Pretty Little Liars: Not THAT Logan Reed!!

The PLL gang is outside, looking at a copy of Ian’s “suicide” “note” on an iPad knock-off.   Apparently, Hanna took a photo of it with her phone and sent it to Emily.  Aria wonders if it’s a suicide note or a confession.  Emily says she’s not exactly relieved that Ian is gone, but Aria tells them that it’s good news because now everyone will know they were telling the truth.  They’ll still think you guys are weirdos, though.  That’s never going to stop, you little drama magnets.  Policeman Garrett shows up, saying that he’s sorry that they had to find Ian like that, but it could have been worse, since bodies start decaying after a week.  Right, that’s understandable because from what I’ve learned from WHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAA?!   Ian had been dead for a week?!  How could he have been texting Melissa?  Ah, but what if it was “A” that was texting Ian?  Everyone gets all weirded out by this, but seriously, if I were part of that group, I’d be all, “Yeah, ‘A’ is behind everything, so I don’t know why we all act surprised when we figure out that he/she’s doing something insane.”

“Okay, so this adjourns the 9:55am coffee break.  I’ll see you guys at the 10:00am coffee break.”  “What, you’re going to skip the 9:57am coffee break?”  “Yeah, sorry, I have to go to the coffee shop to get a cup of coffee.”  “I completely understand.”

Coffee!  Hanna and Aria leave, and Emily’s all, “We now know that ‘A’ is involved, doesn’t that make you nervous?”  Again, girls, “A” should be the first person you blame for ANYTHING.  Geez.  Spencer says that she still feels better now that Ian’s dead, so they should all take a break from the suspense-ness.  She leaves Emily alone to ponder the “suicide” “note” . . . and then Emily gets a mysterious text from “A.”

“P.S.  Did I leave my Sharpie in your bedroom?  I kind of feel like I did.  I’ll just break into your house to get it some time.  LOLZ!  XOXO.”

Credits.  Have you guys ever heard the entire theme song by The Pierces?  It’s kind of dumb.  Kind of like every song by The Pierces.  When we get back to the show, Melissa is sitting on the couch, staring off into space.  God, why are you being such a buzzkill, Melissa?  Oh.  Oh, right, right.  Spencer’s mom (WHAT?!) is on the phone, talking to friends of the family.  The house phone rings, and Spencer’s mom answers it and immediately hangs up, saying that reporters have been calling all day and she’s sick of it.  The phone rings again, and Spencer picks it up and is all, Listen you soul-sucking bastards, leave us alone!  And of course, it’s her grandma on the other end.  It’s an old, easy joke, but I still chuckle every time.  Mostly.  Spencer’s dad (WHAT WHAT?!?!) and mom discuss what to do with Ian. They don’t want a funeral, but Spencer tells them that they need to have a funeral for Ian because Melissa needs this.

Caleb is over at Hanna’s because he wanted to check up on her.  She asks him if he’s ever seen a dead body.

“Yes.  But to be fair, they were all people that I had murdered.”

Get a haircut, hippie!  Caleb says that he has seen a dead body before and then Ashley (Hanna’s mom) comes in and tells her that she kept trying to reach her and she needs to have her phone on all the time.  All the time!  ALL THE TIME!!  Ashley tells Hanna that for a year, she’s been terrified that whenever Hanna left, she was afraid that she’d never come back.  Hanna tells her not to worry, because it’s over.  Okay, so I know that Ian being dead seems like a big relief, but are these girls forgetting that “A” is pretty much blackmailing all of them for nefarious things?  It’s not like they’re even halfway out of the woods.

Speaking of nefarious things, Aria is in Ezra’s office telling him about how she felt when she found Ian.  Ezra tells her that things are going to be better now.

It’s been my experience that hiding a secret affair is much easier when you CLOSE THE DAMN DOOR.

God, these two.  They could strip off all their clothes and have sex on a table in the cafeteria during lunch and they’d still be all, “How did everyone find out about us?  We were so careful!!!”  Oh, no, Jackie shows up and sees them!  How unexpected!  Jackie calls Ezra “Z” and when Ezra introduces Aria as a former student, Jackie remembers that they met at Aria’s dad’s party.  Aria says she was on her way to see her dad when she ran into “Mr. Fitz,” and Jackie’s all, She’s not your student anymore, I think she can call you “Ezra.”  Jackie tells Ezra that the psych dept. moved their meeting, so they don’t have to take over his lecture hall, and then she exits.  Aria’s upset because “the whole point of [Ezra] working at [the college] was so that [Ezra] wouldn’t have to introduce” Aria as his “former student.”  Really.  That’s the whole point, Aria.  It’s not about having a better job or anything.  More on this later, but this is why I don’t like Aria:  She is completely selfish and self-absorbed in this relationship.  And here’s why I don’t like Ezra:  He’s an enabler of Aria’s selfishness.  Aria says that Ezra should start introducing him as a friend.  Oh, okay, because a 25 year-old saying that the 16 year-old with him is “a friend” won’t raise any eyebrows.

Emily’s over at a courier service, handing the worker a slip of paper — someone tried to deliver a package to her mom, but since her mom’s out of town (there was a regional Advanced Standing In Doorways With Boxes seminar in Philadelphia), she’s wondering if she can pick it up for her.  But the employee looks strangely familiar . . . Emily asks if she knows him and he says he doesn’t think so, but he gets all awkward and walks away after Emily asks him if he went to Rosewood High.  As Emily’s leaving, she notices photos of the employees on the wall, and wouldn’t you know it, the guy who helped her is none other than the guy who answered Ian’s Craigslist ad to pick up a package — Logan Reed!

Again, not to be confused with THIS Logan Reed, who is notable for a different sort of package.

And a much more delightful package at that!  Back at Spencer’s house, her mom tells her that Wren called to see how everyone was doing.  Spencer’s studying and her mom’s all, “You work so hard.  You always have.”  But her parents have decided to have a funeral, which Spencer thinks is a good idea since Melissa needs some sort of ceremony.  Her mom also called her friends to see if they could come.  She also apologizes to Spencer for not believing her.  This would be touching if it wasn’t the second time I’ve even seen Spencer’s mom this season.

Emily’s in her room as well, trying to concentrate on studies, but she can’t seem to shake the “suicide” “note” and “A’s” text about her recognizing the “note.”  Meanwhile, Spencer’s online looking up rings that look like Melissa’s (the one that she stupidly pawned for Toby’s truck), and she finds one that looks similar, but the problem is that it costs $10,499.  She types “budget engagement rings” in the search engine.  I’ll do the same thing.

Google image FTW!!

Spencer still can’t find any affordable rings so she gives up.  And wouldn’t you know it, “A” texts her right at this moment:

“P.S.  I borrowed your blue sweater.  I got some Ragu on it, so I’ll get it washed and then put it back in your closet the next time I break in and take pictures of you sleeping.”

I’m a bit curious as to how “A” always seems to text at just the right moment . . . Anyway, a hooded figure walks over to Jason’s house and tries to break in, but right before he can smash open a window, Jason catches him.

We cut to Aria opening her front door to find Jason, with Mike right behind him.  Turns out Mike was the one trying to break into Jason’s house.  Aria apologizes and thanks Jason for not calling the police, but she does wonder why Jason didn’t call them.  He says that he’s seen enough cops at his house for one year.  What, you’re not going to take this opportunity to tell us how you hate cops because they always busted you for DRUGS and PARTYING, Jason? Wow.  I’m impressed.

Meanwhile, in an actually interesting plot, Emily is still poring over the “suicide” “note,” trying to figure out what “A” meant.  She prints off some of the texts she has received from “A” and starts to put the puzzle together . . .

At school the next day, Hanna apologizes to Caleb about having to be in the middle of the conversation she had with her mother.  Caleb says that at least Hanna’s mom cares — turns out his foster mom doesn’t care about him at all, she just cashes the checks and spends his money however she wants.  He struck a deal with her that as long as he goes to the meetings, she’ll leave him alone.  Way to advocate for the foster care program, ABC FAMILY.  Geez.

Before class starts, Emily drops the bombshell that Ian didn’t kill himself, and that the “suicide” “note” was made up of texts from “A”!  What?!  I did not see that one coming!  I knew that there had to be something weird with the “note,” but I didn’t see it consisting of “A’s” texts.  Nicely played, PLL.  Nicely played.  The only people who know about those texts are themselves and “A.”  This also means that Ian never confessed to killing Alison in writing, which means that they’re back at square one.  Emily tells them that Logan Reed works at the courier shop, so she’s going to see him to try to get some answers.  Right after the 10:19am coffee break, of course.

At the courier, Logan tells Emily that he saw an ad offering same day cash for a delivery, so he answered it.  He says that he never met Ian:  A woman hired him.  But he never met her, either.  She just told him where to go and when, and he went to a P.O. box to get the money.  Emily asks him if he could recognize the voice if he heard it again, and he says he might be able to.

“Can you at least tell me if she sounded blind?”

Back at the school, Hanna overhears Caleb’s foster mom yelling at him for having to come down to the school just to drop off some papers.  In yet another boring plot that doesn’t even warrant a new paragraph, Aria confronts her brother.  Mike says he was just bored, but Aria presses him, and it turns out that he was the one who broke into Emily’s garage . . . and Spencer’s house.  He was the one who shoved Aria into the coffee table.  I guess Mike has broken into other peoples’ homes as well.  Ah, yes.  Theft.  The suckiest plot point on any given drama.  We hated it when Dawn did it on Buffy, we hated it when Jenny Humphrey did it on Gossip Girl (although technically, we mostly just hated Jenny Humphrey), we hated it when Orson did it on Desperate Housewives, we hated it when someone probably did it on 7th Heaven (I haven’t seen it, but I bet Jessica Biel or that blonde chick got caught shoplifting something at one point), and now we hate it on Pretty Little Liars. Lame.

Over at Spencer’s house –

– where I’m guessing the Hastings pay about $7 in electricity every month –

Seriously!  Turn on some lights!  Melissa is still sitting on the couch, all catatonic.  Spencer says that she wants to be honest with Melissa.  She starts out saying that she was jealous when Melissa chose Ian over her, but her mother interrupts her by asking her to set the dining room table.  So, Mrs. Hastings, you’ve been gone for 3 episodes and now you think you can come back and boss everyone around?  Not cool, Mrs. Hastings.  Not cool.

Hanna wants to wear a slutty red dress to Ian’s funeral, but Ashley puts the kibosh on that real fast.  What the eff happened to Hanna’s dad?  Last I checked he was still hanging around their house.  Whatever.  Ashley tells Hanna that “It’s a funeral, not a Nicki Minaj concert.”  Oh, way to be timely, PLL writers!  All us kids totally know who Nicki Minaj is!  That’s rad!   Although, why would anyone want to wear that dress to a concert?  Ashley tells Hanna that they need to be there to support the Hastings family, and it’s hard enough burying someone everybody hates, so they don’t need to call attention to it.  Then, out of the blue, Hanna’s all, “Is that what grandpa’s funeral was like?”  Ashley says she didn’t go to her dad’s funeral.  So, Ashley is yet another character on this show that apparently has daddy issues.  Fantastic.  What is this, Lost?  Ashley says that the only reason she knows that he had a funeral is that it took her forever to pay it back, but she doesn’t regret not going.  She left home at 17 and would have left earlier, if she’d had the money.

Time for another PLL funeral!  It’s weirdly at the same church where Ian violently confronted Spencer in last season’s finale.  Why would the family agree to that?  Geez.  The police are there, at Spencer’s parents’ request, in case anyone shows up to cause some drama.

Too late.

Emily talks to Spencer privately, telling her that Ian wasn’t the one who hired Logan.  But Spencer says she doesn’t want to talk about this stuff anymore, that maybe Dr. Anne was right, that they should be separated and not be so obsessed.  She asks Emily if she ever thought about how maybe “A” wants them to be obsessed, and tells her that no matter how much of the truth they find out, they’ll never be able to bring Alison back, and it’s time to focus on the people who are still with them.  Which is a pretty mature thing to say, considering it came from the mouth of someone who pawned her sister’s ring to buy a truck for her boyfriend who hasn’t even shown up to comfort her over the past couple days.  Toby is a crappy boyfriend.

Ezra shows up at the funeral too, which is both perplexing and stupid.  He’s on his way to talk to Aria, but he’s sidelined by Aria’s parents.  Aria waits for him to say that he’s there to support her, but he chickens out and says that he’s there to support all his ex-students.  Aria is not happy to hear this.

“Well, I guess I’ll just have to move on to my physics teacher.  Prepare to have your world rocked, Mr. Rabinowitz.”

Emily tells Garrett about who hired Logan, and Garrett wonders just what Emily wants him to do.  He tells her that he’ll try to find out who the mystery woman is.  Time for the funeral.  For once, we’re treated to a tv show funeral where that freaking “Angel” song by Sarah McLachlan isn’t playing.  Way to buck the trend, ABC Famly!  Weepy piano-y music plays as the PLL girls, front and center, throw dirt on Ian’s grave.  Which I think is kind of odd.  Shouldn’t members of the family be doing this?  I mean, it looks cool, yes, but it just doesn’t seem right.  Aria spies someone sitting far away from the funeral — it’s Jason.

After the burial, Emily asks Aria why Jason’s there, and Aria tells her that Jason probably wants closure.  Emily says that Jason’s a freak and always has been.  Nikki brought up a good point in the comments last week:  Jason 1.0 seemed to have been apologizing to Spencer and wanting to redeem himself last season, but the writers seem to be treating Jason 2.0 as an entirely different character.  And it’s kind of annoying.  Ezra walks up to Aria and wants to talk to her for a minute.  Aria bitchily asks if she should round up the rest of the students so he can address them as a group.  Ezra says that he did come to see her, but it didn’t seem like the right place to tell everyone.  Which, I agree with, given that they’re at a damn funeral!  Aria says they keep talking about moving forward, but they’re not doing anything.  She goes on to say that “this is no one’s fault,” but then she pretty much tells Ezra that it is, in fact, all his fault.  She’s all, “It doesn’t change the fact that I really needed a hug from you today, not later at your apartment or tomorrow at Hollis, but here.  Right now.”  Ezra walks away and says he’ll call her.

I’m going to interject at this point, because this is a perfect example of why I can’t stand Aria.  She is being completely selfish and completely immature by thinking only of herself in this situation.  It’s like she either doesn’t understand the repercussions for Ezra (which is immature) or she doesn’t care about them (which is selfish).  Ezra could not only lose his job — technically, Aria is an enrolled student, and even the scandal  alone would cause Ezra to be fired or have to forcefully resign — but Aria’s parents could prosecute him, which would be disastrous.  But, no, Aria needs a hug.  That’s all that matters.  Shut up, Aria.

Hanna’s at her locker after the funeral, when she spies Caleb’s foster mom (Janet) walking to the office.  Hanna tells her that she’s a friend of Caleb’s and that she knows about her deal with Caleb, and since her mom is a senior partner at the law firm of “Dolce, Gabbana, and Leibowitz,” she suggests that she give Caleb the money until he turns 18, or else she’ll sick “Erin Brockobitch” on her ass and haul her to court.  I liked the “Erin Brockobitch” line, but I find it a tiny bit of a stretch that Janet wouldn’t know what Dolce & Gabbana is (I mean, come on, anyone who’s watched anything on Bravo would know that shit), but whatever.

“My dad’s also a financial advisor for Prada, Dewey, Cheatem, and Howe, so watch your back, bitch!”

At the cemetery, Aria asks Jason why he was so nice to Mike.  Jason’s all, “Maybe it was because Alison threatened to turn me in all the time.”

“For doing drugs and partying.  Because I used to do drugs.  And I don’t know if you knew this, but I used to party.  And I also used to do drugs.  Yup.  Drugs and partying.  That’s what I did.  I just thought you should know.  In case you didn’t know.  That I partied.  And did drugs.”

Why do 5 out of 10 screengrabs of Jason 2.0 make him look all ugmo?  He looks like a younger Glenn Beck in that photo.  And that is NOT a compliment.  He’s so not as attractive as Jason 1.0.  I will say he looks a lot more like Alison than Jason 1.0, possibly.  Jason says that Alison never turned him in because she was too smart and fearless.  He was jealous of her because of that and he feels like his parents think they lost the wrong child.  Aria tells him that maybe coming to the funeral was a mistake, but he says it was comforting because it means that he wasn’t the one who killed Alison.  Turns out, he doesn’t remember anything from the night she died.

“I may have been partying that night.  Or doing drugs.  Or doing drugs and partying.  Because I used to do that.  In case you didn’t know.”

Jason says he blacked out and woke up with a wicked hangover.  I call crap on that, by the way.  I have been drunk.  And I mean DRUUUUUUNNNNNNK.  Not once have I ever not remembered doing anything, and I’ve certainly never questioned whether I had sex with someone or killed someone, as tends to happen in movies.  Having sex and committing murder?  Two things that I’m sure one tends to remember.  Not that I’ve done that.  By which I mean sex.  I totally remember all the drunken murders, though.  Jason hands Aria a note.

Martha Huber strikes again.

Crap tons of bonus points if you got that joke.  Jason doesn’t know who sent him that note but it “almost destroyed” him, because he got jealous and when he got DRUNK FROM PARTYING, he got angry.  But now Ian’s confessed, so he’s all good.  Except Ian didn’t really confess!  Oh no!

Over at the Hastings House of Sad Times and Complete Darkness, Melissa’s still on the couch.  Seriously, their house is dark.  It’s like a 24/7 Bergman film in there.  Melissa tells Spencer that she’s having a girl, and apologizes for choosing Ian over Spencer.  She just didn’t want to believe that Ian could do what he did, and it’s like losing him twice.  Melissa says she deserved to be treated the way Spencer treated her, because she lied to the police, thinking she was protecting Ian.  Spencer tells her not to worry about it, and just as she’s about to tell Melissa about the ring, Melissa interrupts her and tells her that she has something important to say, something Spencer doesn’t know.  All of a sudden, a phone rings in Spencer’s bag . . . It’s Ian’s phone, the one “A” put in her bag from last episode!  Melissa is understandably pissed, as she now thinks that Spencer’s been sending her all those texts the past week!  Spencer swears that she wasn’t the one doing it, but Melissa picks up the phone, throws it, and says that she’ll never forgive Spencer.

“God, RUDE!!”

Ella (Aria’s mom) is putting away some clothes when her husband comes in and tells her that she needs to stop cleaning stuff and have a drink.  She feels guilty because Ian was a coach at the school and she didn’t see or say anything.  Mike tells them that he’s going out to get some dinner with friends.  Oh, Mike.  We don’t care.  We never did.

Garrett shows up to Logan’s work with a bag of money, telling him that he shouldn’t ever see him again, to which Logan agrees.  Garrett then calls Jenna on the phone and tells her that “it’s taken care of.”

Back at Hanna’s, Caleb shows up with some ice and food (oh, I guess earlier there wasn’t any food or ice in her house.  I didn’t think that was important.  It’s still not.  Not really.).  Hanna tells Caleb that he shouldn’t have done that, but Caleb says that Janet showed up with a fat wad of cash.  He can’t stay, though, because Lucas cutely wants Caleb to watch The Goonies with him.  Cute!  He thanks Hanna for “Dolce, Gabbana, and Leibowitz,” and then Hanna gives him a big ole smooch.

Emily’s looking at the program from Ian’s funeral — on the back is a map showing where the grave is located for the service.  She then gets a text from “A” which says that “Sometimes the shortest distance from plot A to plot B is the long way around.”  Emily suddenly recognizes that the map she received (it was in the package that she picked up from Logan at the courier’s) as a map of the graveyard.  I think.  I’m a bit fuzzy about this part.

Anyway, the PLL gang goes to the graveyard at night, with Emily telling the gals that “A” set them up.  Spencer agrees, saying that she thought she’d feel better after Ian’s death, but as long as “A” is still out there, things are going to be wacky.  I told you, ladies!  Spencer says that “A” wanted Alison’s death to look like an open-and-shut case, hence the “suicide” “note.”  I suppose to get the police off their backs so they could find Alison’s (and Ian’s?) real killer.  Which would mean that “A” is trying to help them, which is weird, since “A” tends to treat them like crap.  The girls end up at Alison’s grave, when all of a sudden –

“G-G-G-G-GHOST!”

They hear Alison laughing, and in front of them, playing on the side of a mausoleum, is the video footage of Alison the night she died — the video of her with Ian in the woods.  We see the same stuff we saw before — Ian and Alison, then the camera dropping, and Alison’s hand shaking on the ground and then stopping. . . But this time, there’s more:  Alison’s hand starts moving again, then Alison gets up and thanks Ian for meeting her.  She picks up the camera, turns it on Ian . . . and then Ian walks away, out of the view of the camera!

End Credits “A” Sequence:  The girls try to locate the projection spot, but they don’t spy someone in the dark, skulking away with the projector.