Pretty Little Liars Review: The Big Misunderstanding

This week’s Pretty Little Liars picked up where the last left off.  Lucas is missing, having never come out of the lake as far as anyone can tell, but Hanna is sure he’s still out there somewhere – and that he wants to hurt her.  She admits to her friends that Lucas was the one who destroyed Alison’s memorial, a secret she’d kept for him for some time now.  She can’t tell this to Caleb, though, who wants to go find Lucas and is suspicious of Hanna’s obvious secrecy.

Hanna isn’t the only one with relationship issues, though. Emily and Maya have plans to see a concert together, but Maya is acting a bit anxious and receiving a lot of texts. Emily worries maybe it’s “A” going after Maya, but Hanna reminds her that there could be a million other reasons Maya is so tense. Meanwhile, Aria has been asked on a date by her childhood friend, Holden, and she gets tickets for them to see a play—a play she knows Ezra will likely be attending. She feels bad for using Holden, but with Ezra not returning her phone calls, this may be her only chance to see him.  Sure enough, she does see him at the play, and they way that they looked at each other through the crowd almost had me in tears!  But they never spoke, and Ezra left the show early—I guess being near Aria without being able to speak to her was too much for him.

No relationship drama for Spencer, though—we never see Toby in this episode. (Booooo!)  She’s busy investigating a lead.  She and Aria head up to Philadelphia after finding some hints as to places “A” may have shopped inside of Spencer’s lake house.  There’s no luck, and Aria thinks maybe the clues lead more to Spencer’s parents than “A” – the street is only a few blocks from Melissa’s place.  Spencer gives up on that lead and Aria leaves. But while walking around Philly, Spencer comes across a school for the blind, the one where Jenna had gone.  There she meets a blind boy who had been friends with Jenna. He tells her how determined and strong Jenna was and how much he admired her.  On her way out, Spencer swipes the school’s sign in sheet, which she discovers has records of Garrett visiting Jenna and signing her out the night of Alison’s murder. Also, Alison never visited Jenna that day, as Jenna had claimed.

Back in Rosewood, someone is sneaking around Hanna’s house. That someone turns out to be Lucas.  Hanna is petrified, but Caleb comes in just in time.  Not that any saving needs to occur.  Turns out Lucas doesn’t want to hurt Hanna—nor has he been working for “A.” He wanted Hanna’s help because he was scared to break the news to Caleb that his money is gone—Lucas lost it all gambling. So that whole thing on the lake was a Big Misunderstanding.  No surprise there.

Maya isn’t being tormented by “A” either. Her mysterious texter is someone she’d hooked up with while she was away. She admits this to Emily, who takes it every well. Now the person just isn’t taking no for an answer.  It’s not a fun situation, but it’s better than being blackmailed, at least.

Oh, yeah, and throughout all of this, Mona was all whine whine whine because Noel broke up with her.  I’m not sure if that’s going to matter in the long run, but with this show you never know. So I thought it was worth mentioning.

I’m not sure how I felt about this episode. I didn’t dislike it, but it didn’t feel quite as dynamic as some of the others this season. I wasn’t a fan of the Lucas storyline—mostly because it didn’t feel like much of a twist when it should have. Spencer’s snooping was interesting, and probably the most valuable of the storylines this week. But over all, this episode suffered from a lack of Ezra and Toby. More boys! More!

So here are my theories this week. What are yours?

“A” Is: Melissa
Alison’s Killer Is: Either Melissa or Garret and Jenna
Who Will Die in the Finale?: Still going with Ella.

Season 2, Episode 16: Let the Water Hold Me Down (originally aired January 16, 2012)

Watch Pretty Little Liars Mondays at 8/7c on ABC Family.

Images courtesy of Disney Enterprises, Inc., ABC Family, Eric McCandless and IMDbPro.