Welcome, everyone, to the season 5 premiere! It was a fantastic premiere, don’t you think? After those two, perfectly matched season 4 finale episodes that weirdly had a three month gap between airing? Yes, what a good note for season 5 to start out on, with this premiere. Good premiere, PLL team. And good finales previously.
THIS WEEK’S MVP
THIS WEEK’S LVP
Everyone was on their game this week! So…Toby’s hair, maybe, for making his return much less exciting for those of us (Catie) who finally saw the appeal of him in the briefest cronut moment last season, only to have that glimmer hidden behind this weird mop now.
BIGGEST SHOCK/BEST REVEAL
The reveal of Jessica’s body, not for the surprise [see: Chekhov’s gun dog], but for the composition of the scene itself, with the swirling pullback, and Ali in the center of the bustling action, standing still and weeping. Lovely, sad, very well done as a “reveal” (especially for a show that regularly has characters unearthed to a crowd of weeping liars and gawking neighbors).
BIGGEST NO-DUH
An ABUNDANCE of Liar Logic™, which is the kind of desperate roundabout rationalization that leads to conversations like this:
Emily: “Jason was the one in New York. Once we can prove that he’s the threat that made Ali tell that kidnapping lie…”
Hanna: “Wait, how are we doing that?”
Emily: “I don’t know! That’s why we’re having a meeting! Once the police are on to Mrs. D and Jason, then everything we’ve done can be explained, and Alison can finally tell the truth.”
THIS WEEK
Our foursome has been upgraded to a fivesome.
And all five are back in Rosewood, at the police station, with a sworn pact to finally tell the truth. All of it. And their plan almost flies…until Alison receives a secret text message and it prompts her to start spinning enormous, life-altering lies. And not the kind that keep you close. Welcome to the Hellmouth that is the Rosewood you left behind, Ali!
GIF from swifterly
What, did you read Gone Girl during your time on the lam??
“Welcome to the Hellmouth of our lives” really is the theme this week, with each Liar treating Ali’s newest fiction her own signature way. Spencer bristles; Emily plays peacemaker; Hanna snoops; Aria stews in her own personal misery. Mona outshines and outfoxes all. And Ali…Ali surprises us.
Spencer
When Ali renegs on her promise to finally come clean about her last two years, instead telling Holbrook that she was kidnapped, blindfolded, and held hostage for two years, Spencer is P I S S E D. She’d been the strongest advocate for the truth-telling agreement, so watching it fall to pieces in front of her, apparently just because Alison can’t hold back her natural fabulist, makes her full of a vengeful rage. At home, Spencer just wants to take a shower and crash, but her mother has a million questions and some exposition: Dad and Melissa are in Philly picking up Spence’s car that was impounded. And oh yeah, Melissa’s back from London. “But don’t expect a souvenir. All she brought back was attitude… … …and secrets.” ATTITUDE & SECRETS, the name of our new perfume line.
Little does Mrs. Hastings know how much Attitude & Secrets her second daughter can pile on as well! Spencer gets mad at Emily for suggesting that maybe Alison is just lying to protect her mother, because she wanted to know WHY her mother buried her alive before the police catch up. Uhhh… sure. (Liar Logic™).
Spence and Emily spy Jason cleaning out his car in the dead of night, which they smartly identify as weird. They do some snooping, and learn that he’d cleared out a wrapper from a New York restaurant. They also receive a special delivery from Alison—a cell phone she’s stuffed into a toilet paper roll and thrown out the window, like you do. It contains an anonymous text (although one NOT signed by A): “The Truth will bury you in a New York minute.” When they ask who sent it, Ali just draws a giant question mark on her fogged up window.
So: Why was Jason in New York? (Liar theories: He’s been following Alison for months; he hit Ali with that rock, and he’s the one Mrs. DiLaurentis was covering for!). Who is still threatening Alison? (Liar theories: But A is dead! Is it Jenna? We can handle Jenna.)
As the always super helpful ABC Family hashtag so helpfully informs us, #TobyIsBack!! He brought with him his stupid floppy hair, but luckily he is wearing his own unique cologne that contains neither Secrets nor Attitude, just some Truth & Sincerity. Truth: Apparently when he visited Melissa in London, Wren answered the door instead and told him Melissa was already gone.
Sincerity: He’s genuinely interested in hearing about Alison’s return, and also in getting into Spencer’s pants (the feeling is mutual). Afterwards, they snuggle, but she’s still all grumpy and she won’t—can’t—tell him why.
Emily
Emily has doomed herself to be peacekeeper for the foreseeable future, poor girl. She can’t not try to make everyone’s lives easier, and also she is an eternal optimist. So, she believes Ali. Or, at least, she believes that Ali has grown as a person (who spent the greater part of the last two years in mortal danger) and that when she lied to Holbrook at the precinct, it was for some greater good. She doesn’t LIKE the lie, but she is willing to put some faith in Ali having spun it.
At the same time, Emily has no patience for bickering. Screw Spencer and Ali’s arguments about personal history, even history as fresh as that morning–what’s past is past, and Em doesn’t want to hear them bitch about it. What she does want to do is figure out who is after them now, and END IT. She will do this, no matter what Ali thinks is best, because she is not a doormat. And so she sets out to play super sleuth with Spencer and Hanna and even all on her own, trying to track down Jason’s motivations, Jessica’s whereabouts, and the identity of Ali’s non-A text messager.
She goes about all these investigations, of course, with Nicest Girl In The World aplomb–walking Ali’s new dog (which gives her more time to snoop around corners of the DiLaurentis home); politely as hell turning down dinner invitations (to follow Hanna’s lead from Jessica’s work email); and inventing the most non-threatening explanation for her and Hanna’s presence at a slummy building in Philly to give to some random, drunken vagrant who accosts them on the street (when they follow Jason in the hopes of unearthing Jessica)(oof, unintentional pun)(we are leaving it)(sorry not sorry).
Em’s tightrope act can’t last forever–we already see some raw edges when she is walking down the street for some fresh air and snaps at Spencer’s warnings about not straying far from home–but for now, she is doing her best to be all things to all her friends.
Good luck, girl.
Hanna
It takes Hanna a little while to catch up (“Wait, when did we discuss kidnapping?” “WE. DIDN’T.”) but once she does, she activates Super Sleuth Hanna and sets out for answers. She also makes a grilled cheese sandwich.
Mr. DiLaurentis stops by her house to ask if Ashley Marin can snoop in Jessica DiLaurentis’s work email account to figure out where the heck she is. Ashley is hesitant, but ultimately agrees, and Hanna—like the budding Veronica Mars she is—takes advantage of a momentary distraction to read the emails for herself. The most interesting one, sent to an unknown recipient, says simply “I can’t protect you anymore.”
Hanna drops off the results of the email investigation at the DiLaurentis house, and runs into Emily and an angry Jason, who warns her to stay the hell out of places she doesn’t belong. He is also wearing a dumb hat. He then climbs in his car to go to Philly, so Emily and Hanna hop on his tail, hoping he’ll lead them to Mrs. D.
Jason ends up at a sketchy apartment building (“Well, she wouldn’t be hiding out at the Four Seasons!”), but when Em and Hanna try to investigate further they’re scared off by a seemingly crazy man loitering outside. Oh, well.
Aria
“What happened to Shana—” Spencer starts when the girls climb off the Greyhound in Rosewood and grab Ali before she can get back on the bus, “—happened because of me,” Aria finishes. “And I can handle that part. I think.”
Oh man, Aria. Taking one for the team while ALSO making Shana’s vendetta against Ali…all about you. Never change. Heart you.
But seriously, Aria has some real shizz to deal with this episode, and deals with it almost entirely alone—save some brief IRL interludes with Mike, Mona, and Em and a phone call with Hanna. Of course the first thing she does upon arriving home is call the hospital in NYC to check on Ezra (UGH), and it seems like we’re about to learn he has disappeared from the ICU like a regular old Jason DiLaurentis, but this reveal is interrupted by Mike who comes in to ask Aria what’s going on with Ali, and Mr. Fitz, and all those skeletons he found in her closet while she was gone?
!!! Don’t you know anything about privacy, little brother? “What?! The door’s made of wood, not plutonium.” Plutonium, the most soundproof of door-making materials. Mike, like Veronica Hastings, is on fire this episode. See also: his every interaction with Mona.
Aria sends Mike off to Mona’s waiting arms and falls into bed to obsess over Shana and what happened in the Fitzgerald Theater. Because Aria is nothing if not subtle, she does this while reading Paradise Lost and wearing a shirt that says “YOU’RE NO GOOD” in giant black letters.
Aria’s obsessing turns real when she realizes that the haunting violin song she was remembering Shana playing isn’t coming from her memory…IT’S COMING FROM THE BACKYARD. But before she can locate its source, her phone rings. A!
No, just Hanna, calling to fill her in on the mystery text that prompted Ali’s bizarre lie. Aria is, understandably, P I S S E D (to borrow Spencer’s mood) that she was kept out of this loop, as though she were a child who couldn’t handle more than a smidge of unhappiness at a time. Later, more solo violin songs music appear on Aria’s ipod (while she is ill-advisedly searching New York Website Pages for “theater dead girl Georgia”). So she swans off to the shed in the woods to make it look like the girls really had been keeping Ali stashed away there for two months.
It is the shed where Emily finds her and talks her down. Aria’s side of the conversation, exploding from the pressure of having been held in, reflects Emily’s own explosion at the therapist’s after she killed Nate a couple seasons back:
Most teen growth happens with just this kind of conversation, and exactly the words Em finishes her speech with: “You think that no one can understand what this feels like, but I’ve BEEN there.” Except on PLL, “this” is manslaughter as self-defense, and “there” is the other psychological side of having ended someone’s life.
Just another weekend in Rosewood, PA.
Strength girded, Aria returns home to find Mona back with Mike in the Montgomery living room. She is in a take-no-prisoners mood and is happy to confront Mona about whatever her plans may be. But Aria is also pretty full up on things she can focus on, so the details of what Mona might be planning—or indeed any detail involving Ali’s return whatsoever—are but blurs at the edges of Aria’s vision this week. As she comes to terms with Shana’s death and what they collectively plan to do about it, we are sure that will change.
Mona
Mona reacts to Ali’s homecoming like the consummate politician/supervillain she is: with a dual campaign to win over public opinion while simultaneously beating down her enemies’ defenses.
The first she does by ordering—at her own expense—emergency whistles enough for every girl in school. As she points out to Mike, who runs into her at the Brew, “the psycho who took Ali” is still out there, and until he’s caught, no one is safe. This is actually a great idea! Although she should probably expand it to every PERSON in school, as no one is safe from A’s evil grasp/Ezra’s predatory eye. But don’t really worry about her forgetting everyone in school, because OH WAIT she is A, and she is also trying to convince the principal to download a common app on everyone’s phones. For their SAFETY, of course. Not to set up a network with which to have even easier access to everyone’s lives. Nothing like that.
Anyway, Mike believes her! He also believes the sun rises and sets on her face. Which: accurate. Mona has worked very hard to bully the sun into doing just that. But yeah, Mona is glad for Mike’s return affections. And, like her dual campaign, there is more complex reasoning to this than just liking Mike (which she does) or infiltrating Aria/the Liars/Ali’s world (which she is). Wherever she plans to lead her Beleaguered Extras (#MonasArmy), she starts by visiting poisoned honey and support on a rapidly fraying Aria…
…and continues by following Ali to the mausoleum to acidly launch her first attack:
Alison
Hooray, another Rosewood Dad to inevitably disappoint us! Mr. DiLaurentis finally puts in an appearance in town, and he’s… actually not that bad?? He seems genuinely concerned for Alison’s safety, even going to the trouble of requesting a police barricade for the end of their street so she’s not bothered by cops or reporters. He vows to do whatever is necessary to keep her safe.
At home, Ali wanders around her room, which is perfectly preserved (thanks, Mrs. D!), and gets sniffly about being able to sleep in her own bed again. Alexis felt like Ali was genuinely emotional here (and throughout most of the episode); Catie still doesn’t trust that girl and thinks she is just practicing her “tortured but grateful” face that will be plastered on every magazine cover in the United States once her fake story goes public. In reality, it’s probably a combination of the two: Ali is really happy to be back in her own room, but that doesn’t mean she is through with her machinations.
The peaceful, settled feeling of home is gone quickly, though, because Ali wakes up to find Jason watching her sleep like some kind of creepy robot Edward Cullen. Mr. D thinks Jason knows something about where Mrs. D has disappeared to, and is especially concerned that Jason hasn’t even shed a tear since his sister returned. The next day, Jason is loitering on the porch when Ali comes out to sit and ask him some questions about their mom. They’re interrupted by a woman from the animal shelter, who is bringing by the latest plot device a dog Mrs. DiLaurentis apparently ordered. Ali—known far and wide as a kindhearted friend to all animals, right?—takes him in.
Spencer and Emily bring their Jason theories to Ali, who now knows that Spencer knows they share a half-brother. So do they think Jason tried to kill Ali, to cover up that secret? (Liar Logic™). Spencer’s Attitude & Secrets-fueled brain knows one thing, which is that they’ve all been framed as pathological liars, so no one would ever believe them even if they did turn up the truth. And isn’t that what it’s like, being a teenage girl in a world that believes your opinions are flighty and your knowledge, fallible?
Alison tells them that she has spun this giant new lie to protect Aria, who would otherwise be in trouble for killing Shana. (Again: Liar Logic™). They squabble, but Em reminds them of the focus at hand: the again-mysterious person who is trying to hurt them now. That night, Ali stops by the morgue (in an A-style hoodie) to visit her own grave. Mona shows up to join her, and Ali apologizes, giving Mona a heartfelt monologue about how much she’s changed. “I need you, Mona… as a friend.”
Queen Mona, in return, coldly quotes the mysterious text to Alison. “In case you were wondering, that was me. I sent that text. I guess I should have signed my name, because… I don’t have to pretend to be anyone else anymore. I don’t have to hide. You do.”
Damnnnnnn, Mona. Ali, we’re not sure if we totally bought your weepy apologies and pleas for Mona’s friendship, but we do know one thing: there’s a new queen bitch in town, and she’s already champion of the game.
Everyone is back near the house when their respective conversations are interrupted by the barking of Ali’s new plot device dog. It’s found a toy! Oh wait…that’s a human hand.
Mrs. DiLaurentis’s hand, to be exact, and it’s attached to the rest of her body, now not-so-buried in the dirt outside.
The music swells as each Liar reacts individually to the latest Rosewood exhumation. In a marked contrast to last week, the girls stand mostly apart, and there is little clutching. Alison in particular, hoodie still on, stands completely alone in the middle of the crowd. Her face passes through real, tortured grief… and seems to settle, jaw clenched, into a stoic acceptance. So this is how it is? she projects. Get ready for me.
A’s Game?
A is gone. “Gone.” Gone-ish. So in the meantime, we are left with other spooky episode tags. This week we had the Jessica-unearthed scene as a tag, but the creepy moments that really sung were Jason ghosting into Ali’s bedroom as she slept, and then later sitting in the fancy DiLaurentis living room, alone, in the dark, IN HIS HAT, waiting to spook Spencer when she came over to distract them while Ali got out for the night.
Creeping runs in the blood, we guess.
Until next week, liars.
Kisses,
A (lexis and Catie)
About the Contributor:
Catie grew up in Denver, Colorado, where she often stayed up past her bedtime reading with a flashlight and once sent homemade Hogwarts acceptance letters to her friends. Now an adult, she still loves books and TV meant for teens, but is grateful to no longer have a bedtime.
