Cassidy Casablancas

Infobox character | colour = #7DC622
name = Cassidy Casablancas
other_names = Beaver


caption = Kyle Gallner as Cassidy Casablancas.
portrayer = Kyle Gallner
creator = Rob Thomas
species =
gender = Male
first = M.A.D.
last = Not Pictured
cause = Suicide
age =
occupation =
title =
family = Richard Casablancas, Sr. (father)
Betina Casablancas (mother)
Kendall Casablancas (step-mother, deceased)
Dick Casablancas (brother)
spouse = Cindy "Mac" Mackenzie (girlfriend at time of death)
episode = 15
children =
relatives =
footnotes =

Cassidy "Beaver" Casablancas is a fictional character on The CW television series "Veronica Mars", portrayed by actor Kyle Gallner. He was a series regular during the second season.

Background

Cassidy, known as "Beaver" (a nickname he despises), is a son of one of Neptune, California's richest men, Richard Casablancas, and younger brother of town bully Dick Casablancas. Cassidy hangs around with his older brother a lot, even though Dick victimizes him almost as much as his usual targets. Despite his unspoken reservations, Cassidy participates in the questionable activities carried out by Dick and his friend Logan Echolls.

Cassidy is extremely needy as a result of the emotional neglect he suffers at the hands of his father, who openly favors Dick over him. In season three, a guilt-ridden Dick reveals that he and his father would have contests to see which could make Cassidy cry.

On the roof, before he commits suicide, it is implied that Cassidy had been going through very serious emotional abuse. It is also implied that Cassidy might have been depressive for awhile, and had commited criminal activies (including murders) because he didn't know how to cope with having been molested by Woody and how to deal with the emotional pain he endured through the years.

Notable events

Dick and Cassidy provide an alibi for Logan even though he had returned to Neptune the day of Lilly Kane's murder. Eventually, Cassidy tells Veronica Mars that they had lied to the police.

During Veronica's investigation of her rape at Shelley Pomroy's party, she discovers Dick had encouraged Cassidy to rape her while she was unconscious to lose his virginity. Cassidy, however, denies it. He tells Veronica that he ran out of the room and threw up, after realizing that he could not go through with it.

When his father marries a younger woman, Kendall Casablancas, Cassidy tells Veronica that he suspects she is having an affair and hires Veronica to find proof. In the process, Veronica exposes Cassidy's father's real estate scam. Cassidy's father quickly abandons his family and flees the country.

After a failed request to move back in with his birth mother, Cassidy and Kendall start a new real estate business to make money. With help from Cindy "Mac" Mackenzie as his tech girl, he creates a company named Phoenix Land Trust, using Kendall as the on-paper "owner" of the company, as Cassidy is underage. The Trust buys up cheap properties outside the proposed borders for the City of Neptune, a risky move that bet heavily against passage of incorporation.

Cassidy and Mac soon begin dating, but their relationship falls apart when he refuses to become sexually intimate with her. When she mentions to Cassidy that she had gone to Veronica for advice, Cassidy abruptly dumps her for bringing Veronica into his personal life.

In the second season finale, "Not Pictured", it is revealed that he was among the boys molested by Woody Goodman. Veronica discovers that not only did Cassidy set up the bus crash to kill Woody's other victims, who intended to come forward, but he is also responsible for many of the events of the first two seasons such as orchestrating the exposure of his father's real estate fraud, and Goodman's fall from public favor. She also discovers that he "did" rape her after all, giving her chlamydia in the process, which he had, in turn, contracted after being molested by Woody. After Cassidy blows up the plane bringing Goodman back to Neptune following his arrest, he tries to kill Veronica. Logan stops him, however, and Cassidy commits suicide by jumping off the roof of the Neptune Grand.

exuality

Some fans have interpreted Cassidy's characterization to mean he is also in fact gay. [http://www.afterelton.com/TV/2006/5/veronicamars.html The Good, the Bad, and the Gayon the Season Finale of Veronica Mars] Evidence that this was the writers' intention are in his snide references to his brother and father's views of masculinity, his reluctance in being sexually intimate with Mac and his rape of Veronica in a desperate attempt to prove his manhood. Other evidence occurs in "Welcome Wagon" when Dick tells Mac that she was just Cassidy's beard. Two of the students on the bus, Marcos Oliveres and Peter Ferrer, were both also molested by Woody Goodman and were both gay. The latter was also planning the "outing of all outings", most likely going public with Goodman's actions.

Others interpreted Cassidy's characterization to mean that he was just traumatized after he got molested by Woody Goodman. It is also the main interpretation of fans after Cassidy said he 'couldn't do it' to Mac when they we're in bed and almost started to cry.

Appearances

Season 1

* 1x20 M.A.D.
* 1x21 A Trip to the Dentist
* 1x22 Leave It to Beaver

Season 2

* 2x01 Normal Is the Watchword
* 2x02 Driver Ed
* 2x03 Cheatty Cheatty Bang Bang
* 2x07 Nobody Puts Baby in a Corner
* 2x09 My Mother, the Fiend
* 2x12 Rashard and Wallace Go to White Castle
* 2x13 Ain’t No Magic Mountain High Enough
* 2x15 The Quick and the Wed
* 2x17 Plan B
* 2x18 I Am God
* 2x21 Happy Go Lucky
* 2x22 Not Pictured

References