Rob Thomas originally wrote Veronica Mars as a young adult novel for Simon & Schuster with a male protagonist, before changing the character's gender because he thought a noir story told from a female point of view would be more interesting and original.
Thomas based the novel's setting on a 'thinly disguised version' of Westlake High School near Austin, Texas, where his father worked as vice-principal.
Kristen Bell was chosen from more than 500 women who auditioned for the role of Veronica Mars.
Jason Dohring originally auditioned for the role of Duncan Kane but was redirected by producers to read for Logan Echolls instead, while Teddy Dunn, who first auditioned for Logan, ended up playing Duncan.
During his final audition for Logan, Jason Dohring played a scene with Kristen Bell as if his character had raped her, giving the role an 'evil and fun' feel; at that point Logan was only meant to be a guest star in the pilot.
Rob Thomas called Amanda Seyfried's audition for the murdered Lilly Kane 'the biggest surprise of the year,' saying she was about 100 times better than any other actress they saw, which led him to use her in more episodes than originally planned.
Sydney Tamiia Poitier was billed as a series regular playing teacher Mallory Dent but only appeared in four episodes despite being credited for seven, reportedly due to budget issues.
The original, darker pilot was intended to be pitched to FX, HBO, or Showtime, but UPN required it to be lightened to match its standards, including a lengthy debate over whether Veronica could be depicted as a rape victim.
Rob Thomas originally planned for Lilly Kane's body to be found in the ocean rather than by the pool, implying her father disposed of it to protect his son, but UPN felt this was too dark and had it changed.
Most Neptune scenes were filmed in Oceanside, California, at Stu Segall Productions studios, with the series spending an estimated $44 million a year shooting in San Diego, over half of the area's film production revenue in 2006.
Oceanside High School was paid $7,750 by Stu Segall Productions for use of its campus and extras as the setting for Neptune High.
For season three, the fictional Hearst College was filmed mainly at San Diego State University, University of San Diego, and UC San Diego, with SDSU alumni working as crew and half of the extras being film department students.
The character Stosh 'Piz' Piznarski was named after Mark Piznarski, the director of the pilot episode.
The theme song 'We Used to Be Friends' by The Dandy Warhols was chosen early on by Rob Thomas, despite composer Josh Kramon originally planning to produce a noir version of an 1980s song instead.
Composer Josh Kramon played nearly all instruments himself—including piano, guitar, bass, and drums—for the show's score since there was little orchestral music and he wanted a personal, filtered sound.
Fans calling themselves the 'Cloud Watchers' hired a plane to fly a 'Renew Veronica Mars' banner over the CW offices and raised $50,000 through donations and merchandise sales to campaign for the show's survival.
After the series was cancelled, fans sent more than 10,000 Mars Bars candy to the CW network hoping it would reverse its decision.
The 2013 Kickstarter campaign to fund a Veronica Mars film reached its $2 million goal in under 11 hours and ultimately raised over $5.7 million from 91,585 donors, becoming the platform's largest successful film project at the time.
Fans of the show are nicknamed 'Marshmallows,' a reference to a line in the pilot where Wallace calls Veronica 'a marshmallow... a Twinkie,' a callback also referenced in the 2014 film.
