Previously on Pretty Little Liars, Shana Costumeshop revealed herself as the Original Emily Fields and then drove our Emily Fields to an abandoned warehouse to meet up with a very alive Alison DiLaurentis. Spencer busted up their reunion by clanging together a bunch of pots and pans behind a pile of old tires, which spooked Ali into fleeing and caused Emily to almost propel her homicide count to two. Hanna dealt with her Caleb breakup by rebounding onto Travis’ lips/balls, but was rescued from her implosion by a plate-hurling Ashley. Ezra threw a Hobbit-sized fit in the middle of the street, smashing his tiny fists on a car and threatening to decapitate a blonde lady (his apparent favorite hobby) before stashing some knives in Kung Fu Jake’s kung fu kicking bag and sharing a brownie a la murder with Aria.
Let this be a lesson to all you gaymos out there: Emily Fields, nearly perfect and mostly Canadian though she most certainly is, does not always react Hufflepuffy to the charity of her friends and girlfriends. You get her a meeting with an Olympic swim team coach, she won’t make out with you for a month. You offer to help her shoulder her burdens, she shouts the word “FEELINGS” at you so loud your brain rattles around in your skull. You keep her from getting her heart figuratively and literally ripped from her chest by her reincarnated first dead girlfriend/first dead girlfriend’s axe-murderer, and you can absolutely forget about being invited to the movies. Which is to say that Emily is not hanging out with Spencer, and she’s not hanging out with Hanna because Hanna is still hanging out with Spencer.
Instead, Emily is spending her time helping Aria raise Mike, who has stopped living under the DiLaurentis’ porch and started throwing pizza parties back at the Montgomery’s place. Mama Aria isn’t thrilled with the noise or the mess. Mama Emily isn’t thrilled with the two people making out, fully horizontal, on the desk in the living room. She clonks one of them on the head repeatedly like she’s knocking on a door and tells them to scram. But the real thrill appears in the form of Mona Vanderjesus, right outside Aria’s bedroom door. She’s hanging out with Mike these days, thanks to a hookup suggested by the new school guidance counselor (which, sidebar: I am now dying to see Mona interact with him. She ran the table at a freaking haunted asylum. She won’t even have to expend any adrenaline from her hyperreality tank to game this guy). Aria goes, “Are you really into Mike or are you into the fact that he kind of looks like me and smells like me and and lives one door down from me?”
Mona smiles because she doesn’t need to date Mikey to have unfettered access to Aria’s bedroom. She shrugs and toodles on out of there.
Spencer, meanwhile, hasn’t been to sleep in maybe a week. Between her regular school stuff and extra-curriculars, her deep investigation into decades of doings at Radley, her project of decoding Ali’s diary pages (on her phone), the stress of being estranged from Emily, and tailing Jessica DiLaurentis’ drunk ass around Rosewood 24 hours a day, her schedule is pretty full. I mean, she almost always lacks a normal person’s sense of tact, but when she calls up Hanna and finds out she’s decided to rebound from Caleb with James Patterson novels, she legit snort-laughs because sleeplessness destroys her WASPy decorum. Hanna is undeterred. She’s learning stuff Spencer never even thought about addressing in her weekly sleuthing seminars, so suck on that, Hastings.
The next morning Papa Fields returns Emily’s car keys to her, all, “The mechanic said your GPS and engine were hacked from a remote location, similar to that time you drove to your death in a barn at the behest of a doll that was dressed just like you. Nothing to worry about.” But Emily will worry! She will worry so much that she’ll ride her bike everywhere from now on, thank you very much!
Guess who’s back in town? Maggie Mack! No Malcolm this time, though, which pisses off Ezra so bad. He cannot believe that this child he did not father, this kid he did not adopt, this eight-year-old boy he knew for three months, max, during which time: his underage girlfriend sent him to the emergency room for head stitches, and his underage girlfriend’s best friend kidnapped him – Ezra simply cannot wrap his mind around the fact that Maggie will not let him spend unsupervised time with that little dude. It’s a confusing morning for both of them, to be honest. Maggie can’t seem to understand why her Rosewood landlord won’t give back her security deposit if she doesn’t return all the keys and get her shit out of the apartment. Aria overhears Maggie and Ezra fighting in his classroom but after Maggie storms out, Ezra tells her not to worry about it. “People get what they deserve,” he says. “Sometimes it’s knives in their feet; sometimes it’s their car driving itself right into the sea.”
Do y’all remember anything about Officer Holbrook? I do not. I remember Detective Roma Maffia, oh yes I do. But not Holbrook. He looks like every other handsome adult white male in Rosewood, so you can count on him being either a negligent father or a child molester. Maybe both. He cozies up to Hanna at that outdoor bookshop on the square that everyone is so fond of these days and I don’t even know, really. Tries to get on her good side. Recommends a book. He’s sorry he is the reason Ashley Marin spent all that time in jail and Hanna almost had to go live with horrible Tom and his horrible wife and their triple-horrible daughter. All of this means he’s working with Cece Drake, I’ll bet you three hundred dollars. He gives Hanna some tips about how to read James Patterson, which made me laugh for a couple of reasons, one of which is that in one of his books he describes popcorn as “grits with high self-esteem” so his character eats popcorn for breakfast, which is a total Hanna Marin move if I’ve ever heard one.
At school, Aria sees Mona making out with Mike and oooooh, it irks her. When they’re all done grabby-handsing each other, Aria marches over to Mona to demand an explanation and Mona says she had to find someone new to play with after the Liars ostracized her for the tenth time. She’s like, “I brought y’all coffee, I let you hang out in my mobile lair, I turned myself into the police on Ashley Marin’s behalf, and I didn’t run over a single one of you with my car for six entire weeks. And you still froze me out? Your mistake!”
Debate Team Andrew, who you will remember as the catalyst for The Great Hastings Bra Removal of 2012, reminds Spencer that they’ve got a big physics test this afternoon and that is some news to her. She doesn’t look Radley levels of rumped – her hair is still regular-sized – but the not sleeping is really starting to take a toll on her her perfect face. Andrew says he’ll cover for her if she wants to skip class and take a nap, mostly because he’s hoping to get better acquainted with her boobs. Spencer thanks him and asks him to come over later.
In her bedroom, he admires all of her trophies and ribbons and things and she’s like, “Look, hook me up with whatever Ritalin or Adderall you’re using to keep your academic shit together.” And he’s like, “Aw, man, for real? I thought you asked me to come over because you…” – and I awesomely quote – “…broke up with that carpenter.” She’s like, “Nope, but I did show you ten percent of my breasts on time.” He agrees that deserves at least one week’s worth of ADHD medication.
It’s an even weirder day than normal at Rosewood High. I mean, it’s no cow-brain-inside-a-locker weird, but there are a lot of adults messing around inside these halls today. Maggie was here. There’s this new guidance counselor that Aria tries to talk out of helping Mona, but he ends up talking her into needing therapy. And then here comes Papa Fields with just the solution to the problem of Emily being maxed out on wigging out: He wants to add more stuff to her schedule. It goes like this:
Papa Fields: Mr. Ezra Fitz, hello! I stopped by to ask you if there’s anything you can do to help Emily get over the fact that her mother and I abandoned her to live with the ghost of her first dead girlfriend and that girl’s batshit insane mother who still seems to think she’s alive. Mr. Fitz: Do go on. Papa Fields: Yes, well, Emily seems to have an affection for you, which I assume is due to the fact that you didn’t lock her in a basement to die like her last history teacher or abandon her to go make donuts in a castle in Austria like her last literature teacher. Mr. Fitz: It’s probably those reasons that she feels so close to me, yes. It definitely doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that I’m boning her best friend. Papa Fields: That’s what I figured. Listen, can you just give her more stress to help her feel less stressed? Mr. Fitz: I have some papers she can grade and some parrot cages she can clean out, alone, at midnight. Papa Fields: Excellent! Well, I’d better get going. I have to take my heart pills.
Papa Fields rushes home to tell Emily the good news and she comes thiiiiiiiis close to stabbing him in the face with a pair of scissors. Oh, man. I just remembered at the hoe down when Red Coat slithered through the hay in the back of Travis’ truck and Emily grabbed that pitch fork and started stabbing! and stabbing! and stabbing! with absolutely no regard for what the hell might actually be under there. Remember that? Even Spencer was like, “…yikes.” I kind of think killing Cousin Nate afflicted Emily with some sort of sleeper agent bloodlust.
But that’s not even the weirdest/best thing that happens at Rosewood High on this day. No, that honor belongs to an interaction in which Mr. Fitz calls Mona into his classroom and asks her to close the door for a private meeting (…of the Jekyll and Hyde Club)!
I think we can all agree that the best course of action for the Liars at this point in time is: not to split up. And so of course they split up. Aria tracks down Maggie in the street and slaps a box of her possessions onto the ground and bitches at her for having the audacity to keep her son away from a guy who is not her son’s father, adoptive or genetic. Maggie goes, “Well, at least one of us has started making good decisions where Ezra Allen Poe Fitzgerald is concerned. I got seven years of free rent and dressage lessons for my kid out of it. Enjoy your paper bag mask.”
The other three Liars … I don’t actually know where to start. All three things are so exceptional and terrifying. Let’s just go with Spencer first. Spencer decides that one of Ali’s ciphered diary entries is about Board Shorts, who attended Hollis College at the time that she was doing him, which was when she was, no shit, like 15 years old. OK, so Spencer, looking more and more like a zombie every second, decides to hit up a pub over near Hollis to do some Scoobying.
The place is called like Grave Concoctions or something, I don’t know, but as soon as Spencer walks in the door, she sees ol’ Ezra Fitz enjoying a quiet dinner alone. He’s like, “…hey?” And she’s like, “…hey?” And they stare at each other for an awkward longness that exceeds even that time Spencer jumped in his car in the school parking lot uninvited back in season one. When the server walks by, Ezra goes, “Hey, uh, cancel the rest of my order, that one thing I ordered, if you know what I mean, and don’t say what it is out loud, bye.” And he runs out of there as fast as his little legs will carry him, leaving half a piece of uneaten boysenberry pie in his wake. The server comes back and gives Spencer the rest of Ezra’s order, which is just a beer, because he already paid for it and frankly Spencer looks like she could use a little liquid libation for relaxation.
Only, guys. It’s not just a beer the server hands Spencer. It’s a beer called Board Shorts Ale. BOARD SHORTS ALE. As in, “Tippi wants a cracker, I love you, hello, Where the fuck is Board Shorts, Board Shorts Board Shorts Board Shorts, phone number of a seer hiding in the walls of a sorority house.” Spencer flashes back to a story Ali wrote in her diary and it goes:
Ezra and Ali are sitting together on these bar stools at Grave Concoctions and she’s not even old enough to have a learner’s permit for driving a car and he’s reading some stories she’s written and telling her what a promising writer she is and she’s mocking him for eating boysenberry pie with Board Shorts Ale and then she’s eating his pie without asking and he’s not slapping her hand for some reason and then they are full-on making out! HOLY BALLS.
HOLY.
BALLS.
I mean, we knew it. But now our eyeballs know it. I feel like that time when JennaBot got her sockets magicked down in the basement of Rosewood General.
The next insane thing is that Hanna decides to hit up the dentist to sleuth around and see if she can figure out how the girl who was buried in Ali’s coffin had teeth that matched Ali’s teeth. I’d forgotten Hanna’s dentist is Shaun’s dad and that the dental hygienist is Shaun’s mom, but I am so glad that’s true because it means we get to hear the lady say Shaun is coming home from boarding school soon even though he’s done so good with the ladies there, which: I am so sure! That guy is gayer then Mona! OK, no. Not that gay. But 80 percent as gay as Mona. Shit, Mona probably worked out a thing with Shaun to date Hanna for life so Hanna would never have any dudes to sleep with. What a bearding scheme! And gay Lucas too! Remember how A taped all those hundreds of noodle dollars to the paper towels in the bathroom so Hanna would dance with Lucas at that school fundraiser? That was when A was Mona! So many homosexual cahoots!
What was I talking about? Oh, right. The dentist. So Shaun’s mom leaves Hanna alone for a minute and Hanna goes snooping through the closet looking for dental records and what she finds, I think, is a list of people whose teeth were examined the same day as dead Ali’s teeth. One of those mouths of teeth belonged to C. Cavenaugh, which isn’t Toby’s mom (that’s Marian Cavenaugh) but something sinister is afoot and my guess is that it involves: Jessica DiLaurentis, Peter Hastings, and a Radley rooftop.
Hanna doesn’t have time to piece the puzzle together, though, because A breaks into the dentist’s office, drugs her to sleep, and implants a message in the enamel of her actual tooth. A MESSAGE IN HER TOOTH. Sorry, Ella’s bumble bee attack, there’s a new fucking creepiest thing in town … for now.
Emily, who is too scared to drive her own car, is just hanging out in the bowels of her high school all by herself in the middle of the night, making copies for Ezra, when the literal school comes to life and attacks her! I know that seems like one of those things I make up for dramatic effect, but I am telling you the whole truth! The doors and shutters start opening and closing on their own, some death metal starts blaring from the loudspeaker like another Satanic fashion show, poisonous gas spills in from the air vents, the desks and chairs clatter around like so many metal spiders, the marquee literally spells out “Act normal, bitch!” and of course A tries to break down the door with a flamethrower in his/her hands. Emily loses her goddamn mind. Not like the time she almost got sawed up in a box. Not like the time she got trapped in a barn. Not like the time she got GLASS IN HER HAIR or Cousin Nate pulled Paige out of that closet or the police found another dead girlfriend in Ali’s backyard. I mean, her mind leaks out of her ears, is how messed up she gets.
She calls Papa Fields to come and rescue her and he senses that she is so close to death that he scales the wall and breaks a window and carries her down to the ground to safety on his back like a spider monkey. Aaaaaand then he collapses and almost dies, because hey, guess what? He didn’t come home from Army because a car drove through the living room and nearly crushed poor old Pam to death; he came home from Army because he’s got Exploding Heart Syndrome. But don’t worry. Only high stress situations will kill him.
When the Liars meet up at Aria’s house, Spencer and Emily wrap each other up in the tightest, most relieved embrace ever shared by two women on this earth. Spencer says, “Please don’t send me away” and that’s when I also developed Exploding Heart Syndrome.
It takes them a few minutes to share their respective tales (attacked by another building, time-traveling third-party flashbacks, drugged into unconsciousness by a fake dentist, broke a picture frame, etc.) before they realize that Hanna has received a message from A. The one in her teeth. It’s like, “I made you a necklace out of teeth, in case you forgot. Don’t fuck up your smiles with your snooping.”
The Risen Mitten shreds the dental records of Ali and C. Cavenaugh. Shreds them right onto a little tray. Shreds them right onto a little tray and totes the tray over to a cage and slides it into the bottom and Tippi the Bird sings her thanks. TIPPI THE BIRD! “Board Shorts, Board Shorts, I missed you, I love you, Grunwald, Grunwald, Can a sister get some chicken?” My darling, darling bird, mama will get you anything you want.
My screencapping partner Margaret deserves all your love and affection. Follow her on Twitter and download her caps here.
