Pretty Little Liars Part 2 (TV)
(Contains spoilers)
This is the second part of the Pretty Little Liars review, where I present all the main problems and mistakes that, in my opinion, occurred in all the seven seasons of the show (warning: there’s a lot). I finish this in-depth review with a conclusion, and recommend some excellent video essays on the topic that you should give a try if interested.
“Did you miss me bitches?” — A
The Main Problems of the Show
In 2010 when Pretty Little Liars aired, I was 12 years old and an ideal audience member for it. I was obsessed with the show, the fashion, the mysterious storyline, and all of the characters. I didn’t understand the problematic themes, especially the recurring issues regarding the characters and their relationships, that the show glamorized until I revisited the series later on. I’m going to discuss about them in more detail next.
The Teacher-Student Relationships
The most troubling factor of the show is the inappropriate relationships between older and younger characters, which can be “excused” only by them being conventionally attractive, and the actors and actresses themselves being between the same age range. The most obvious one is the relationship between high-school student, Aria, and her teacher, Ezra Fitz. As appeared in the first season, neither of them knew each other, their age, or occupation. Aria and Ezra met in a bar and ended up drinking and making out. On the next day, Aria hears that the school has hired a new English teacher, Ezra, and they still decide to continue the relationship.
Lines such as “When I’m with you, I don’t care about anyone else”, “Even though it doesn’t look right, it has always felt right”, and “When you love someone, it’s worth fighting for no matter what the odds”, work as a “us vs. them” set-up for their romanticized and glamorized relationship. The viewer was meant to sympathize with them, and as a former younger audience member, I can confirm that it worked. I though that Aria’s parents and Noel were acting so unfair for trying to break them apart. As I rewatched the series, I was shocked about how little the parents and Aria’s friends actually intervened.
Ezra’s redemption arc started even before the predatory relationship with Aria was official. There’s scenes where Ella Montgomery praises how good influence Ezra is on her daughter, and as a viewer, it seems like she might accept their relationship — and I should too. The show runners suspected that not everyone was okay with the couple, and started the rescue operations early. It seems so forced and out of the place, which made it all more clear that Aria and Ezra’s relationship had been planned to be the center of the series from the beginning.
Ezra as a character was already creepy and predatory, but when we find out that he also had a relationship with Alison prior to her disappearance (Board Shorts plotline), who was even younger than Aria at the time, it confirms the fact that this is not an isolated incident on his part. Ezra knew Alison and was familiar with her friends, including Aria, and knew how old Aria was. He understood how wrong the whole situation was, but still pursued her. As Pretty Little Liars glamorized the exploitation of children, it also ignored the obvious grooming that Aria was a victim of. In the last season, Aria got married to the man who exploited her as a child, which further makes me question why this was the relationship that the show runners wanted to concentrate on.
When you’re an adult, and especially a teacher who deals with children of different ages, it’s quite common that students believe that they have feelings towards them. It’s a safe way for a teenager to explore their sexuality and romantic feelings with a subject who should always be out of the reach — a teacher. I also had a crush on my secondary school teacher, and me and my friends would constantly talk about him, but I obviously didn’t want to act on it. And even if a student feels that they might want to carry out these fantasies, the reality is that they are not mentally ready for it. If a underage student decides otherwise, it’s the teacher’s job to (carefully) reject them, and not to exploit the situation. For example, when a teacher uses terms such as “buddy” and “kid”, the student might comprehend the unnatural setting, and reflect on their feelings.
However, this being said, I believe that with a right writing, Aria and Ezra could’ve been a great couple. For instance, I didn’t see any point to the Board Shorts reveal on Ezra, and if that had been left out, Ezra actually wouldn’t have had any idea that Aria was still a high school student when they met. Ezra could’ve rejected Aria softly, and explained to her the dangers of the situation. He should’ve let Aria date and gain romantic experiences with people that are the same age as her, and finally in their adulthood, they could’ve develop romantic feeling towards each other. I would’ve supported this storyline.
In addition, the teacher-student relationships are so cliché at this point, that there’s no point on shows to still write them. Byron had an affair with his (adult) student, Meredith, but because of the position of authority that one person holds, there’s still the power imbalance present. Some other series where teachers had relationships with their students are, for instance, Gossip Girl, Riverdale, Shameless, and even Friends. In the cases of Gossip Girl and Riverdale, Dan and Archie were both minors, which made the situation all more dangerous and predatory.
Other Adult-Minor Relationships
While many concentrate on Ezra and Aria’s relationship when criticizing the series (and rightfully so), other inappropriate adult-minor relationships might get less of an attention. Pretty Little Liars clearly took on the task of displaying predatory behavior as much as possible and made it seem romantic and exciting to the viewer.
Melissa’s boyfriend, Ian, flirted with and kissed Spencer, 14-year-old girl, when he himself was already in university. Around the same time he also had a relationship with Ali who was the same age as Spencer. Melissa’s other boyfriend, Wren, was involved with Spencer when she was 15–16 years old, and he in his 20’s, and around same time, he tried to pursue Hanna who was the same age as Spencer. Ian and Wren can both be characterized as predators who have a clear type (as they usually have). Spencer resembles Melissa a lot, but is younger and more care free, less complicated version of her. She’s starving for attention from someone as her parents always fixate on Melissa, and when Ian and Wren notice that, they take advantage of the situation.
As mentioned earlier, Ezra fooled around with 14-year-old Ali before he met Aria. In this case Ali had lied about her age and said that she’s 16-year-old, but who in their right mind would still date a minor when they themselves are in college. At the same time Ali also had a summer fling with Wilden, “Beach Hottie”, who was at least 8–9 years older than her. They even had sex which in itself is statutory rape, and lead to a pregnancy scare.
Note: Upon investigating the relationships further, it seems that Wilden was born in 1977 or 1978 according to Pretty Little Liars Fandom, which makes him around 16 years older that Ali! He was in his 30’s in 2009 when he had sex with 14–15-year-old. That’s so disgusting.
But wait, there’s a lot more inappropriate relationships in Rosewood. Emily and Samara had a big age difference when they started dating, and the same reoccurred when Emily met Talia, who was married and at least in her 20’s, and Emily still a minor. Aria and Jason started seeing each other in season 2 when Aria was still a minor and Jason a university graduate. CeCe and Jason dated a bit even though CeCe knew they were step-siblings. When Toby and Jenna became step-siblings, Jenna started to force herself on (rape) him and kept him quiet about it because she made him think that no one would believe him. So yeah, it’s actually harder to find normal relationships in Rosewood than the twisted ones.
The Plot Holes
It’s actually impressive how many plot lines one tv-show can have. Some classic question marks are N.A.T Club and it’s importance, Cyrus and his motivations, Claire and a bunch of fake classes in her car, Mike and his disappearances, the liars’ moms when they get trapped in the DiLaurentis basement in season 6 finale, and Harold Crane who was a proprietor in the Lost Woods Resorts and later a part-time janitor in Rosewood High and was stalking Mona for some reason.
Ravenswood
- Episodes that focused on Ravenswood were meant to just introduce the new characters that the spin-off series included, which made the main plot much more confusing, because the pieces didn’t fit together. Caleb even left the show for the spin-off series.
- Mrs. Grunwald wasn’t that interesting character to me, but the show had every intention to make her an important one at least. She was a psychic woman who saved Ali’s life after her mom tried to burry her alive, and let her hide in a panic room in Cicero College’s sorority house. However, nothing gets explained once again.
All the Other Supernatural Themes
- Adding supernatural themes to a show that has already got so much going on, wasn’t a good idea. For example, in the Halloween episode, Ashley tries to help a little ghost girl to find her mom, but before she could even call 911, the girl disappears and is never to be seen again.
The Police
- At the start of the show, it made me quite annoyed how the liars supposedly couldn't trust the police to handle the threats, but as seasons went on, it became clear that the whole institution was as rotten as A and the A-Team. Reynolds stole evidence, bribed Logan, blackmailed Ian, and worked alongside Jenna to mess with the liars. Lieutenant Tanner was always suspecting liars of some crime, and didn’t take their concerns seriously. Detective Holbrook had a relationship with then underage Ali, kissed then underage Hanna, and manipulated Ali’s polygraph test.
- The worst of them all was Warren. He was a pedophile who used his authority to take advantage of people. He worked for A, took bribes in order to keep secrets, tried to kill Aria and Spencer, and killed Reynolds. No wonder the liars couldn’t trust the police.
Alison DiLaurentis
- Why were all the three girls — Ali, Bethany and CeCe, wearing the same clothes at the night of the Labor day? Apparently Bethany had stolen CeCe’s clothes and planned on attacking Jessica, because she didn’t want DiLaurentises to know Charlotte’s true identity. If so, why did CeCe have two sets of the same clothes, and why was it necessary for them to wear them at the same time. Doesn’t make any sense.
- What did Ali do while she was gone from 2009 to 2011?
- In season 2, the liars found pictures of Aria sleeping in DiLaurentis shed, and thought that Jason was the one who took them. As it turned out, it was Ali and the reasons for that were never discussed. Maybe Jason lied?
- How did Ali manage to became a teacher after the time jump when she missed most of her high school years being on the run? She didn’t have any interests in teaching or studying when she was younger. She’s not a good role model and hasn’t even got educational background.
- Why was Ali so fixated on the fact that Charlotte was her sister and because of that deserved to have her freedom? She knew what she had done and what she was capable of. Maybe Ali would've changed her mind if Charlotte had actually kidnapped her to the doll house, and not make Mona dress up and act as her. And why didn’t she since Ali was already back home in Rosewood?
Ezra Fitz
- Ezra had many plot lines that ultimately lead to nowhere. For instance, the existence of Malcolm, the abduction of Nicole, and him being Board Shorts, were just means to create obstacles for Ezra and Aria’s relationship. There’s a lot of true crime authors that don’t stalk their subjects. Just saying.
Meredith Sorenson
- She goes from a unpleasant character at best, to a total lunatic. She kept Aria unconscious for several days by slipping pills in her drinks and food, knocks her unconscious, and locks Hanna and Emily up when they try to save her. All I have to ask is: Why? What was the point in that?
Sara Harvey
- Who is Sara Harvey? A young girl from Courtland who went missing around the same time as Ali, but what happened to her? Why was she part of the A-Team?
Spencer Hastings and Toby Cavanaugh
- What was the point of Ivonne and Toby’s relationship in season 7 if Ivonne was just going to die, and Toby and Spencer could then end up together? The show runners shouldn’t have focused on the meaningless relationships just because it brings variation. Same happened between Spencer and Caleb who became an item just because they travelled to the same destination by accident. Pointless and unnecessary.
Incoherent Timeline
The show’s timeline is all over the place. It can be divided roughly into 8 dimensions: pre-show, season 1, season 2, season 3, season 4, season 5, season 6 and season 7. However, there’s at least seven time-jumps: season 2 (1 month), between seasons 2 and 3 (5 months), in season 3 (1 month), in season 5 (1 month and 3 month), between seasons 6 and 7 (5 years), and in the end of season 7 (1 year). Events in pre-show happen between the years of 1988, when Charlotte was born and adopted by Jessica and Kenneth, and 2009, when Ali and the liars were spending time together, Ali disappeared, and Aria moved to Iceland with her family.
Even the pre-show has some serious inconsistences in the timeline. For instance, Bethany supposedly pushed Toby’s mom from the rooftop of Radley’s in 2000, and Charlotte (then known as Charles) was witnessing this. However, Charlotte was born in 1988 which would’ve made her 12-years-old, and Bethany being born in 1992, only 8-years-old. Toby’s mom was also alive in the pilot but then revealed to had been dead all along.
The first seasons actually make sense considering the timelines. Season 1 starts when Ali has been missing for a year, and the liars start their Junior year at Rosewood High. It lasts from September 2010 to November 2010. Season 2 picks up immediately after season 1 ends (November 2010), and continues to December 2010, and after the 1 month time-jump, February, March, and April of 2011. After the final episode of season 2, some events occur in the summer, and season 3 picks up after 5 months (August 2011). I tried to put the main events and timelines of season 3, 4 and 5A (S5E13) in a more understandable format, but as you can see, here the plot gets really messy.
From the episode 1 until the episode 13 of season 3, the timeline is still somewhat acceptable. Mona has been in Radley for the past five months (during the time-jump) and been recruited back to the A-Team by Charlotte. In September 1st the liars start their Senior year at Rosewood High. Emily has known Nate, whose real name is Lyndon James, roughly two weeks before she kills him in self-defense. Toby also has been working for A around that time, and in episode 12, when this is revealed, takes place the second 1 month time-jump. Episode 13 (October 31st of 2011) takes place in Halloween train.
November 2011 lasts from S3E14 to S5E12 which is in total of 48 episodes! This means that since November has 30 days, sometimes two episodes happen in a day. And given the nature of these events, it’s not possible that these all occur in FOUR WEEKS:
- Mona is a patient at Radley two separate times and gets released from both sentences.
- Spencer finds out that Toby is working for A, discovers a body from the woods believing that it’s Toby’s, has a mental breakdown and gets send to Radley, is released after a day or two, gets back together with Toby and joins the A-Team, gets addicted to amphetamine pills again and goes to 3 day rehab, and is arrested for Bethany’s murder.
- Aria breaks up with Ezra, starts seeing Jake, cheats on Jake with Ezra, breaks up with Jake, starts dating Ezra again, breaks up with him the second time, has a fling with Riley in between, and finally gets back together with Ezra once again.
- 4 people get killed (also 2 in the beginning of season 3).
- 3 funerals are held.
- A attacks and tries to kill at least 9 times, Ezra makes the overall tenth victim, however, he was not shot by A.
- Emily gets trapped in an elevator with Jason, almost dies in a fire with the other liars and Mona, saves Mona from A attack, hurts her shoulder and is being suspected of being a victim of abuse, gets almost run over by a car, saves Jenna from A attack, survives the attempted murder of A, and is witnessing Ezra being shot and Shana being killed. This means that she’s in danger around two times a week — poor Emily.
- Characters move from or return to Rosewood around 15 times, not including the releases from Radley or when liars visited New York or Aria her father in Syracuse.
- Ella was supposedly in Vienna for a year but only absent for 18 episodes, under two weeks.
- Melissa moves to London for an internship which only lasts 20 episodes.
- 6 characters are arrested and none of them stay incarcerated.
- And lastly my absolute favorite from the November of 2011. Toby enrolls at police academy in episode 8 of season 5 and graduates in episode 12, which means that he trained to become a police officer for a maximum of five episodes and around 2–3 days. Was he just paying someone in order to get fake credentials? How would’ve he even been allowed to enroll the school with a criminal record, and after graduating be allowed to work in a case that is associated with his girlfriend, Spencer?
The rest of the episodes (14–25) in season 5 occur during February and March in 2012 after the 3 month time-jump. Season 6 picks up immediately after the finale in season 5, and continues from March to May 2012 until episode 10 where A gets revealed, and is followed by the 5 year time-jump. In April of 2017 the liars reunite, and the birth of Uber A has began. Season 7 continues from April 2017 to May 2017 until the final time-jump in episode 19. The events of the final, 20th episode, occur during May 2018.
The timeline errors are not that major in the beginning and end of the series. However, I can’t comprehend how the show runners missed the mark so badly on seasons 3, 4 and 5, and especially on the 48 episodes of November 2011. I guess time just works differently in Rosewood..
Missed Opportunities
Pretty Little Liars is one of those shows that should keep in track all the fan theories that the audience provides, because they are so much better than the outsmarting and quickly thought out plots that they delivered. Gossip Girl, for example, faced the same problem when they decided to change the identity of Gossip Girl after New York Times guessed it would be Eric.
I wouldn’t have been annoyed if Gossip Girl, A or A.D. turned out to be a character that I suspected earlier as long as it would’ve made sense — which in both series, wasn’t the case.
In my opinion, Alison and Aria are the characters that faced the most missed opportunities related to the plot of the show. During the Alison flashbacks, the liars are portrayed as being “only” the bystanders when Alison was bullying their classmates. They didn’t approve Ali’s mean behavior, but they were also too scared or unbothered to intervene, which is unusual to a character like Aria, who’s characterized as being an empathic and caring person. In addition, Aria is actively part of the bullying in the pilot while running away from Mona with Alison. She doesn’t get nearly as much heat from Ali as the other girls, and seems to be really comfortable when spending time with her when the other girls are always a little bit cautious on what to say or how to act. Aria didn’t need a lot of persuasion when Ali suggested that they trash Byron’s office because of the affair he was having, and she has several other violent outbursts during the show.
It was noticeable that during the show Aria was weirdly obsessed with mirrors, which a lot of fans though to be leading to something. It could’ve been a clue about a dissociative identity disorder (DID) which can be characterized as not being able to recognize one’s own appearance in a mirror. Many mental disorders are also hereditary which Aria could’ve gotten from Byron’s side of the family. Byron described his brother being “not himself” part of the time, which could be related to bipolar disorder, schizophrenia or DID among others. Aria had already existing patient data on Dr. Sullivan’s office and apparently some documents on Radley, which made the assumption that she had been previously a patient there. While volunteering and keeping an art class in Radley, one of the employees, Eddie Lamb, recognized Aria, and she got visible shocked by it, which never gets explained. In addition, in the last episode of season 7, Alex Drake approached the sleeping Aria and whispered to her ear that she felt like the two of them would get along the best out of the other liars. Did Alex somehow identify herself with her?
What comes to Alison, she was the perfect villain before her returning. She was a manipulative, cruel bully, who did things based on her own needs. She picked and chose people to be part of her friend group, and because of her charisma and status of being a popular girl, she faced no difficulties on being accepted. She created close relationships with the liars that were based on secret keeping — “secrets make us close”, and used their vulnerability for her own gain. She acted fast and exaggerated if she didn’t get her way. At first, Ali was only seen in flashbacks which made her feel larger than life, untouchable in a way. Even when she was presumably dead, her actions lived on. Her disappearance broke up the friend group, because after she was gone, they had nothing to talk about. The liars, and especially Emily missed her dearly. And Lucas, Mona, Paige and other classmates that were bullied by her, struggled with the consequences still, not to mention the Jenna thing.
The reasons for Ali’s behavior were not explained throughout the show, but the fandom has theorized on the possibility of sexual violence towards her. Many were disappointed with the fact that we never get explanation on this, but, in my opinion, I don’t think there’s needs to be any. Some people just are like that — they want to create chaos and make people miserable in order to feel better about themselves. Ali clearly had some sociopathic tendencies which don’t just disappear when you grow up, and this made Ali’s redemption arc after season 4 so unconvincing. People kept telling us that she was changed and doesn’t behave the way she used to, but we don’t experience this. For example, right after her return, she tries to escape Rosewood leaving the liars face A by themselves, which further proves how untrustworthy she is, and how she still cares only about herself.
Who should have been A and A.D.?
In my opinion, A should’ve been Aria or Alison, or them working as a team. Aria and Alison are characters that we don’t know a lot about. Alison treated the liars as her puppets, and according to her villainous deeds, it’s not a reach that she would raise the stakes of the game. She didn’t need specific motivations for her actions, as we have seen, but she could’ve been angry at the liars for slowly stepping out of her authority. As for Aria, the storyline of her possible mental illness would’ve been great if executed right. Not to mention, both of their names start with “A”.
The A-reveal should’ve definitely been the end of Pretty Little Liars but since they wanted to introduce a final villain to the show, I’m going to talk about the possibilities on that. One popular theory for A.D.’s identity is that A.D. could’ve stand for Alison DiLaurentis, which are initials that she herself used in some scenes, like when she wrote her and Ian’s names on the kissing rock, and Emily found it. Another theory is that A.D. stands for “After Death”.
A.D. could’ve also stood for two people, like Alison and Darren (who, however, was deceased at the time) or Alison and Damien. Damien Hayes was a minor character in season 7 but he was investigating Charlotte’s murder just like A.D. was. That being said, it would’ve been disappointing to see a character that stars in two episodes to be one of the big villains of the show, but at least they would’ve been introduced to the audience before the reveal (unlike Alex).
Conclusion
There’s so much more to say about Pretty Little Liars. For instance, the ways the show handled serious subject matters, such as eating disorders, substance abuse and trauma. Getting skinny lead to popularity, and after reaching a certain weight goal, the problematic measures that helped along the way, such as starvation, were forgotten. Eating disorders were not seen as prolonged illnesses which they usually are. In some points of the show, Emily, Caleb and Hanna had problems with alcohol which were dropped entirely after it had nothing to do with the plot anymore. Same happened with Spencer’s pill addiction, and any PTSD symptoms that the liars had. Overall mental illnesses were shown in a negative light. Radley’s institution was seen as “nut farm” or “nut house” for “crazies” and “psychos”, and it appeared to be very old-fashioned in outdated practices (experiments with the patients) and interior (heavily medicated patients in the hallways, dim lighting).
I Marline King is talented at setting a mysterious scenes but ultimately fails when the sub-plots are supposed to match and make sense at the end. The series experienced with different themes throughout the show, like all the supernatural topics, which created a lot of unanswered questions and confused the main plot even more. On top of that, it’s quite clear that the show writers wanted to outsmart and shock the fandom when all the big reveals happened. That’s why I also believe that the way they brought in a transgender character was not to be inclusive, but to tip the audience off — “Oh they made it seem like A is a boy but it’s actually a girl, and this is not something I would’ve thought of and now all my suspicions were off”.
Considering that Pretty Little Liars was promoted as a show where you have to pay attention to every detail in order to solve the mystery, it’s unsatisfying when some earlier factors or plotlines are ignored, totally abandoned, or when major characters (like A.D.) turn out to be new characters, and all the detective work that the audience did was pointless.
There’s many problems regarding the show, and even though after it might seem that I hate it, I actually like the themes and nostalgia that the show brings me. There’s very few characters that I actually dislike (ignoring the predators) which in itself is a huge achievement in my books. Either the writing (although I doubt it) or the chemistry and natural charisma of the actors and actresses compensate the errors in the timeline and problems in the plotlines. Pretty Little Liars is always going to be my comfort show.
“Who says I want to end this.” — A
P.S. If you want to check out some excellent video essays and theories on Pretty Little Liars, I will link some below:
- Friendly Space Ninja (2021). The Inevitable Downfall of Pretty Little Liars.
- marinaalexis (2016). PLL Theory: Alison is Uber A.
- marinaalexis (2016). PLL Theory: Was Aria in Radley?
- Serena Skybourne (2021). a deep dive into all the A reveals… PRETTY LITTLE LIARS.
- Serena Skybourne (2021). Everything wrong with PRETTY LITTLE LIARS… *in retrospect*.
- Serena Skybourne (2021). why the PRETTY LITTLE LIARS finale ruined the show… *Who should have been AD?*
P.P.S. I rescinded my partnership for the Medium Partner Program, AND today’s my blog’s one year anniversary!
