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“Pretty Little Liars” recap (5.11): That’s so Ravenswood

Before the Beginning, there was neither day nor night; neither land nor sea; neither planets nor moons nor stars. There was no nothingness before the Beginning, for nothing is Reality, and Reality is Something. Existence burst forth from hyperreality. Light became, and so did Darkness. Mona Vanderwall was the spark of infinity. The architecture of the heavens sprang from her mind. She knit the universes with her hands. The fabric of space and time coalesced in her person.

Her particular favorite was a planet she called “Earth” and on it she planted Human Beans to grow in her own likeness. The Light called to her, but the Darkness required her constant attention. And so she found herself in the Darkest places across the span of eons, singing it into a shape her Beans could manage. There were weeds in her Bean garden, roguish fungi, parasitic cacti. She pruned them but they grew. They grew and they grew.

“One day my Beans will have to stand on their own,” she said to her faithful spectral gatekeeper. “One day the Light will need me too.” The gatekeeper nodded. He loved her, as all those with right minds and hearts loved her.

She was everywhere. She was nowhere. She was then. And she is now. Aria: Seems like we’ve stood here and stared longingly at this police station so many times before. Hanna: Shut up, Aria. You only just started being on the same show with us this season. Emily: This time, though, we’ve got real evidence. Not trophies smeared in rat’s blood. Not fractured, potentially robotically implanted memories of doing shovel stuff. But like actual pictures of Ali being alive and free. TV store: *springs to life* Spencer: Motherfucker. TV store TVs: *slideshow of Ali visiting the Liars dressed as a ghost of herself* Spencer: I will throw a brick through this TV store’s brain and destroy all of its- Emily: Honey, no. Hanna: I can’t believe I quit drinking for this. Spencer: I’m not really in the mood for coffee. Emily: Man, that’s dire. It’s cool, though; we can just do stuff with this whipped cream. Spencer’s eyebrow: *quirks* Spencer’s phone: *buzzes because Ali is calling* Spencer’s lady-boner: *is crushed* Emily: I think A might actually be Ali. Spencer: Or someone wanting us to think she’s Ali. Emily: Or Ali wanting us to think someone else is trying to make us think A is making us think she’s Ali. Spencer: Masks! Goddamn masks! Anyway, are you OK, lesbian-wise? Emily: I’ve been thinking maybe I shouldn’t have chucked away every real and righteous thing I had with Paige just because Ali was resurrected. Like maybe I forced a dichotomy onto something because the #TeamJacob vs. #TeamEdward marketing for Twilight made us all a lot dumber. Spencer: I’m not being even a little bit sarcastic when I tell you that literally the only thing you need to do is apologize to Paige. Emily: Nothing is that easy. Spencer: The way Paige McCullers loves you is that easy.

Hanna: *kisses sleeping Caleb on his unwashed face* Caleb: *tries to murder her* Vodka bottle: *rattles on the floor* Hanna: What the junk, man? Caleb: I thought you were supposed to be at the police station telling the truth about Ali. Hanna: Yeah, well, A has more pictures that tell a bigger truth, like how Ali kept visiting us like a ghost every time something shitty happened. Caleb: HOW DARE YOU SAY THE WORD GHOST TO ME. Hanna: Yeah, I’m out. Ezra: *is sitting around with a paper sack on his head* Emily: *is at the door* Ezra: Did you come here to beat me up, because I already got shot for you guys, I think you’ll remember. Emily: Cut the crap, turbo-creep. I am here because I need you to help me figure out why Cyrus Petrillo would confess to a crime he didn’t commit. I think it has something today with this Cyrus Petrillo-sized guy that used to hang out at ATM machines with Ali. Ezra: Thank you for trusting me to help you with this important research. Emily: You are the last and only person on earth who might actually be useful to us. Ezra: Fine, thanks for being honest. Byron: I am less terrible now that the truth about Ezra has been revealed. Aria: Marginally, yes, but you still cheated on one of the most bombastic ladies on the planet with Jodie Sawyer, who tried to murder me in her basement, so don’t try to steal any of Emily’s dad’s “Father of the Year” medals or anything. Byron: Mike and Mona are cute together, right? Aria: If you think her using him to get close to me and my friends for the either gay things or kidnapping things is cute, then sure. Byron: The main thing we need to do is pretend he doesn’t exist and go see some noir films in costume. Aria: COSTUMES? OKAY!

Aria: Do you guys want to talk about my little brother’s love life? Hanna: Only if it involves details about Mona’s sexual prowess. Aria: Who the what now? Hanna: Just kidding or whatever. What I want to talk about is who wants to keep us quiet re: Ali’s whereabouts for the last two years, but my thoughts cast Ali in a shady light and I don’t want Emily to thrax me. Emily: I am finished with that. In fact, have worn this shirt with a window to my cleavage in an attempt to make up with Paige today. Spencer: You will be successful. Hanna: OK, well, I think maybe Ali is the one trying to bully us into not going to the police. Liars: Yeah, probably.

Hanna: Spencer, a private word. That young gentleman you used to hang out with who knew all about addiction… Spencer: Jason? Hanna: No, the other one. Spencer: My sober coach? My mom fired him. Hanna: Oh, he worked for your family? I just thought he was another age-inappropriate man getting grossly intimate with one of us. Well, could I hire him to talk to my alcoholic boyfriend? Spencer: Nah, but Toby’s back in town. Maybe he can talk some sense into Caleb, bro-style. Hanna: That sounds awful, but OK. I’m getting pretty desperate. Paige: Based on the general knowledge I’ve accumulated from existing in Rosewood for 18 years, everyone is a bunch of dicks, but at least Sydney was a good swimmer. Emily: She’s still on the team. I want to tower over her on dry land while she’s flopping around in the water and see how she likes a metaphor come to life. Paige: Are your socks also pants? Emily: It’s weird how I only see you at swim practice. Paige: Yeah, it’s definitely weird how we don’t see much of each other after you dumped me for acting squirrelly when my emotional torturer returned from the grave and then you coerced me into helping her against my will and better judgment, a thing that resulted in a rat in my swim cap. Emily: Maybe we could talk later tonight or something.

Paige: Did you buy those socks at like a sporting goods store for giants? Emily: Seriously, Paige, I want to talk about us. Are you free this evening? Paige: No because I am an openly gay single lesbian teenager who looks like Lindsey Shaw. I have one thousand dates. Emily: Spencer said this boobs shirt would do the trick. Paige: Yeah, well. I can’t even look away from your damn perfect face. Spencer: *forces Hanna to listen to her have phone foreplay* Hanna: Do you think this intervention will work? Spencer: Toby is way better at interventions than anyone in my family. Hanna: No offense, but your family is only good at seeing in the dark and murder. Spencer: Speaking of which, get a load of this handwritten note from my bitch-ass sister Melissa, who has returned to London, apparently.

Hanna: Anyway, so Melissa left Spencer a note saying she’d know everything soon enough. Aria: Same old bullshit, always. Hanna: I wonder how come Ali was able to leave town even though a couple of episodes ago, A promised to bury her if she left town. Emily: Probably she made some kind of deal that involved saving her butt and not our butts. Hanna: I wish I could buy some full butt armor. Detective Tanner: Butts, did you say? Well, may I butt in and buy you girls an ice cream and also threaten you, coyly? Aria: Do we have a choice? Detective Tanner: Nope!

Detective Tanner: Now, as you know, the person who confessed to kidnapping Alison was arrested and then released three seconds before she corroborated his story, exactly 48 hours after he was booked, which was so convenient for him. Liars: Heh. Yeah. Detective Tanner: So, if you see something, say something, and don’t wander around by yourselves after dark. Also, who do you think killed Bethany Young? Liars: *blink* … *blink* … *blink* Emily: I mean, we didn’t even know her? Detective Tanner: Sadly, it is true that we cannot find any connections between you guys and her, except that you were asleep 30 yards from where she was walloped and buried. Liars: Oh, um. Detective Tanner: Oh, um indeed. All right then, bye. Aria: I’m just going to vomit. Hanna: Jesus, Aria. When Emily killed somebody in a summer finale, she’d dealt with it by the Halloween episode. Get it together. Spencer and Toby: *make out* Toby: One thing I have learned at police academy is observation, and what I am observing is your parents are not home. Spencer: True. Let’s talk about Caleb. Toby: *sigh* Spencer: He’s drunk. Toby: No, dude, he’s haunted. Spencer: Haunted by a gay ghost that makes him question his sexuality??? Toby: What? No. Spencer: Oh. Yeah. How weird would that be, haha.

Hanna, on the phone: TANNER IS LOOKING FOR CONNECTIONS BETWEEN US AND BETHANY YOUNG. Spencer: I leave you guys alone for one hour! But at least there aren’t any connections. Hanna: Yeah, until Bethany Young’s horse popped you one in the peeper and Aria stole her drawings of a godzilla gobbling up Mrs. D. Spencer: Once second. Toby can you get the back door where the delivery man is knocking; the front doorbell is broken. Toby: I know what a knock on the door means, Spencer! I am police now! Here, it is a package from your sister. She is in Bed of Lies, Belgium, I guess. Spencer: Hanna, I have to go. Video Melissa: It is time for two of us to keep a secret. Spencer: Wait, there’s a song about that! “Only two can keep a secret something something…” I don’t remember. OK, go ahead. Video Melissa: The night Ali was killed, someone who looked like her was dressed in a spare pair of her clothes, lying unconscious on the ground in her backyard, and so I buried her in the off-chance you’d been the one to kill her. But then we found out she wasn’t dead when she was buried, so actually, I killed her. Maybe you hit her with a shovel first, though. Who even knows. Spencer: No! Melissa, wait! I just remembered the song! “Only two can keep a secret if one of them is dead!” Video Melissa: OK, goodbye forever. Spencer: Woof, man. This is bad.

Hanna: Toby, when Caleb arrives and gets relaxed, I will touch my right ear and then the tip of my nose and give you a subtle nod and take a sip of my water and then a bite of-oh, he’s here. Toby: Bro, are you a wino now or what? Hanna: TOBY. COME ON. Spencer: Perhaps this is how men communicate. Caleb: Is this an intervention? Fuck all y’all. I was watching VHS tapes on my bombastic VCR/TV combo unit. I could have stayed in the woods doing that and eating nachos. Toby: That does sound fun, but you are an alcoholic. Caleb: You don’t know me! None of you bitches know me! I am timeless! I am hexed! I am-none of your GD business! Hanna: Spencer, your ideas continue to be the worst. Emily: Good Christ! Paige McCullers! Your collarbones! That dress! That lipstick! My pants are on fire! Where are you even going? A date? Certainly it is a date you are dressed for. Paige: I didn’t know you worked this shift anymore. Also, your t-shirt and messy ponytail deal right now is breaking my heart all over again because I am way more turned on by women in pajamas than lingerie. Emily: You just want to know they’re comfortable.

Paige: I probably gotta go. Emily: Yeah, yeah, of course. Paige: *goes* Emily: I’ve made a huge mistake.

Two rainbow choppers, please!

REAR WINDOW BREW

Ezra: So what I found out is the guy Ali was robbing ATMs with was Cyrus Petrillo. He’s got a bunch of aliases and a rap sheet that’s mostly just petty crimes. Emily: I wonder how Ali convinced him to confess to kidnapping her. Ezra: You think Ali really has that kind of pull over him? Emily: Have you met her? She’s like the Mirror of Erised personified. Ezra: Somehow I am the main victim in all this. Emily: Of course you are.

WATER CLOSET

Aria: Now that we are finished making out, I am back to hating you. Mona: Mike definitely deserves someone better than me. Aria: Well, now you’re crying and I feel bad. Mona: Don’t feel bad for me. It’s just that my army fell apart because Alison gave them Twizzler and Kit-Kats, which was to be expected, I guess; she was always robbing me of everything, including my dignity. Aria: We hate her too now. Mona: Even Hanna? Aria: Especially Hanna. Mona: Well, at least that’s something.

COME ON, MEATHEAD. (DON’T CALL ME THIS.)

Video Melissa: So, just to reiterate: I murdered someone because I thought you might have murdered her first. Spencer: Goddammit, you really are the only person in this family who ever loved me. Video Melissa: Remember that Alison is a satan and I will be with you always. When there are one set of footprints, I carried you. Spencer: Or I left you alone on a deserted beach because because I wanted to go back to the car for a snack! *HOWL OF AGONY*

STATELY MONTGOMERY MANOR

Aria: After I kissed Mona on the mouth, I made up with her, so she’ll be dying next week with Melissa. Byron: That’s sweet. Tanner: Yoo hoo! Mind if I come in? Aria: This woman is just hardcore evil. Tanner: Mr. Montgomery. Nice fedora. Byron: I do not understand sarcasm. Thank you. Also, though, why do you keep questioning our kids when no parents are around? Tanner: For starters because no parents live in this town. But, hey, here’s something: One of the Liars agreed to talk to me, so that’ll be happening soon. Aria, in the shadows: *vomits*

RAVENSWOOD REDUX

Caleb: AHHHHHHHH! Hanna: Yes, I was, in fact, sitting in the dark waiting for you to get here so I could turn on the lamp and scare the piss out of you. Caleb: I don’t want to talk about my drinking problem. Hanna: Would you instead like to talk about your Ravenswood problem? Caleb: Yeah, OK. I was a ghost. Miranda was a ghost. Everybody was ghosts. We had to die on repeat because of a pact with a preacher about soldiers staying alive and Miranda’s uncle was sort of a vampire and his housekeeper was also sort of a vampire but also like a real witch. There was that one girl from The Ring. She was on bridges. “Honey-roasted penis” is a phrase people said. And then Miranda may have got to heaven with the fireflies, but I don’t know because the show got cancelled. Hanna: Um. I’m just going to call Spencer real quick and see about getting a phone number for this, er, hair salon called “Radley” that she uses. BRB.

BSC HQ

Spencer: Melissa killed Bethany, here is the video. Emily: Ali knew Cyrus Petrillo, here are the photos. Aria: I … actually don’t have anything to contribute. Emily: Things feel like they’re coming to a climax, like it’s about time for someone to die. Aria: Yes! I’ll get my shotgu-oh, you mean like on accident. Like time for us to find a dead body. Emily: Yes, that is exactly what I mean. Where is your head tonight?

One hundred gazillion thank yous to Nicole (@PLLBigA) for the screencaps! Follow her on twitter for the very best theories about next week’s summer finale!

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