Episode Report Card Jacob Clifton: A+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Sweet Disposition
By Jacob Clifton | Season 1 | Episode 15 | Aired on 01.31.2011
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Aria has been up all night -- dressed like if the Hamburglar joined Bananarama -- because that picture of the somebody chasing Alison from That Night was totally taken from Alison's bedroom. So they send Spencer to speak to funny-talking/hot brother Jason DiLaurentis, who gets the photo tested but later admits he could have taken it. He was fucked up that night because that whole year he was doing drugs with Ian, whom btw he and all the other drug guys knew was boning Alison, which is gross on all levels. Spencer figures out at some point during the episode that it's actually herself in the picture -- because of that time she murdered Alison for warning her about Melissa finding out about Ian in a way that seemed like a threat -- but then they see Jason skulking around in Maya/Alison's bedroom and they all scream!
Hanna's stuff this week is amazing. Turns out that old lady is coming back to the bank early, which means Ashley is shitting herself, so A sends Hanna this awesome Mother's Day card and drawn on the front a comic balloon coming out of the mommy's mouth that says, "I NEED MONEY!" which I think just might be the greatest A message of the entire show, it's so fucking beautiful. Well done.
So the deal is that Hanna's supposed to get Ella to figure out her daughter is sleeping with Fitz, by sending her to this out-of-town museum opening that Ezra and Aria are attending as a real-life couple. After Spencer accidentally compares Hanna's A-rrangement to the annexation of Poland, she realizes you shouldn't give into bullies -- for real -- but when she tries to warn Aria off, girlfriend just bushies her eyebrows and calls Hanna a hater some more. All of which gets fixed later; the important thing is that both Aria and Ezra look hotter than the fucking sun on their date.
Thanks to secret helping by Caleb the Cyberwolf, Ella's car breaks down, and she ends up hitching a ride with Estranged Byron and then boning him in the museum parking lot! YES! The cagey way Mom acts and lies about this to Aria the next day just confuses the issue for everybody, but the point is: A was defied. That should turn out well. Oh, and then further irony: Mrs. Potter drops dead minutes before her appointment, so the whole Hanna/Aria throwdown thing was even more of a useless farce than it seemed. Which is nice, because I don't like it when Hanna is sad.
Feeling bad about her memories of killing Alison in the yard that time, or at least yelling at her and being photographed in the yard that time, Spencer spends the episode running around being like twice as Spencery as usual: When Emily gets menaced and gay-bullied by her competition on the swim team, Paige McCullers who wears Selma Blair's old haircut and a shitload of cardigans, Spencer calls a PE coach tribunal that causes Emily to nearly take her head off. Oh, and then Paige tries to drown Emily and it's awesome.
Also, they follow up on the maker of those bracelets they always wear and stare at all the time, and it is Mrs. Garrett rocking some short white hair and support for Geri Jewell's sexuality. She says A bought the bracelets under Spencer's name, so it's a dead end, but then in the creepy tag we find her making tea for A, remarking on her "interesting eyes," and Renfielding around about how she told Spencer the lie she was supposed to. Oooo!
Next week: Running around, screaming, Spencer finally makes an ally of Toby.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!Jason's running around the track shirtless, so right away you know he's going to behave himself. I love, love the way he talks. It's so weird and special. It reminds me of the first time I saw Adam Brody and I was like, "That's not how you act on TV! I've seen TV before." He sketchily says he's "Taking care of family business," and when Spencer -- dressed like a cross between Annie Hall and Carmen Sandiego, of course -- shows him the photo he's like, "After Ali disappeared we got bizarre things in the mail, too. Sympathy cards from strangers ,and letters with conspiracy theories about what happened to her... Sometimes it was photos..."
How great if he'd been like, "This one persistent dude keeps making me take my shirt off all the time and act weird at funerals. Do you know anybody named A?"
So but okay this is in actuality an actual image of Alison, in Spencer's actual yard, wearing her actual disappearing outfit, with a person chasing her, from the vector of Ali's actual bedroom. Not one of those whatevers he's talking about. Jason agrees to take it to their family's PI, and then just as Spencer's ready to run he's like, "Spencer. Ali's memorial was the hardest thing I've ever done. I was a jerk." Spencer says it was sort of more intense than that, but acknowledges his apology. She is stern, but just.
Emily's back on the swim team, and breaking records left and right. This makes Coach very happy, but current team captain Paige McCullers not so happy. Paige McCullers is a very pretty girl whose severely fucked-up looking Annie Wilkes/Selma Blair geometric haircut not only gives her, somehow, linebacker shoulders, but is also a flashing neon sign for CRAZY BITCH. Like, even Spencer finds her a little intense.
Hanna keeps calling Ashley to cry about the money, and whatever, but then Spencer and Aria appear, having made themselves a super dumb plan. Spencer's dad has tickets to this art opening in Philly that he's not using, so she's giving them to Aria for an out-of-town Real Couple Date with Ezra, as well as a sleepover alibi. Spencer is a good friend. Or else she just knows Aria's going to be the next one to crack if she can't figure out a way to make her sick fake relationship feel like the movies. One of the two.
Paige gets all the swim girls together with giftbags and delivers this speech about morale and team spirit -- interrupting herself to bitch at Emily for looking in the bag, awesomely -- and finally Coach tells her to cut it short: " All righty all righty Paige, I'm sure everybody appreciates your gifts, but I want you swimmin', not shoppin'." That's how she talks, all the time. Coach is fucking great, as a character and performance, by the way. She reminds me of a lot of Betty Buckley in Carrie: Just so sweet, and so obviously brilliant, so willing to toe the line of professionalism in order to save your soul, so willing to punch a bully in her stupid face. She was one of my role models growing up, and I'm always so happy to echoes of that character in places. Anyway, Emily tries to apologize to Paige for her excellence, but she just Nurse Ratchets her shit on up outta there without even looking.