Pretty Little Liars S04 E06 – Bird leads

Previously: Nothing made sense as Spencer and Emily visited a college campus for Ali-clues and Hanna tried to bury a gun.
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Under the Gun:

Lorraine: Detective Tanner is preparing her coffee as she says that Hanna won’t tell her anything about the gun she was apparently burying on a college campus. Tanner offers Hanna some coffee, and quips that she doesn’t need a lawyer to answer that question. This is Rosewood, though, so you never know. Hanna turns down the offer. Tanner switches tactics and tells Hanna what she knows: Han was carrying a concealed weapon without a license, the gun is a .38 caliber revolver that holds six bullets, but only had four. Hanna could be looking at up to a seven-year-charge for just having the gun. Tanner asks Hanna to reconsider who she is protecting.

Sweeney: In Hanna’s defense, I think there is literally nobody in Rosewood who actually remembers why they’re doing anything at this point.

Lor: Excellent point. I mean, we certainly don’t know why any of these people are doing anything.

There is a knock on the door and Ashley Marin stomps in to say that Hanna’s bail has been posted and her lawyer is on the way. They’re leaving. Tanner walks them out and Hanna’s shocked to see her father waiting for her. He immediately tells Hanna that they are keeping the gun for testing and Hanna demands to know what kind of testing. “The kind that determines whether your dad’s gun was used to kill a police officer,” Tanner helpfully informs us.

SHHHHH.

After the credits, Emily is in the locker room, Hanna is at home, and they are on a phone call. Hanna apparently isn’t allowed to go back to school until the DA says so. (S: Because of suspicion, but the girl who definitely did stalk/harass/throw-cars-at students was allowed back a hot minute after leaving a mental institution? Cool, Rosewood.) Hanna tells Em about her possible seven-year-sentence. Emily says Hanna isn’t a murderer, but Hanna seems resigned to the fact that that probably doesn’t matter much. Emily points out that A planted Ashley’s cellphone in Wilden’s casket, fished his car out of the lake and called the cops on Hanna, so this is probably all a set-up. Emily suggests telling her parents about A and Hanna’s all, “but… no.” Okay! But, no, everyone!

Emily has to end the call because Shana walks into the locker room wearing a Sharks uniform. Shana switched to Rosewood in the middle of the semester for the better swim team and to bring her shadiness closer to the Liars, I guess. Shana offers fake sympathy and Emily is having none of it.

Papa Marin comes into Hanna’s room and demands to know what she told the police and why the hell she had the gun and decided to take it to a frat party. I hate you Papa Marin, but good question is good. Hanna yells that she was trying to protect her mom and she didn’t take the gun. She found it in Ashley’s luggage. Hanna’s phone buzzes and Papa Marin tells her to turn it off and come downstairs.

Rosewood’s One Coffee Shop. Spencer and Aria are waiting for Emily, who Spencer thinks might be avoiding her. Aria tells her to get over it or apologize or do whatever because they need all the brainpower they can get and they are already down Hanna. Who decided to take a possible murder weapon to a frat party, so probably, no loss there. Aria tastes her coffee and kind of spits it back out as she says it tastes horrible. She holds it out to Spencer and tells her to taste it, which she refuses to do. This was a super cute little friend moment, brought to you for probably no reason at all, that I appreciated. If it tastes horrible (or you spit in it) don’t ask me to taste it.

  Sweeney: They throw these in occasionally because I think some wise soul in the writer’s room recognizes that they are the show’s only redeeming moments.

Lor: Bless.

Emily arrives and says that Hanna’s super freaked out because the police are testing her father’s gun and trying to pin it as the murder weapon. Aria’s all, “SAY WUH?” because apparently she’s never seen an episode of CSI, Law & Order or NCIS, which I didn’t think was actually possible for a human being. Spencer briefly explains the concept of ballistics and Emily’s all, “but there’s more!” Shana, the girl that maybe tried to set them on fire, is now at Rosewood High. They wonder why Shana would suddenly show up at their school and figure it has something to do with Melissa leaving town, since some episode ago I can’t remember, we learned that Jenna and Shana are afraid of Melissa. Hey, guys, I think I just admitted to needing the terrible exposition because I totally forgot about that.

Sweeney: That’s less a defense of he terrible exposition than an indictment of the cracked out absurdity of this show’s plot threads.

Lor: The girls hear a crash behind them and Emily sighs a big sigh because on top of everything, she’s poor, and has to work and train the new guy and run open mic night. Aria offers to help. Like right right now. She’s going to go over to the new guy and help because he’s friends with her brother. Aria just struts over in her fancy dress and shoes (cute, but where is she going?) and the extent of her help is handing him a rag.

She left, though, to give her friends a chance to talk it out. Spencer apologizes for being a human bulldozer.

Aria asks Connor about his upcoming game and he says he has to get a B on an English assignment before he can play. He asks if Aria could help him, or at least review the essay and she agrees to and heads back to her friends.

Marin Manor. Papa Marin is confronting Ashley about the gun Hanna found in her closet. Hanna confesses that she was looking for the ruined shoes, but Papa Marin is more concerned with the whole gun thing. Ashley yells that she didn’t kill anyone and she definitely didn’t bring a gun into the house. She’s being set-up. Papa Marin asks who would do something like that and Hanna gets twitchy in the background. She looks down at her phone and an A message is waiting for her: You bark, I bite. Say my name, they BOTH get the blame. Kisses – A

Rosewood’s One Coffee Shop. The girls are up but they stop when they see Mona.

    Mona wants to talk to Spencer alone but Emily says she can talk to all of them together and Spencer agrees. Mona smirks and says she’s been out investigating her missing Stalker RV. Turns out, Toby gave it to A and Spencer already knew that. Emily says Mona better have proof. Mona may not be A anymore, but she says she still has her stalker skill in tact and can “recon their asses” anytime she needs to. Mona’s continued presence around these girls really disturbs me, you guys. I probably shouldn’t let this show get to me at all, but there you have it.

Sweeney: It’s amazing how many things about this show continue to distress me. I think it’s actually a good sign than we haven’t been completely desensitized to things like “stalking” and “pedobears” after everything we’ve witnessed for the blog.

Lor: Go us!

Later, Aria and Emily can’t believe that Spencer kept this from them. Somehow, Aria’s made it to the idea that maybe something in the Stalker RV could’ve helped prove Ashley innocent, but it’s gone now. Hanna calls Aria’s cell phone from her land line because her parents took her cellphone. Han tells Aria about the gun being planted in Ashley’s bag and how she walked straight into that trap. Plus, Hanna can’t say anything about A or else, I don’t know, A will frame them even more. The threat seems to be, ‘if you tell anyone I’m doing this thing, I will continue to do this thing I am already doing.” That A. So sneaky.

Sweeney: This episode, in particular, drove home another super fucking irresponsible thing about this show marketed to young girls. The entire premise that this kind of harassment should be kept secret is really disturbing. It made a certain kind of sense in the first season, but to now have years of this bullying and harassment be swept under the rug by these girls sends a really scary message to the 15 year olds watching it. “If you out your bully, your parents will go to prison.” Or something like that.

Lor: Hanna has to hang up because her mother picks up the line and starts dialing. Aria says that Hanna doesn’t want their help and Emily asks if they are going to let that stop them. Back with the Marins, Ashley says Wilden wanted money she couldn’t come up with, so she took the gun for protection. She did see Wilden, he grabbed the gun from her hands and she ran. There is a knock on the door and it’s Caleb, trying to check on Hanna. The Marin Parents send him away and Hanna is sad.

Hastings House. Spencer wants to tell her friends the truth about the Stalker RV, but Toby doesn’t like that idea. If they tell them the truth, he’ll never find out what happened to his mom. Spencer asks why he would think that and Toby completely blows by the question and says that he went back to Radley to question E. Lamb and got nowhere. His dad was no help either. Toby’s run out of leads and needs A to figure out what happened to his mom. Spencer grabs her cellphone and says she can’t change Toby’s mind, but she needs to earn some trust back. She calls Gamma Zeta Chi and we cut away.

Aria and Connor are going over his crappy paper. Mike sees them and gives all kinds of disapproving looks. Aria asks if he spoke to their mom and when he’ll be back and he gives short answers to both questions. Connor tells him to have fun and Mike shakes his head a bit as he heads out. Connor asks if Mike is cool with him being there and Aria says it isn’t about him at all.

Marin Manor. Emily’s come to visit under the guise of bringing homework. Hanna says she’s in purgatory (which she looked up) and was also doing all kinds of Questionable Google Searches before her parents took away her internet. Emily says that if Ashley didn’t kill Wilden, the gun may not be the murder weapon. A couldn’t possible tamper with evidence, right?

  And by “sooner” she means, “at some point after three full seasons.”

Emily’s real reason for coming is because she wants the footage of Ashley running Wilden over. Hanna says definitely not, but Emily comes back with some convoluted idea that the second half of the video show Jenna and Shana helping him off the road so that maybe the police will think they murdered him. Hanna repeats that she can’t out A, but Emily thinks that the threat loophole is that she can. Emily begs and gives the footage over because this is the stupidest thing ever.

Sweeney: After 3+ seasons, I still don’t understand PLL logic.

Lor: Aria is done helping Connor and he asks her out. She shoots him down, kindly, and the kid goes all in for a kiss. Aria backs out of it and says she isn’t interested. She shows him the door.

Emily is walking around the police station under the guise of hanging up an open mic night flyer. When Detective Tanner is turned away, she leaves a CD on her desk with a sticky note: Want to know what happened to Wilden? Watch this. Guys this plan is foolproof. I’m sure no one saw that and there is no surveillance at all in a police department.

Sweeney: THEY MAKE ME SO ANGRY. STOP BEING SO STUPID. LEARN THINGS.

Lor: Ashley is so sad she doesn’t realize she’s burning dinner. Papa Marin asks what they’ve heard from Mariska Mom. There’s no news, which is bad news. Ashley burns her hand and freaks out. Papa Marin says people would believe her if she said it was self-defense. Ashley says she already told him the truth and they both notice that Hanna is eavesdropping.

At Rosewood High for Liars Not Facing Criminal Charges, Emily passes a note to Caleb on Hanna’s behalf. She jokes about also copping a feel for her, but that isn’t going to happen. Caleb thanks her and as he leaves, Spencer calls out and follows Emily through the hall. She’s clearly not happy with Spencer at all. Spencer says she’s figured out who Alison was calling. None of the sorority sisters knew about the hidden room Spencer found in 2 seconds, but they used to have this house mother who would mysterious disappear and reappear. Emily already knows about “the Grunwald” because of the creepy mask last episode. Spencer wants to go talk to Grunwald and see what non-information this newest character will add. Emily stops her and says that having the Stalker RV could’ve helped Ashley (WHYYYY) and she’s not going on a wild goose chase just to help Spencer clear her guilty conscious.

    Emily walks away but then immediately feels a bit bad about what she said. She’s distracted when she hears classical music playing from an empty classroom. It’s Shana, playing the violin. Is this supposed to be significant? The Strings of Stalker Tendencies or something? IDK.

Mike finds Aria in the hall and asks how she could do something. Aria has no idea what he’s talking about so he spells it out: hook up with Connor last night. He says it very awkwardly and slowly like Cooooon-nor last niiight. Guys, seriously, I understand less and less of what is happening by the second. Anyway, Mike heard this gossip in the locker room. Aria stomps off in that direction, right past Ezra Fitz. Have we been seeing less of him lately? Because his face on my screen made me feel more, “UGH, WHAT? WHY?” than usual. (S: +1.)

In the locker room, Aria announces to everyone Connor is with that nothing happened between them. Mind you that all his buddies are congratulating him on the “conquest” because misogyny starts young and stuff. Connor says Aria can cut the innocent virgin act because everyone (except the authorities!) know that she wasn’t just Mr. Fitz’s Scrabble partner. Aria is stunned into silence and when she turns to leave, Ezra is there looking like a creep. He tells her that she isn’t allowed to be in there and she leaves. (S: But also what business does this random pedobear English teacher have in the locker room?)

Spencer and Toby are on a road trip to go see Mrs. Grunwald. Spencer is being short with Toby so he apologizes to her.

     

Rosewood High for People Not on Road Trips. Aria is sitting alone and Ezra finds her and asks what happened in the locker room. He tells her she can’t let stupid rumors get to her and she explains that it can’t actually be a rumor if it’s true, so I’m assuming she means the “sleeping with a teacher” and not the “Connor” portion. Aria says that Ezra doesn’t get to be the guy who helps her feel better anymore. She asks him to stay away from her and leaves. I LIKED THAT SCENE. (S: ME TOO.)

Toby and Spencer arrive in Ravenswood and suddenly their color is all washed out, like this is Forks. (S: SAME THOUGHT. SO MUCH BLUE.) There are lots of ominous things like a lady at a graveyard, a ton of birds, old cars and Spencer having to parallel park. (Seriously, I can’t do that. You don’t have to learn in Florida.) Additionally, there are no street signs and no one will talk to them and someone is peering out at them from behind some blinds. Everything is crazy in Ravenswood.

Emily finds Mona during 3rd or 4th lunch (who’s counting?) and demands to know what A has on Toby. Mona says she doesn’t know. All she knows is that A has proof of all the bad things they’ve ever done. One wrong move and they all go up in flames.

Spencer parks just outside of the address they are looking for. She asks the gardener for Mrs. Grunwald and the gardener says there is no one there but him and he only deals with the master of the house.

Sweeney: A+

Lor: As soon as Toby and Spencer leave, the gardener calls someone. They park in town again and Toby is hungry. Spencer doesn’t want to eat and Toby’s all, “WOAH WOAH WOAH,” because he isn’t driving back to town with “low blood sugar Spencer” who is worse than “low caffeine Spencer.”

  Very, very, very luckily for Spencer, Mrs. Grunwald is getting her hair done at the salon she’s standing just outside of. Very unluckily for Spencer, Mrs. Grunwald doesn’t help at all. She doesn’t know Alison, claims to have never spoken to her and further claims to not be the person Spencer thinks she is.

Aria is crying in bed. Mike comes to see her. She says she’s sorry that his whole team thinks she’s a slut and she’s sorry that their mom went away. Mike sits down and admits that he messed up. He should’ve stood stood up for Aria. He says he’ll make it up to her and they hold hands. (S: This was kind of adorable.)

Hanna gets home after a walk and finds her dad drinking on the stairs, as one does. Hanna blames herself for everything that’s happened with Wilden and all her failed attempts at fixing things. Papa Marin wishes she would’ve come to him, so he probably forgot that he’s a crappy father, or whatever. Or maybe not because when Hanna says she didn’t think he wanted her to come to him, he just keeps drinking.

Spencer is convinced Mrs. Grunwald is lying, but Toby just wants to go home. “You’re following a lead that came from a bird.” Oh, Toby. Dear, sweet Toby. Somehow that line just explains everything. Toby says Spencer has to learn when to let things go. Spencer says she may be trusting a bird, but Toby is still trusting A.

Toby goes to get something to eat. Spencer hears some choral music being blasted out of outdoor loud speakers. Everyone in town seems to be walking in one direction and Spencer follows. They all end up gathered in front of a Weeping Angel, everyone just staring, not saying anything. Spencer spots Shana and takes off back toward Toby. Not only that, but they see Shana get into Jenna’s car and they speed away. Toby and Spencer run back to their own car, but something crashes against their windshield. They get back out to investigate and it’s a dead bird.

Open Mic Night. Google tells me Anthony Stable is playing. Emily is feeding Aria sympathy food. Connor is there, which Emily couldn’t help, but she at least put him on garbage duty. The one adult who used to work at One Coffee Shop is out of the country. Hilarious.

Spencer arrives and tells her friends that she thinks Shana got to Grunwald first. Tanner walks in and says she needs to see Emily at the station alone. Everyone makes Big Eyes at each other. At the station, Tanner is showing Emily a video of someone in an Emily mask, holding up a sign that says, “guilty.” Plus, someone of course saw her hanging up a flyer and an hour later, Tanner found the Wilden video. The note on the CD is different. It’s in Emily’s handwriting now instead of the more block-like letters Emily actually used. Tanner gets a call so she says they’ll have to finish this questioning later.

At Rosewood’s One Coffee Shop, Aria is freaked out about Emily being take away.

    Spencer tells Aria that she Shana get in Jenna’s car but then she lost her. But no! She didn’t! Because Shana is just behind them, playing violin at Open Mic Night. So, that’s why we saw her with a violin earlier. Smooth.

Meanwhile, Ezra stands outside of the coffee shop and looks in on Aria like a total creeper.

Sweeney: I LOL’d. It was kind of a RAGE LOL because of my hatred for him, but he’s at max creeper game here.

Lor: Emily is still at the station and she gets up real close to the video. The person with the Emily Mask is standing in front of the population sign for Rosewood.

Shana plays on and her audience is enraptured. Outside, someone is beating up a car with a baseball bat. Connor heads out to throw the trash away and yells at the vandal that that’s his car. The vandal takes off running and Connor sees that “LIAR” is spray painted on the side of his car.

Finally, we head back to the Marin Manor where Ashley is being arrested. The gun was used to kill Wilden and Ashley’s fingerprints were on the bullets. Ashley asks Papa Marin to look after Hanna. She says she loves Hanna and is lead away.

A-nonymous. A breaks into and hotwires a car while wearing an Emily mask.

 

 

Next time on Pretty Little Liars: Emily steals from the Rosewood PD and the girls search Wilden’s apartment in S04 E07 – Crash and Burn, Girl!