Pretty Little Liars S06xEp13: The Gloves Are On

Lucas resurfaced, Liam showed us his abs on video chat and Emily came clean…sort of. And then there’s the whole Caleb-Spencer thing. I think I’m equal parts scarred and intrigued by the developments on that front.

Spencer tells Hanna the truth about her feelings for Caleb before acting on them and then trying to keep their tryst a secret. (Sidebar: Gotta love Spencer’s insistence that she hadn’t yet hooked up with Caleb because, “I would never do that to you,” even though we were just reminded that Spencer totally would do that.) How mature and, frankly, how unlike everyone on this show! A+, Spencer. Just like old times.

Over at Radley, Ashley is having a little chat with Lorenzo. He clearly suspects that the security footage had been tampered with, and he demands a list of every staff member and every hotel guest from the night of Charlotte’s murder. Poor Ashley. She is the only mom on this show who gets interrogated by the police as much as the liars. Let’s hope she doesn’t end up hitting Lorenzo with her car too.

Emily’s mom receives a letter from Pepperdine University and discovers that Emily never actually graduated from there and has been lying to her about it for years now. I didn’t buy the whole Emily is broke storyline, or the subsequent news that she’s selling her eggs. That’s very unlike her and is the last thing I would have expected. It is comforting however, to know that she doesn’t have some sort of illness.

But dear lord, Ezra has surpassed himself this season. It’s a jump to accuse him of murder based only on the fact that he’s day-drinking and saw Charlotte on the night she was killed, but then I operate on the assumption that he’s a psychopath at all times, so why shouldn’t his previous victims do the same?

That said, there’s something about the new dynamic between him and Aria now that she’s an adult that makes all their interactions that much more disgustingly fascinating. She always had a ludicrous amount of power in the relationship given that she was a high school student and he was her teacher, so to see them just remain toxic as ever is weirdly satisfying. Of course she believes he’d kill for her, and of course she’d offer to protect him.

As the episode nears its end, one by one, the girls all get a text message. At the same time. OMG! The message reads: YOU KNOW WHO DID IT AND I’M GOING TO MAKE YOU TALK. It’s signed, not with an “A,” but with what looks like a devil-face emoji. It’s official! Our “big bad” is finally here.