‘Pretty Little Liars,’ Pretty Big Finale: Did the ‘PLL’ Earn an A?
Opinion
We cannot tell a lie: Pretty Little Liars stuck the landing.
And thank god, because series finales can be tough. Especially ones that need to wrap up years of mysteries, loose ends and relationships. Best case scenario, you get The Vampire Diaries. Worst case, you get Lost.
Thankfully, PLL didn’t get lost in its two-hour series ender. Instead, we got a “Great Moments in Rosewood” buffet of callbacks, some solid returns (all hail Tammin Sursok’s Jenna, Torrey DeVtto’s Melissa and Julian Morris‘ weasley Wren, who totally got what was coming to him) and the long-awaited, flashback-filled reveal that “A.D.” was [spoiler alert] Spencer’s twin, Alex, a British nutjob born of Mary Drake (Andrea Parker) and brought to town by Wren, the father of Ali’s twins.
Yeah, it was convoluted and crazy and almost inexplicable—where did Alex get then money for a high-tech underground prison AND an above-ground silo in which to construct a picture-perfect replica of Rosewood?!! And who constructed this thing without anyone noticing?
PRETTY LITTLE LIARS – “Till Death Do Us Part” – Seven seasons of secrets came tumbling out in the two-hour series finale of Freeform’s hit original series Pretty Little Liars.
Seriously though, who cares? The thrill and joy of PLL has always been that we were in for the ride and these last two hours were fast, dangerous and fun as hell. I mean, Troian Bellisario channeling a low-rent Minnie Driver alone was worth the time and it wouldn’t have been so surprising if Ezra (Ian Harding) had actually died after being abducted before his wedding to Aria (Lucy Hale). That head wound did not look good. And Ali (Sasha Pieterse) proposing to Em (Shay Mitchell) in a pug sweatshirt? Come on. Adorable!
The only point where we would have called shenanigans was Hanna (Ashley Benson) taking in Mona (Janel Parrish) again. Sure, a year had passed, but that teeny monster is never to be trusted, as we learned in her last scene. At least Haleb ended on a happy, preggers note and the ladies all shared a final moment in Rosewood before Ezria’s honeymoon. The tears were clearly real and I’m not just talking about on the actresses’ mugs. If Twitter is to be believed, there are a lot of fans out there who could use a hug today.
So congratulations to the cast and crew. It’s been a bonkers seven seasons and for those of us who have spent that time theorizing and suspecting and shipping, the end of PLL was simply put, an A-plus effort.
Oh, and good luck to those new little liars teased in the kicker. If they were smart, they’d just let Addison rot wherever she went and block all unknown numbers that are sure to start texting them, because they were nowhere near as cool as our original squad.
