'Pretty Little Liars': "Turn Of The Shoe" Or This Show Is About A Parrot, Right?
Hey gang, we're back! This is my favorite episode of Pretty Little Liars yet (of the two I've seen) and I think it's all because this episode features a parrot and a dojo. Those two things speak to me. Anyway, let's get down to it.
The girls are noshing at a coffee house named after a Hitchcock film.Where I grew up in Delaware we just had a place called the Brew-ha-ha. Alas for me...
Hannah (or Hanna? Who is she supposed to be? Saoirse Ronan?) is worried about her mom. The girls are arguing over who the lady in the long black veil was. Also, they are still arguing over whether or not Allison is dead or not. You would think a good autopsy would straighten that all out.
Creepy Mona shows up and whines about not being cool enough to join their girl gang. Once more, the girls peer pressure Mona into showing them something mysterious. At one point, Emily is like, "I'm not even sure what we're supposed to be looking for." THAT MAKES TWO OF US!!!
Oh, they're where Mona and Hanna locked that trailer last week. The trailer is gone. Mona looks way uncool to the four cool girls now. No way they'll ever let her into their girl gang. Mona is upset. She's being rejected by the cool kids…again! She gets into her car in a huff, but before she can put on her seat belt, the crazy baby mask lady-dude-person who's hiding their identity starts to strangle Mona with her own seat belt.
Mona hits the Mask of the Doll Death in the head with her trusty Maglight flashlight and manages to escape into the arms of Aria and Emily. Soon Doll Face is trying to hit the three of them with her car. The girls land in a ditch. Emily is wounded.
We finally have come to the show's opening credits.
Am I wrong, or does a LOT happen really quickly on this show?
Hanna is wearing an outfit that makes no sense and gets a text that makes no sense. Mona's car was found?? I thought they lost her RV??? She talks to a woman with enough plastic surgery to play her mother. Mom and daughter talk fondly about how they're happy Officer Wharton College is dead. Hanna gives her mom her phone back and both women are clearly hiding things from each other.
Spencer Tracy gets a rejection letter from U Penn (which should have been obviously a rejection before she opened it because it came in a small envelope).
Hanna and Aria have some girl talk about Emily's shoulder injury and how A is framing Hanna's mom for murder. You know, girl talk. Hanna sees some nice enough seeming girl studying and decides to insinuate she's hiding something about…something?
Emily's girlfriend is showing off some Sims version of their dream dorm room at Stanford. They get excited (sexually) and Emily's girlfriend tries to embrace her, but she only embraces her sore shoulder. Emily lies about almost being murdered.
Spencer wants to hang out with Arson Eyebrows, but he's acting weird about his new job. They have a fight about secrets and Arson Eyebrows acts unsurprised that Mona's RV was stolen and Mona was almost killed. Spencer is aghast by how apathetic Arson Eyebrows is about this and thinks it means he was involved.
I...just think it means he's a bad actor.
Aria is in class with her hot ex-boyfriend, who is her current teacher, and thinks his reference to doomed literary romances is an allusion to their tryst, but he's just talking about John Steinbeck. Aria and her friends leave when the bell rings, but Spencer Tracy stays behind and starts to cry to hot teacher about not getting into U Penn. He offers to help her write an essay for a different school and then stares off into the distance as he mumbles about not getting what your heart is set on--and that--that I think is an allusion to his tryst with Aria. Not East of Eden.
Hanna and Emily are talking on the phone like girls and Emily is complaining about her shoulder. Hanna brings up that Emily has a big swim meet the next day and you know, shoulders are important for swimming. Swimming is important for getting into Stanford with your lesbian lover, but that's just the subtext. So, naturally, Emily starts taking prescription pills. Oh, and Hanna discovers that her mom's Manolo shoes are covered in mud, which is weird because she was in New York and there's not a lot of mud here.
Aria enters a dojo.
Yes. Aria enters a DOJO.
I'm totally on board with this show right now.
Immediately a hot guy talks to her. She decides to sign up for classes, which is what I would do if I actually knew there was a dojo full of hot guys somewhere.
Then, Hanna asks her mom about her Manolos and her mom gets a weird 'tude that screams that her mom is hiding something horrible…like she murdered Officer Wharton College. But it's probably something else, because that's how shows like this work. Or she did kill him. I don't know. Why can't this whole show be about hot guys in a dojo? Whomp-whomp!
Has anyone notices that the music on this show is really dramatic? I can't help but think all these girls' lives would be easier if they listened to more Betty Who.
Okay, anyway…
Hanna wants to hang out with Spencer Tracy, but since she can't, she hangs out with dead Allison's living mom. There are some creepy camera angles that suggest someone is watching them from inside the house. But they're just camera angles.
Oh, there is a parrot who sounds like Allison. MAYBE THE PARROT REMEMBERS ALLISON'S LAST WORDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The proof is in the parrot!!!!!!!!!!
Spencer Tracy is hanging with hot teacher under actual legitimate circumstances. They are working on a college essay. I like this. This is the one part of the show that feels true to my high school life. Except they're talking about how one of her friends was murdered and she lost her mind, and my essay was about how I wanted to own a moped one day. (Hey! It got me a big scholarship to Boston University. They love the mopeds in Boston.)
Aria is in her dojo. Hot guy is helping her learn how to defend herself. It's all very Tris/Four in Divergent. (Oh, Divergent…did you see those film stills in Entertainment Weekly?!?!?) Hot guy wants Aria to trust her because the dojo is a place of trust. He spouts some zen lines about feeling safe, but it's really just foreplay. I LIKE THIS STORYLINE. MORE DOJOS. LESS CREEPY DOLLS.
Oh my God, did Hanna just ask Allison's mom about Allison's dead body being recovered?!? YOU CAN'T JUST ASK PEOPLE THAT, HANNA.
Flashback zone: In the past, Allison's mother liked alcohol and Allison liked low cut shirts. Allison tries to manipulate her mom into letting her stay alone in a beach house by holding her breath. It somehow works.
Hanna tells Allison's mom in the present day that Allie never invited them to the beach house and her mom's like, "No shit, Sherlock. Do you want my parrot?"
Yes, I would like your parrot.
Back in the dojo, Aria kisses her hot dojo master and then leaves. I like her style.
On her way home, Aria gets stuck in traffic and notices some cops laughing together. Oh, wait, she sees Creepy Mona talking to the cops. That seems more suspect. So, Aria stops by the cops and tells Mona to get in the car. Mona is in the girl gang now.
Aria is like, "ARGH! CREEPY MONA!!! Why are you laughing with the cops!?!?" And Mona is like, "Uh, I was spying. They found high heel tracks at the scene of the crime." Mona thinks this means Allison was there, but we already know that Hanna's mom's heels are muddy, so…
Arson Eyebrows admits to Spencer Tracy that he moved Mona's RV for A. In exchange, Arson Eyebrows got a transcript of one of his crazy mom's last conversations before she killed herself.
Emily is doping up in the locker room and that studious girl Hanna hates tries to get in Emily's head. She also wants the Stanford swimming scholarship. It's going to be a swim-off! So, Emily takes more drugs.
Spencer Tracy reads Arson's crazy mom's last crazy report aloud like it's a love poem. It sounds like Arson Eyebrow's mom was actually doing better before she killed herself, but Spencer Tracy thinks A is manipulating Arson Eyebrows, which would make sense since this entire show is about A manipulating people.
Cut to: The Swim Off. Emily is so doped up that she hits her head on the wall of the pool and knocks herself out. There's blood. It's gross. The EMTs show up and wheel Emily away. They ask a concussed girl on drugs how she hurt her shoulder, and rather than tell the truth, Emily says she fell off her bike, which only sounds like she's being domestically abused…so this will turn out well.
Aria starts bitching to Spencer Tracy about Creepy Mona and blabs about kissing the hot guy in the dojo. Spencer Tracy is all, "Ew, why would you do that?" Aria moans about all the shit in her life, but it's like, "Bitch, please. You kissed him because he was hot and you were in a dojo, aka the sexiest non-geographic location on earth that's not a Medieval tower."
Anyway, Hanna shows up with her new best friend: the parrot. Hanna claims that the parrot might give them clues, but she's really hiding her loneliness and how much the parrot trusts and believes in her. Hanna finds out about the muddy high heel footprint and the parrot starts singing a creepy song.
I love this parrot.
Later, Hanna confronts her mom while she's texting. Her mom jumps like she's been caught mid-sext. Hanna asks her mom if she's hiding anything and her mom is like, "I'm not a murderer." When I ask my mom if she's hiding anything, my mom's reply is usually, "Yes. I ate all the potato chips after you went to bed." I'm not implying anything, but I think Hanna's mom shouldn't be trusted.
The parrot is now hanging out with Spencer Tracy who doesn't appreciate the bird's avian beauty. She wants Hanna to take the bird away until she realizes the parrot isn't singing a song, but a phone number. Now, Spencer Tracy loves the bird as I do.
Aria's dojo master makes a house call, which is one of my sexual fantasies, and asks to go on a date. He makes some teacher-student relationship dig and Aria is finally turned on and wants to grab coffee.
Emily's lesbian girlfriend finally learns the truth about her injury and A and all that jazz. They kiss and it's sweet and not interesting.
Aria, Hanna and Spencer Tracy are debating calling the parrot's phone song number. They go to get the parrot and the parrot has been parrot-napped! OH NO! MY HEART! IT'S BROKEN!
Hanna's mom is drinking white wine alone, which is something I like to do, when she decides to put her muddy heels in the trash. The lights creepily blow out. She leaves the house.
Now we're looking at some rice and chicken and someone with gloves is feeding my beloved parrot real human food. I LOVE YOU, PARROT!
That's all that happened.... I think?