This week on Pretty Little Liars, Caleb and Hanna bring their relationship to new and improved even higher lesbian levels and I spend the whole episode worried about my Friday Brain Sciences Exam.
We open in the hallowed halls of Rosewood High, where our Liars discussing Spencer McCriesalot. Looks like she hasn’t been coming to class or even *gasp* the academic decathlon team practice.
Around the corner, Team Dictator MonA has one of her new lackies tell Spencer she’s donesville. More importantly, it’s reveled that Spencer has officially entered the “ugly sweater” phase of mourning the loss of TobAy. It took a while, but I finally figured out this guys name is Andrew. Let’s see here. We’ve got a new guy who’s almost as smart as Spencer phased in just in time for the big TobAy revele. What’s the under/over on how many episodes until he and Spencer bone? I’m guessing 2 episodes max. I hope they have them do it to “Bittersweet Symphony” by The Verve.
Spencer is so angry she decides to just open and slam shut her locker over and over again until she feels better. When this proves ultimately unfruitful, she resigns to talking to Emily.
Emily wants to hang out after school and paint their toenails together but Spencer already has plans to longingly look at old pictures and wallow in self pity. She goes to storm out of school but just as she’s putting on her sunglasses there’s a note from A.
Ugh, I hate when A makes them hate on each other. I only like it when A forces Emily out of the closet or forces Aria to tell Ezra about his baby situation. C’mon A, let’s up the entertainment value here and force Emily to take Paige to a Tegan and Sara concert or something.
After school at the Life Cafe, Aria and Hanna obsess over totally different problems while Emily works like a real person. There’s a lot of bending over going on.
Aria wants to help Spencer with all of her deep emotional feelings about having feelings about her feelings. Hanna, on the other hand, wants to get all up in Caleb’s business. She’s still dwelling on the Caleb’s UncleDad issue. Hanna thinks she can track down Caleb’s uncle, Jamie, and prove he’s Caleb’s dad, and then Caleb will be happy forever. Aria suggests Hanna stay the fuck out of it.
If she really wants to make Caleb happy she can just buy him a new Sleater-Kinney CD and a Form 6. Oddly, as the two are sorting it all out, Ezra’s mother calls Aria and asks about Wesleywolf. Aria tells her that she has no clue where Wesleywolf is hiding out. Even though she totally knows he’s at Ezra’s Annex. Liar liar pants on fire. As usual.
Elsewhere, in between dropping it super low to buss tables, Emily runs into Cece. Emily asks her if she knows whether Ali might have been doing the nasty with Wilden. Cece denies ever seeing the two bump uglies, but claims every idiot and their brother wanted on Ali. Emily’s like, “As if” and then jots down some lines in her notebook to incorporate into her new book, Fifty Shades of Alison.
Cece: Yeah, and four million other Delta Phis and they all wanted to rush Ali.
Over at the Hastings’ residence, Spencer is making nearly the grossest smoothie of all time. I’ve had more conversations with PLL fans this week about this smoothie than any other topic including, “Who the fuck is A.”
Spencer is either pregnant or aiming for “death by carrots.” I guess she could also be on a Fruit Feast which is what the yoga girls in my med school call a fruit fast. Nerdy Andrew swings by and tries to explain why it’s totally not his fault that Spencer got kicked off the team.
Andrew explains that BOTP, the team doesn’t need Spencer anyways. He’s apparently so fucking good at history. Spencer challenges him to a history trivia match. He’s not interested. So Spencer proposes that they play strip trivia. He’s still not very interested. I’m very interested.
I’m not sure how I never thought to play strip trivia in college, but I wish I had. I would have ended up a lot less naked then all those games of strip poker.
Up at a mysterious ranch, Hanna tracks down Caleb’s uncle Jamie. In approximately 2.4 seconds it’s confirmed that Jamie is, indeed, Caleb’s father. Jamie wants to tell Caleb, but he has a dark past involving a police record for petty theft. Hanna is mortified, which is hilarious since she got busted for petty theft in season one.
Back over at Naked Nerd Central, Spencer and Andrew go tit for tat until Andrew gets Spencer down to tit. Well sort of. She does that all important “take your bra off under your shirt” move. You know the move I’m talking about.
We’re just one wrong question away from seeing Troian Bellisario goodies when Emily stops by.
Emily, normally I love you, but please stop ruining this for us right now.
Emily wants to know what the fuck is going on with Spencer’s spiral. She also unfortunately implies that Spencer was only getting naked with Naked Trivia Andrew to get back at TobAy. C’mon Emily, that’s pretty anti-feminist. There are lots of reasons Spencer might be rushing into a new sexual relationship. Like to piss off her parents or seem cool to her friends.
Emily keeps insisting that whatever happened with TobAy couldn’t be that bad. I’m unclear as to why the writers don’t have Emily appropriately hating men. Don’t they know anything about lesbians? Mostly Emily just wants Spencer to knock it the fuck off and get her head back in the game. Like any game at all. Except that smoothie game, because that shit was really gross looking. I think getting her head back in that strip trivia game is probably a solid plan.
This was a good moment. To quote Riese, via email to the whole team, “Holy shit Emily Fields is finally yelling at somebody for real and it’s awesome.”
Emily is so over it. Me too.
Aria heads over to Ezra’s Annex where Wesleywolf is packing up all three of his worldly possessions. Looks like his mother is hot on his trail and he’s gotta pack up all his belongings into a rucksack and git. Aria kinda sorta wants him to stick around, but he insists he has a friend in Philly he’s meeting up with.
Aria gets a call from Cece begging her to photograph some stuff over at her shop. I guess Cece needs a new website and Aria is the only photographer she’s ever met. Aria gets a sneaky smile on her face and offers to come as long as she can bring an assistant. Insert Aria and Wesleywolf making mooneyes at each other.
Back at Hanna’s, Caleb is fucking pissed. Oh did I say “pissed”? I meant “in need of some serious emotional processing.” So. Much. Processing. He thinks Hanna totally crossed a line by tracking down his dad. You know, completely unlike when he and Paige tried to track down Mona.
Unfortuantely, Hanna has already booked the big Daddy Date with Jamie. Caleb angrily tells Hanna she can go meet Jamie alone and then storms out to go upgrade his fixy.
At Rosewood High, Jason is lurking in a classroom. Does he work here now? I think I missed that. Wait. I remember him vaguely running some group for many of Rosewood’s At Risk Youth. Maybe that’s what’s going on.
Emily meets up with him and tries to un-tell him that that Wilden maybe knocked up Ali. Jason isn’t as dumb as he looks and has already called Wilden. I want to know what that phone call sounded like. “Hey Detective Wilden, this is Jason calling. Um. I was just wondering if you knocked up my dead sister. So. Um. Call me back when you get the chance.”
Emily lets the beans spill that Cece was the one who said Ali was pregnant. Somehow this leads to Jason proposing the two of them drive to his dad’s house and find some old picture of Ali on a boat.
At the Hasting’s, Spencer is practicing her telekinesis on fruit!
The parents are out of town and Melissa is baby-sitting! Remember when she was pregnant and crazy?
Well she gets a slight dose of that again when Wren shows up. By which I mean she dances her way the hell out of there.
Turns out Mona told Wren that Spencer was in need of help. This is actually, probably definitely true. Either way, the second Spencer hears Mona is involved she gets that Scooby-Doo look in her eye and you just know she’s got a nifty plan. Wren plays the part of the dumbfounded psychiatrist who, as I like to point out again and again, is at least 30 if he’s already done with his residency.
Spencer suddenly declares that she simply must get some air in the country. She demands Wren take her out on a drive all the way to Ispwitch for dinner and a film festival. Wren, despite the fact that the idea of dating a high school student should revolt any grown man who is also a doctor, is pretty into it.
Hanna gets ready for her coffee with Caleb’s dad and, just when it looks like she’s going solo, Caleb shows up. He decides he wants to talk with his dad as long as they can pick up a few more cats on the way home. And maybe write in the dream journals together. And maybe watch a couple of episodes of Rizzoli & Isles.
The two head to the Life Cafe but Jamie doesn’t show. Well. He shows up late. Late enough that Caleb seriously starts to regret buying his dad reconciliation Indigo Girls concert tickets. They talk I think but I’m way to distracted by Caleb’s weird looking hair. Is it possible that he made it more lesbian since the beginning of the episode? I’m also super distracted by Hanna’s adorable patterned collar. Also I don’t care about this plotline. Whoops.
Starsweep to Cece’s shop where Aria starts to get here Photography 101 on. Wesleywolf is obviously wolfing out of control over Aria while she explores the world through her camera. And maybe also her sexuality. Unclear. Cece is all, “Aria and Wolf-boy sitting in a tree…” To which Aria is all, “Shut up! I don’t even like him… do you think he likes me?!”
Jason and Emily head over to Jason’s place, but weirdly his front steps are covered in whiskey bottles. And by weirdly I mean awesomely. Most awesomely ever. Jason, because maybe he’s a recovering alcoholic I think, starts pouring out all the booze. This seems wasteful.
Starsweep to Cece’s Little Shop of Horrors where the photo shoot marches on. Cece runs out to pick up some dinner while Aria and Wesley do what any high school students might do: flirt and drink Cece’s wine.
Wesleywolf tries to wolfout and show off how strong he is, but he just ends up spilling the bottle of wine. This is why high school students shouldn’t drink.
The two romantically try to mop up the wine. Okay, I’ll admit, it’s not that romantic. But if Paige and Emily were mopping up wine it would be way hotter.
At the Marin’s, Hanna and Ashley rehash the big Caleb/Dad meet-up. Hanna points out that it was almost as good as queer lady speed dating at the Strand Bookstore. Ashley asks, “Don’t you think you might be projecting a little bit?” To which Hanna responded, “Project project project project.” Anyways Hanna talks her mom into asking her boyfriend Pastor Ted to hire Jamie to fix the church’s bell tower. Wait you mean the boyfriend we haven’t seen for like 20 episodes and the bell tower that broke at the end of season one? Bold move, Pretty Little Liars writing staff.
Jason and Emily arrive at Jason’s dad’s place and start digging through old boxes. Emily gets on Jason’s case a bit about being BFFs with MonA. Jason admits he doesn’t seen MonA as a friend, he sees her as part of the Ali Death Puzzle. Jason finally digs up the picture of Ali and, low and behold, Ali is indeed on a boat. This is as real as it gets. She’s on a boat motherfuck don’t you EVER forget.
Cece and Wilden are there too and everything gets real suspicious. Jason takes us on a pastel flashback to That Night Everything Happened and Ali Died (Maybe). Jason in his drunken state saw Cece and Melissa chatting it up. Confusingly, Cece is wearing the same style yellow shirt as Ali. Also Melissa was just coming outside as Byron left so I vote he actually just mistook Ali for Cece.
Spencer and Wren finally arrive at their restaurant. Oh did I say restaurant? I meant the academic decathlon location.
Wren goes off to find a table, because he seriously still hasn’t figured out what’s going on, and Spencer goes to track down the team who’s avidly preparing for the next day’s exciting events. Spencer makes a bunch of empty threats to MonA about how she’s going to upload MonA’s psychiatric case study online and reveal to everyone how crazy she is. This would make more sense if everyone in school didn’t already know MonA had gone off the deep end. Or if that wasn’t completely impossible to get and totally illegal.
Did I mention MonA is dressed as a super uptight countess in the 1950s? It’s a hard look to pull off. Spencer tries to go toe to toe with MonA but, as it turns out, MonA is just too good of a manipulator. Before you can say “Crazy chicks are so fucking hot,” Spencer is loosing her shit and trying to beat the crap out of MonA. It’s a good moment.
Aria and Wesleywolf finish up with still no sign of Cece. Wesleywolf lets it spill that he’s actually planning on sleeping in the back of his car. I have a lot of feelings about this and it makes me sad forever. Seriously! I get really messed up thinking about kids with no place to go.
Cece calls Aria from her car and apologizes for being out so long. She explains that her car got towed while she was in the restaurant. Yes you read that correctly, Cece called from her car to claim that her car had been towed. In other words Cece lied to give Aria and Wesleywolf alone time together. Pretty sneaky, Cece. Pretty goddamn sneaky.
Either way her plan works and somehow Aria ends up inviting Wesleywolf back to her place for a slumber party.
Starsweep to the local church where Caleb and Hanna wait around by candlelight. Looks like Hanna got Pastor Ted to give Jamie a job interview. Same day. On a Friday night. Caleb and Hanna take the opportunity to make out in a church. It’s kind of romantic but mostly it’s just weird.
Ashley shows up and announces that Jamie got the job and they’re all going back to the house to celebrate.
Before leaving, Hanna sticks a fiver in the collection box. The bill has some dice drawn on it. Ugh. You just know that dice bill is coming back to haunt us.
Meanwhile, the only person I care about gets stuck in an elevator with Jason. Well, at least she’s wearing that hot leather jacket of hers.
Starsweep to the middle of nowhere. Dr. Wren drives Spencer home, moderately unimpressed with her behavior but, knowing him, probably fully prepared to hit it anyways. Melissa calls to check in and Wren lies and covers for Spencer. So I guess Spencer isn’t going to Arkham insane asylum. Pity, the pajamas would go great with her crazy eyes and unbrushed hair. No. Seriously. Crazy Spencer is sexy as hell.
Hopskipjump over to Aria’s bedroom where Wesleywolf searches through Aria’s things while she grabs some extra sheets and blankets. Wesleywoilf and Aria bond over the fact that they, like every person in the country, both read before going to bed.
Then Wesleywolf recites Aria some poetry and they kiss. We all cheer. Not like Emily and Paige making out style cheer, but a light, half-hearted, bored-of-Ezra cheer.
Back over in the elevator of doom, Jason and Emily start to panic. It’s only been like 15 minutes but they decide to give up on anyone coming to rescue them ever. Jason pries the doors open to let Emily jump around to the floor below.
FYI, if you’re ever actually stuck in an elevator the safest thing to do is just wait it out. Even if it’s a Friday night you’ll probably be okay until someone comes Monday. Well, you’ll be hungry, thirsty and potentially covered in your own shit, but you’ll survive. But Jason and Emily didn’t ask me and they give it a whirl anyways. Emily peers over the ledge and observes that, yes indeed, they’re approximately a billion stories up. Wait. I’m confused. Weren’t they just in the basement? Why’d they go up so many flights?
Just as Emily gets to safety, the doors snap shut and the elevators starts to plummet. That’s right, Jason is falling to his death and I’m watching one of my biggest fears realized on TV.
Back over a the pizza and beer church celebration, the food finally shows up! Jamie pays the pizza guy and in a surprise to exactly no one, he uses the marked five dollar bill. I bet this is a classic Pretty Little Liars misdirect. Like we’ll think that Jamie is stealing but then actually Pastor Ted gave him a portion of the money cash upfront as a show of good faith. Or actually Paige has been drawing dice on every five dollar bill in Rosewood as part of her latest performance art project to help her get into Hampshire College. Or Jamie is just, like, not actually Caleb’s dad at all and just trying to scam money out of him/the church. I guess that wouldn’t be a misdirect, but I’m just spitballing here.
Emily sends out an S.O.S. to the other Liars who drop whatever they’re doing because, let’s be real, their shit is not nearly as big as Emily’s shit right now. Emily’s shit is the biggest shit. She’s bedside at the hospital where Jason has amazingly survived.
Jason finally admits to Emily that someone wants the members of the N.A.T dead. It only took, what? Two dead members who were also framed for Ali’s murder? Bro does not catch on quickly. Jason asks for more water because apparently his pain meds are giving him dry mouth. I’m pretty impressed with the writers right now, since dry mouth is actually a side effect of Fentanyl. Out in the hall, Emily meets up with the other Liars.
Even wild eyed Spencer is there. Emily fills them in and reveals that someone stole the picture of Ali on a Motherfucking Boat from Jason. They all hug and kiss and proclaim their undying friendship. Just as they’re about to go in for the group hug, a nurse comes out to ask them where their friend went. You know, the patient who was just in the bed. The one who’s gone now. That’s right. Jason escaped from the hospital, for G-d knows what reason, bare ass in the breeze.
The Liars then burst into the final musical number, “Living on a Prayer” as they link arms and– wait. Wrong show. Actually we go to our final cut scene where A1 and A2 play spin the whiskey bottle with more whiskey bottles with Liars’ faces glued on them. I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried. I must say if they’re targeting queer women ages 21-35 they certainly know their audience. The bottle stops on Aria but one of the two As moves it to point to Spencer. I guess they’re not done fucking with her yet.
Tune in next week when Paige finally returns from whatever rock she’s been hiding under and we answer questions from last episode like “Who was that girl at the bar?” “Was Paige actually faithful to Emily?” and “Did Lizz pass her Brain Sciences Exam?” At this point, only A knows, so see you then.
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When are we going to find out that Ali was adopted and CeCe was the 12-year-old birth mother? And that CeCe actually had identical twins who were split up by the adoption agency?
That smoothie though…pregnancy cravings? Bleurgh
Personal experience has made me wary of elevators, so that bit was particularly harrowing.
I love that Riese sends out team emails re: PLL.
Also, the thing that bothered me more about the smoothie scene was how long she had the refrigerator open. Like she didn’t even close it before going to play strip trivia with Andrew. Seriously wasteful.
That severely bothered me too.
I Don’t Hate Men!!!
lol, but seriously, I don’t.
but Emily was so spot on about the monopoly on pain thing. Shes a life guru of hope and unicorns.
Why cant Ezbian happen right now. I miss my Ezbian feelings frenzy.
That smoothie was seriously grody. Why was it so bright?!
If Wren is British though, he could potentially be as young as 26 since they can go into med school from high school, no? Not really that much less creepy, just sayin’…
And as if Jason could pry all the elevator doors open with his bare hands. That was ridiculous.
Doesn’t anyone else question CeCe’s crazy involvement with everything?
This episode made me roll my eyes a lot. Spencer was fucking crazy, and Emily calling her out on her bullshit was the best thing about this episode. Caleb’s a bigger lesbian than Hanna, and that’s saying a lot. And Wren. Urgh. Just all the urgh.
great recap!