Previously: A is back again again again again again again again again again again again again.
—
The Silence of E. Lamb
Jessica: We open on a class of students diligently at work at Rosewood High School. Just kidding! Emily is walking around the halls with her mom, who’s talking about Skype conferences with teachers while she was in Texas.
Marines: I like that the show feels it necessary to try and fill in the gap of why Emily basically doesn’t have parents. Cute, show. Like we care.
J: That’s more effort than they’ve put into a lot of plot lines in this show. Maybe they hired some vaguely responsible-feeling writer late in the game? (M: Ha.)
The other Liars and Ali walk by, prompting Mrs. Fields to tell Emily to ask them all to dinner, particularly Ali. Apparently Emily’s been staying in her house alone while Mrs. Fields was in Texas, because Mrs. Fields hasn’t seen Alison since she’s been back, and I swear she’s been in Emily’s room at least half of that time. Mrs. Fields wants Ali to know that she’s there for her if she needs an adult. Aw, that’s sweet, and boy does that girl need an adult! But sadly, even Mrs. Fields probably isn’t enough to help undo what years of trauma and current blackmailing have done/are doing. Nice try, Mrs. Fields.
Mari: While you are trying, maybe you could hang out with your child more. Just kidding! Still don’t care.
J: Emily gives the girls the scoop in the bathroom, and Alison is suspicious about this spontaneous invitation from a caring, potentially trusted adult source. Hanna shuts her down, saying it’s unlikely Mrs. Fields is “one of Mona’s secret ninjas.” Ali prefers suspicion, however.
The other Liars try to get out of dinner. Aria’s going to be busy with her new volunteer/spy job at Radley, and Spencer’s going to help EzraFitz move “his research and spy stuff.” Surprisingly, Aria does not gag or grimace when those words are said aloud. You know, since they were all used on her, about her, without her permission. (M: But he’s super sorry! When you are super sorry, it basically fixes everything.)(J: So long as you are super sorry and hot. And rich.)
Ali decides they will go to dinner and “get this over with.” Rude. Hanna sassily states that Ali’s wish is their command, and peaces out when the bell rings, without responding to Ali’s rise to her comment. I notice as she’s leaving that she’s got some Bad Girl Styling going on, with a pleather black jacket and jeans with edgy zippers on them, so we know what her attitude is going to be like this episode. Maybe she switched bodies with Faith??
Mari: She’s not remotely cool enough.
J: True. Faith would make quick work of these characters.
Alison holds Emily back in the bathroom as the others leave. She asks if Emily will walk her home after school, because Emily’s basically her bodyguard now (I added that last part, but it’s true!). Ali asks how Em’s arm is, and is worried the teachers will see her neck bruises and report it. And apparently they didn’t do the basic stall check when they first come in there because BigMouth Sydney comes out of one of them. So… she was just sitting in awkward silence during that whole previous scene.
Mari: Um. They said a lot of stuff during the time Sydney was pretend pooping. They don’t seem nearly worried enough.
J: They hardly seem shocked when she just waltzes out of the stall.
Sydney introduces herself to Alison, and touches Alison’s scarf WITHOUT WASHING HER HANDS FIRST. Even if she was in there not doing anything, that’s still kinda gross.
Ali’s face is not impressed with Sydney this whole time, but right after the scarf touch, we smash-cut to black with a little sound effect. Maybe Ali just blacked out in rage?
SHHHHH.
Hallway. Sydney is telling Emily about the dead rat in Paige’s locker. No one has copped to it, and the way things are non-revealed on this show, I doubt we’ll learn anything more ever, or in less than another 50 episodes. (M: I’m sure we’ll all be paying real close attention in season 7 to find out about this rat.)
Poor Paige stayed home today and I do not blame her. Emily confronts Mona but she plays her I-don’t-know game and suggests that dead rat “has ‘boy’ written all over it.” Emily mentions Noel Kahn, and we see that Mona is holding a notebook that has his name written on it. She claims he let her borrow his notes, though I have no idea why that would be a thing. Is he still going to that school or does he live in New York now? I don’t know and frankly, don’t really care.
Caleb is reading a Swamp Thing comic. And man, I really hate his new look. Someone shave that face!! Anyway, Bad Girl Styling Hanna walks up. She even has dark lipstick on guys! Caleb’s in school for contrivance exit exams. She steals some of his chips and he gives her a look. This leads into talk about what’s wrong (she took three whole chips!) and she brings up the Fields dinner. Caleb tells her to just make the break with Alison, even though it will be hard. Hanna is worried about losing her Liar friends in the process, and Caleb says if that happens she always has him. She gives him a feelsy look in return. He senses the awkward and leaves.
Mari: Last episode he was like, “yeah I’m definitely running away,” and this episode he’s like, “you still have me!” This is why awkward things happen to you, Caleb.
J: Ragin’ Radley. Regretful Radley? Reeeeally-try-not-to-get-sent-there Radley. Volunteer Aria walks into a room, and Eddie Lamb introduces himself. He says he thinks they’ve met before, and Aria super unconvincingly says they haven’t. Wait, have they? I have no idea. Maybe she’s being all suspicious because she knows who he is. The music gets all ominous and she looks relieved when he leaves.
Rosewood High School of wait, I had something for this. Damn. Alison finds Caleb signing in to his exams in an empty classroom. Apparently she’s taking it too. Wait, the exit exam is the same as the entrance exam? Whatever, who cares. Caleb bandies words with her about how she was “in a box” and then “got out of a box.” The whole conversation is tilted heads and narrowed eyes. “I don’t know you that well,” he says at the end. “You don’t know me at all,” she counters. He likens her to a tornado and we cut to another scene, so I guess she didn’t have a good comeback to that.
M: Welp. Finding her was easy.
J: This is Aria we’re talking about. If they’d made the next clue/lead more hidden, she’d never have found it. Her boyfriend literally wrote and handed her a book about all the mystery happening.
Hastings Household. Melissa walks up and she and Spencer talk about their parents. Spencer is worried that her dad wants to sell the house. They fight and Spencer grabs a plastic bag from Melissa that has a mouse dead in a trap, which Melissa claims is because Spencer’s previous Drug Nanny (remember him? he was around about 2 episodes) left food in the barn.
Marin Manor. Hanna paces in the kitchen until Caleb arrives. She sent him an SOS text and wants to know what he said to Alison, who left Hanna an angry message. Caleb doesn’t care if Alison’s mad since Hanna’s “trying to dump her.” Hanna rightly responds that she doesn’t need him to do it for her. Caleb cracks open a beer because he walked away from the exit exam, and claims that civics and algebra aren’t useful in real life. Honestly, I haven’t use any algebra since my last class in it, so that part’s pretty legit. He and Hanna fight and she kicks him out.
Pedopartment. Spencer appears and it’s awkward and my notes say that Spencer should just punch Ezra right in the nose! I agree, Past Me, I agree. She’s amazed at all the boxes he has from spying on her and her friends, which she brings up and it’s amazing. Ezra and Spencer fight about Eddie Lamb and Spencer wins, it’s awesome. Spencer then gets idea-face and asks to borrow one of his gross spy cams and he says yes because really, he owes her that at the very goddamn least.
Mari: It’s a super hesitant yes, so you just know that he knows that he can’t say no. Spencer could ask for a kidney and he’d have to pony up.
J: True. She should’ve thought that one out more. Though I’d say he owes them favors for the next season at least. They should take advantage. “Hey Ezra, get me some ice cream!” “Hey Ezra, wash my car.” “Hey Ezra, figure out who’s stalking/trying to kill us and turn them into the police!” You know, something like that.
Mona is standing in the street, watching construction on the burnt-out Cavanagh house. Emily walks by and joins her. Mona babbles crazily about how things change. Emily tries to threaten her about Paige and Mona replies, “you can call me a lot of names, but don’t call me an amateur” which yeah, we know you’re not an amateur at crazy, Mona. This is not helping your case. Anyway, she insinuates that she’s way better at revenge than dead rats. “Give my love to Alison,” she says and walks off.
M: I STILL HATE THAT THIS CHARACTER GETS AWAY WITH ALL THE THINGS. I want to throat-punch her really bad.
J: Back to Ezra and Spencer, having finished moving all his research into some ambiguous friend’s shed. Spencer thanks him for taking a bullet for them from Shana in New York. He waxes poetical about his book, claiming he hoped to write a book about his family instead, but failed. So naturally he took to stalking teenaged girls. Shut up Ezra!
“I went with a mystery I thought I could solve,” he says and admits he probably made it worse. Spencer’s being way too nice, and tells him the spy camera is to figure out how Melissa is connected to everything. Ezra suggests walking away, but neither of them can do it.
Mari: I hate him so much. He’s having mopey feelings beause stalking teenaged girls is not even what he WANTED to do with his life.
AW, POOR PEDZRA FITZ. LIFE HAS BEEN SO CRUEL TO HIM.
J: Don’t forget his family riches! That’s been a real drag for him too.
Roaring Radley. Aria’s cleaning up the art room when Angry Girl appears behind her and touches her hair all creepy-like. Angry Girl, named Rhonda, claims Aria ripped the drawing out of her book, which was given to her by Bethany. Rhonda threatens and Aria gives the drawing back, but Rhonda won’t answer her question. Eddie Lamb shows up but Rhonda walks away angry and unhelpful to both of them. Aria texts Emily that she’ll be late for dinner.
Marin Manor. Emily appears after Hanna sent a lame cramps excuse text to get out of dinner. Spencer also bailed, to go spy on Melissa I guess, and Emily is super not keen on dinner with just her, her mom and Ali. Wow Ali, way to go, didn’t take you long since coming back to being the one no one wants to hang out alone with.
Emily wonders what the beer bottle is for and Hanna claims her mom washes her hair with it. Lol, whut? Emily somehow accepts this and moves on to urging Hanna to come to dinner. Hanna claims she’s hit her “Ali limit” and doesn’t want Ali sucking her life force anyway. Hanna wonders what’s going on with them, what with all the hand holding a couple episodes ago, and Emily non-answers. Hanna caves and promises to be there in 10 minutes.
Rigorous Radley. Aria is sneaking around, and watches Angry Rhonda go to the shower. She goes into her room and rifles through her drawers. She hears Angry Rhonda shouting and hides under the bed. Angry Rhonda stomps back in and lies down on the bed, leaving Aria trapped underneath. But she sees something with “Bethany” carved on it hidden under the bed springs so things worked out after all.
M: Phew. I was thinking this might be difficult for her in some way.
J: Fields house. Alison is charmingly chatting up Mrs. Fields. Hanna arrives. Emily helps her mom inside, leaving Hanna and Alison alone on the porch. Ali asks about Caleb and Hanna says that he won’t make trouble and that she trusts him. Alison doesn’t. Alison berates Hanna for hanging out with Caleb and Hanna asks her if she’s telling her not to see Caleb. Alison gives her an eyebrow of innuendo but doesn’t answer. She goes inside and Hanna gives a significant glance to a bottle of vodka.
Fields House. Mrs. Fields is chatting and Hanna starts talking all sassy. She’s got a glass of clear liquid (hint: it’s not water!) in her hand. Emily is awkward but Alison is ready to engage. She starts talking about her fake kidnapping and Hanna gives a little frown. Alison says she blamed herself for what happened, and that she was ashamed, and asked her friends not to tell anyone when she returned. Hanna and Emily share glances across the table. Alison reaches out and holds Emily’s hand.
“You’re the special one, Ali,” Hanna says all angry-like. “There is no one in the entire world like you.” Ali gives her a narrow-eyed glance. Hanna chokes on her “water” and Emily gets suspicious face. Alison offers to help Mrs. Fields clear the table, leaving Emily and Hanna alone. Emily grabs Hanna’s glass, sniffs it and glances at her angrily. “I needed something to wash down all the baloney,” Hanna says and, legit. That’s also an excuse I’m going to use when I grab my third beer while reading Grey.
Mari: Except over there the baloney becomes cyanide.
J: LOL …. But yeah. Truth.
Hastings House. Spencer and Aria are going through the art book Aria stole from Angry Rhonda (you called the thieves to you, Rhonda!). They find the page where the drawing was ripped out. It was the last thing that Bethany drew.
Her other drawings aren’t interesting, so Aria asks how the day went with Ezra and if they talked about her. Spencer angrily says that she had no reason to bring Aria up in conversation because the whole world doesn’t revolve around you Aria, God. (I added that last part).
Meanwhile Bethany’s sketches morph from innocuous horses and still lifes to creepy drawings with monsters and people. One is a picture of a falling woman, who they think might represent Toby’s mother. Ugh, is this subplot going to come up again? I thought we were through with this! Can Toby at least get better hair if he’s going to be around more? (M: It’s the least they can do.)
Next is a drawing of Mrs. DiLaurentis with devil horns, and it would be kind of hilarious if it wasn’t so creepy. They guess that Bethany knew Mrs. D was part of the TobyMom death coverup, escaped from Radley and went looking for her, only to be confronted by A, murdered and buried. I guess… that wouldn’t be the weirdest thing that ever happened in Rosewood, or the biggest conclusion they’ve ever jumped to. Spencer wants to show it to Toby. They take a picture because Aria is going to return the book to Angry Rhonda.
Fields House. Emily is confiscating Hanna’s keys while kicking her out. Hanna claims that Mrs. Fields wasn’t buying any of Ali’s “blaming herself” speech, and storms out.
After the Not-Commercial Break, Hanna is at the coffee shop, presumably to sober up. Sydney introduces herself. Sydney smells the vodka on Hanna’s breath and convinces her to stay and share a panini. I mean, a panini is probably worth sitting with almost anyone, especially if it’s a good panini and I get to eat all of it. Ahem.
Hastings Household. Spencer is sitting at the counter in the dark, talking with Melissa about their mom. They fight about their dad, who’s currently staying at Melissa’s apartment (but not the London one! Wren gets that one. Lucky stupid pedo-tastic Wren). They fight over taking sides and the impending divorce. It’s not about love, Spencer says, but lies. Melissa looks feelsy during this, and says Spencer is right but that love is there too, and sometimes people do things they regret, but it’s still about love. #ThingsAMurdererWouldSay.
Mari: A hashtag that transcends recaps.
J: Melissa leaves and Spencer gets up after something beeps. It’s a tablet with the spycam readout. Spencer, watch out! You’re becoming creepy like Ezra! Spycam shows Melissa entering the barn and turning off the lights.
One Coffee Shop. Hanna and Sydney are bonding over the panini, and how melted cheese is the best thing when you’re drunk which is totally true. I lived in Prague for a while and they had the best best best drunk food ever, which was a fried cheese sandwich sold at all the little food carts. It was magical.
Sydney uses a conveniently placed newspaper to bring up the blast at the Cavanagh house. She asks if Hanna knows them and Hanna mentions Toby and Jenna. Sydney’s voice does this weird thing while she’s trying to casually bring up how everyone casually brings up Jenna’s name, and it made me laugh. Hanna says she’d like to “rake her over the coals,” meaning Jenna, but then recants and says she was “fighting someone else’s battle” when she was against Jenna. Sydney wonders if she’d want to make up, and Hanna mixes up her name with Shana’s and says “with everything that happened in New York, it was too late.” Careful, Han! Sydney’s eyes narrow on this juicy tidbit but we cut away.
Fields House. Emily asks her mom why she invited Ali for dinner and Mrs. Fields says it was to see the two of them together. She thought maybe Emily thought of Ali as more than a friend. That’s getting pretty perceptive, Mama Fields. Man, she really has improved since the beginning of this series. Emily admits this was true, and Mrs. Fields asks how she feels now. Emily says she’s “working on it.”
Mrs. Fields still talks to her former colleagues the police, and says the Ali’s kidnapped story has some issues. Emily looks worried, realizing Hanna was right earlier. Mrs. Fields says that even if she has saved Alison in the past, “you don’t need to keep saving her.” Camera pans in on Emily’s thoughtful face.
Mari: I would’ve only liked this more if Mama Fields was like, “you don’t need to keep saving her, talking to her, looking at her, acknowledging her or thinking about her!”
J: Mama Fields has been in Texas, skype-ing Emily’s teachers. She can only do so much!
Coffee Shop. Sydney offers to give Hanna a ride home, but Hanna sees Caleb walk in and changes her mind. Sydney leaves and Caleb spots sad Hanna on the couch with her coffee. Even his bad hair can’t pull him away and he walks over. She tells him she got kicked out at dinner and he sits down next to her. She doesn’t want to talk about Alison but “about us.” She calls him out for not making a decision about her since he returned, and reveals that she and Travis don’t exist when he’s around. “What do you want?” she asks. “I don’t know,” he replies. Ravenswood messed him up, made him question things and he’s not the same person. It’s rough trying to come back from a failed TV show, man. He’s seen things! (M: Like bad ratings.)
Hanna wonders if she’s still important to him, which she is. They kiss and the music swells.
Hastings Household. Spencer’s watching her spy tablet. She gives up momentarily to watch the barn door from her window, then the tablet beeps. Someone is waking by the barn door and the flood lights go on. It’s Alison. The music gets ominous as Spencer frowns.
Fields House. Emily leaves Paige a message and apologizes for getting her back into the middle of things. She asks her to call back, starts to say “I love you” and awkwardly changes it to “I’d love to hear from you” and hangs up in time to get an SOS text from Spencer.
Montgomery Manse. Aria’s on the phone, telling Spencer she’s on her way. She opens the door and EzraFitz is standing there, like a creeper. He says that Eddie Lamb called him and set up a meeting, but never showed.
Time Jump! All three Liars are at Spencer’s house, looking at the footage of Alison, dressed in different clothes than she went to dinner in. Spencer hasn’t seen her since, and Emily says it was hard to tell how she was acting when she left her house, because of Hanna’s drunk shenanigans. They all get a text message simultaneously and stare wide-eyed at their phones until Hanna walks in. She didn’t get the text though, which is about New York, Ali’s secrets and “Hanna’s big mouth.” “Care to fill us in?” Spencer asks and the three Liars stare at her judgmentally until we fade to black. Ok come on girls, like none of you have ever made a mistake! Lost a clue bird (Spencer), dated a spy (Aria), shot a man (Emily), faked your own death (Ali). Among other things. And if you needed help picturing that last bit, remember this:
Mari: Also, this is not the first time it’s been drunken mistakes. I’m pretty sure Emily was in front of an open grave and Spencer had a whole pill problem. Step off.
J: A-nonymous. Black gloves are steaming open a letter to Mrs. Pam Fields from some people named Zach and Ella. It’s just an engagement notice. A snaps a photo of the invitation then re-seals the envelope. The growing screech music reminds us all that reading someone else’s mail is a BFD! Also a federal crime.
Next time on Pretty Little Liars: Alison moves in with Hanna and things get darker than a patch of dark hair in S05 E08 – Scream for Me.
I'm a chronic book nerd and love storytelling in all forms. I'm particularly excited by the rise of the television show as an art form with long, cinematically beautiful plots and complex character arcs (I also watch cartoons). My travels in the past handful of years have led me through three continents and most recently landed me among the majestic mountains of Colorado. Some day I will compile all my travel journals/blogs into one place. Some day. Until then, you can find me with craft beer in hand, ready at any moment to deeply and passionately discuss survival tactics for the zombie apocalypse.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
