is fan-backed, your post here makes me curious about the ways in which fans have been able to, in a very real sense, own VM since the show stopped but are now in a position of seeming ownership in an industry sense (financial) that carries with it a potential shift (away from fans) of content ownership despite their apparent mobilization and presence in the conversation.