Pretty Little Liars Ep. 23: Eye of the Beholder

March 5th, 2012

Aria discovers more about Alison’s past, Emily gets a message from Maya, Spencer tries to bond with her new brother, Hanna saves the day and Ezra pushes me too far. Find out what happened on tonight’s brand new episode of Pretty Little Liars after the jump!

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After a stranger called out Vivian’s name thinking she was Aria at the end of last week’s episode, we learn that his name is Duncan Albert, he’s been in Florida for a year, he gave Aria his phone number and he’s cute. Duncan told Aria he met Vivian in Brookhaven in a bookstore not too far from the creepy doll store.

While discussing Duncan outside the cupcake store (NOMNOM), the girls see Jenna and Toby get out of a town car and Jenna’s eye is bandaged. Can she see now? Spencer looks like her heart actually breaks when she catches a glimpse of Toby. I heart Spoby.

Spencer runs into Toby in the hall and has the most poorly articulated conversation I’ve even heard Spencer engage in. Spencer asks about Jenna’s eye and Toby explains that she is only getting one done at a time. Spencer tells Toby she’s been thinking a lot about their relationship, but Toby says it’s too late for that.

Toby takes Jenna to the hospital for a check up and of course he runs into Wren.

Jenna introduces herself and seems to take a liking to Wren’s accent. Finally, something I can relate to with Jenna. I wonder if Jenna will have her way with Dr. McDreamy and make him the new Toby/Garrett/Noel.

Duncan and Aria meet at school and Duncan’s first question is whether Aria told him her real name, since he knows that Vivian didn’t at first. Homeboy seems to know a lot already. But what he doesn’t know is that Vivian/Alison is dead. Aria tells Duncan that Alison disappeared a year ago on Labour Day weekend, but Duncan tells Aria that he saw Alison that weekend. Duncan knows that Aria kept journals and reveals that Alison talked about the four girls to him. Duncan says they spent a lot of time together near Brookhaven the summer before Alison disappeared.

Jason finds Spencer and Emily at school and tells them that Maya dropped of some of Alison’s things she found in her house. Jason is confused because he read in the paper that Maya is missing, but somehow dropped off the bag. We’re all confused too.

Emily gets a text from a private number, but Maya signs it with her name and says she’s safe and to not tell anyone. This could easily be A. I feel so bad for Emily. First crazy Paige tried to drown her, now runaway Maya is acting like she’s one half of Thelma and Louise. Where are the nice girls in Rosewood?

Maya finally sends Emily a real message (longer than one only typed with her thumbs) in an email. Maya again asks Emily to not tell her parents, but does tell Emily that she shouldn’t have come back to Rosewood and wishes they had ended things on better terms. While Maya definitely broke up with Emily in the email, I’m still not convinced that this is the last time we’ll see her. It’s PLL. Everyone comes back. Even dead people.

The girls are walking home from school and see Toby and Jenna talking to the fire department outside their house. Are they blaming Alison for the fire that blinded Jenna? Also, do all Fire Marshall’s dress like they’ve just be awarded the purple heart? Fancy.

After throwing her cell phone into a sink full of water, Hanna argues with her mother to buy her a new phone. How about you get a job? Ashley refuses to replace the phone. Hanna refuses to make any face other than this one.

Mona has a six month old phone (is it rotary?) that Hanna can use and Mona even agrees to foot the bill. Nice! How long before A gets Hanna’s new digits? Hanna wishes that she could get Toby alone without Jenna to talk him out of helping Jenna frame them for the fire. Mona comes up with a plan to pretend she’s buying Toby’s truck and gets him alone in a classroom.

Hanna swoops in and reminds Toby that Jenna was terrible to him and that he should stay away from her. Toby reminds Hanna that he knows what the girls did to Jenna when they blinded her. This would have been a good time for Hanna to point out that it was Ali, not the other girls who set the garage on fire.

Ella drops by Ezra’s office to make it clear that her visit last week to his apartment does not make her an ally; it only means that she wants to ensure that Aria is safe. Ella asks Ezra if he knows of anyone that has ever bullied Aria or used their relationship to hurt either of them. Ezra, as always, is unhelpful.

After his talk with Ella, Ezra calls Byron to his office to do easily the stupidest thing I’ve seen him do in two seasons. And this is from a guy dated his teenage student. Ezra tells Byron that he’s turning down the job in Louisiana and won’t be bullied by his girlfriend’s father. It’s official – I can’t stand Ezra. How does Ezra not get that he is totally in the wrong in this situation? He should be kissing Byron’s feet for not sending his vest wearing butt to jail. I’m out. Team Anyone But Ezra.

Duncan wants to talk more to Aria, so he invites her to the airfield where he and Alison hung out. Duncan used to take Alison flying because she felt safe in the air (I assume because there’s no cell service) and Duncan admits that he was in love with Alison, but someone got in the way. We don’t find out who that someone is, but Duncan does tells Aria that on the day Ali disappeared he picked her up in his plane from Hilton Head in South Carolina and flew her to a field in Philadelphia. This means that Alison was in Rosewood when the girls thought she was still on a bus coming home from her grandmother’s house in South Carolina.

Jason brings over the bag Maya dropped off filled with Alison’s stuff and Spencer and Emily look through the contents. Everything is peachy keen until Mrs. Hastings comes home to find her husband’s illegitimate son in her kitchen and freaks out.

Jason leaves and Mrs. Hastings tells Spencer to never invite Jason into their house and to never ever ever go to his house. What is the deal?

When Emily leaves, Spencer talks to her mom again about Jason. Spencer thinks they need to stop hiding and instead talk to one another, but Mrs. Hastings wants Spencer to forget that she ever found out Jason is her half brother. He’s not a sweater she left on the bus. It’s kinda hard to forget that info. Spencer tells her mother that she confronted her dad about Alison blackmailing him and Mrs. Hastings admits that it was she, not Spencer’s father, who hired the Private Investigator to follow Melissa. This doesn’t seem that shocking but Spencer’s all ‘WHAAAA?’

Hanna and her old phone head to Spencer’s and drop the news that her attempt to make things better with Toby backfired.

Spencer tells Hanna to not worry (chill Spencer = me likey) and before they can delve into the psyche of Toby, Hanna finds one of the newspapers that was inside Alison’s bag. The girls were looking at the objects in the bag, not at what they were wrapped in. The newspapers are all from the summer that Alison disappeared with different articles highlighted.

Spencer already returned the bag to Jason, but he wasn’t home so she left it on his back porch. Hanna runs back to his house to retrieve the bag and search for more clues in the wrapping paper, but instead finds Jason’s house on fire.

Not only that, but Jenna in trapped inside. Freaky!

Hanna pulls Jenna out of the burning house and Spencer arrives in time to help Hanna carry Jenna to safety before the house explodes! Holy timing, Batman!

In the hospital, Jenna tells Toby that she got a text from Jason asking her to come over. When Jenna got to the house someone let her inside. This is all she remembers.

Jason tells Aria that he doesn’t know why Jenna was in his house since he never texted her and was halfway to Scranton when the police called him about the fire. Also, I think Aria and Jason should date.

Mrs. Hastings arrives and it looks like she and Jason actually talk. Before Spencer can eavesdrop, Toby delivers a message from Jenna asking the girls to visit her room.

Emily, seeing how worried Mrs. Marin and Mrs. Hastings are over something happening to Hanna and Spencer, finally calls Maya’s parents and tells them that she’s heard from their daughter. GOOD!

The girls seem to think that Jenna is blaming them for the house catching fire, but she never really says that. She does ask Hanna why she pulled Jenna out of the burning house and Hanna answers her with a ‘you’re welcome’. Why didn’t Hanna ask Jenna WHY she thinks Hanna wouldn’t save her and then we can finally figure out whether Jenna definitely thinks it was the four girls who blinded her.

The girls look through more of the newspapers from Alison’s bag and find a concert in Rosewood circled. Could that have been where Alison was in the hours before she disappeared?