Love it or hate it, there’s no denying the continued growth and success of Kickstarter. Every few months, it seems that some site record is being smashed or some new form of project is being launched. This week, one of the most exciting Kickstarter projects launched: the funding of a Veronica Mars feature film.
A revival of the detective show that was cancelled several years ago, the project isn’t just exciting on a personal level for this huge fan of the show. It’s exciting because of what it potentially means for television production in the future.
The funding goal for the Veronica Mars movie was $2 million. Within four-and-a-half hours, the project had already become the fastest Kickstarter project to reach $1 million, with the funding goal being reached within the first 24 hours. With the rest of the month to reach new monetary heights, the project is on track to become one of the most successful projects of all time.
This is a project started by the creator and stars of the show after long negotiations with Warner Bros. to even get permission to try. The studio’s logic was that there wasn’t enough interest to warrant financing a movie. That’s clearly not the case, and early next year, the proof of that will hit theaters. This project will show other networks that there’s a way to involve fans in financing some of their critically-acclaimed, but low-viewed shows. Veronica Mars was cancelled in 2007 and it still proved it had enough fans willing to put up the cash to spend more time with the characters.
How many shows like Veronica Mars are on today? It seems like every year cult shows like Arrested Development and Awake are taken off the air too soon. What if NBC, which would rather have a show they can renew than pay the expenses of producing a bunch of new shows, could turn to the few million viewers of Community or Parks and Recreation to help fund a new season?
The Veronica Mars Kickstarter is going to set the bar for this kind of project. It’ll show how much fans are actually willing to put up. Would a $10 million goal for a show still on the air be that ridiculous if this project can make $2 million in a day?
Some people are wary of corporate entities becoming involved in Kickstarter. For whatever reason, there’s a sense that the site should “remain indie.” The problem with this mentality is that it leaves out so many awesome venues for crowdfunding, something that cult TV show fans have longed for. If the networks can’t justify funding a new season, there’s no reason why the fans can’t have the option to do it themselves.
And I’m not trying to say this sort of system would be perfect. If it did happen, it would take a while for networks to find the right balance, to understand what shows would need this option and what shows wouldn’t. Also, the risk would always exist that a show would be funded only for the new season to never materialize.
Regardless, the potential for Kickstarter continues to present itself in new and exciting ways. For a huge television fan like me, the possibility that I could help decide the fate of my favorite shows someday is pretty cool. For now, though, I’ll just get ready for a return to Mars Investigations in Neptune, California.
