Pretty Little Liars – Power Play

By starrymag | May 15, 2017

By: Michelle Lopez

 

 

After almost stabbing her fiancé’s ex-fiancé, Aria (Lucy Hale) spent the night waiting for Ezra (Ian Harding) to show up and take over babysitting duties. He walks in full of apologies and explanations, but Aria’s over it. She fulfilled her moral obligation to not leave Nicole alone and now she’s out of there. Ezra tries to get her to stay, but she’s not going to play second fiddle to Nicole. To avoid explaining the Nicole situation to parents, Aria opts to stay at Ali’s (Sasha Pieterse) house. They head into the kitchen for a snack and discover the game board mid-full system reboot.

 

The next morning Ali gives Spencer (Troian Bellisario) a call to ask how the game board ended up in her kitchen. Spencer is shocked because she spent an hour moving it so Marco (Nicholas Gonzalez) wouldn’t notice it when he stopped by for a “nap.” Spencer ends the call when Marco wakes up to avoid the call getting weird. He wants her to come back to bed, but she’s too frazzled from AD’s antics for any of that. Luckily (and unluckily), Marco gets a message from work that requires his attention ASAP and he rushes out.

 

At Lucas’s loft, Emily (Shay Mitchell) rushes around looking for clothes that don’t smell and aren’t covered in coffee while Hanna (Ashley Benson) apologizes to Lucas over the phone. The investors pulled out so Hanna’s fashion career isn’t looking so good. Hanna tosses Emily a clean shirt while she spirals over what fresh hell AD can bring since she didn’t complete her turn. Emily tries and fails to comfort Hanna as she steals Hanna’s breakfast and runs out the door almost an hour late for work.

 

At Rosewood High, Emily walks in as the morning meeting lets out. Paige (Lindsey Shaw) hangs around to clean up and let Emily know that the University of Iowa offered her an assistant coaching position. Alison walks in steals away Emily’s attention so Paige walks out with an exasperated eye roll.

 

At the house of Hastings, Spencer notices Peter’s (Nolan North) luggage, rummages through it and pulls out his passport and the business card of a PI. Her parents have once again been lying to her since Peter’s been in the country as long as Veronica. He’s been working with a PI trying to find Mary (Andrea Parker). Peter wants to keep Mary away, but Spencer wants to the opportunity to have a chat with her birth mom.

 

At school, Alison lets Emily know she’s finally made up her mind. Archer manipulated her into loving him and then stole away her agency in Welby after gas lighting her. This pregnancy is another way Archer still has a hold on Ali’s life and she’s done with it. She’s going to terminate the pregnancy and take back control of her life. Marco interrupts their conversation to let Ali know that they received Archer’s finger and it shows that he was killed around the time he allegedly disappeared. Obviously, Alison is a person of interest in the case but they’re also interested in Mary’s possible involvement.

 

After school, Alison calls a liar meeting to update them on her conversation with Marco. Hanna’s pretty much at the end of her rope. Yeah, she failed her turn but isn’t poisoning Caleb and ruining Hanna’s career enough? It’s becoming clearer to the liars that AD isn’t messing around and they can’t afford to have anyone else mess up their turn. The game board dings because it’s chosen its next victim. Welcome to your turn Alison.

 

Finding Mary

At the barn, Hanna’s got shade to throw at Spencer for sleeping with the guy that’s probably going to end up arresting them. She finds the business card Spencer swiped from her dad and gives the PI a call pretending to be from Peter’s office.

 

With the information from the PI, Spencer and Hanna have been searching for Mary. At the last house in the neighborhood the PI recommended, they are shocked to find Pastor Ted (Edward Kerr) answering the door. Spencer hangs back while Hanna questions Ted about Mary. Ted claims to have no knowledge of Mary’s whereabouts, but he’s obviously lying. As Spencer and Hanna leave Mary appears behind Ted to make sure he kept her being there a secret. Ted did, but needs to know why Mary’s hiding out in his house.

 

A while later, Ted stops by Lucas’s loft to come clean to Hanna. He admits that Mary has been staying at his place for the last few days. He and Mary dated when he was in college until she ghosted him. Mary reappeared to let Ted know that he was Charlotte’s father. Ted never knew about Charlotte, but did meet her when she attended a camp he ran. He pulls out a picture of himself with young Charlotte (known then as Charlie) and her only friend, Lucas. Hanna’s surprised by this news and stops worrying about having lost Lucas money in the investment debacle.

 

Spencer walks into the Hastings house to find Peter anxiously waiting for her. He’s been worried about her since he knows she spent the day looking for Mary. Spencer doesn’t understand why he’s so concerned about it as she just wants to talk to her birth mom, but Peter opens up about Mary. The last time he saw her was when Spencer got home from rehab. Mary broke into the house and lurked in the shadows of Spencer’s room. She wanted revenge on Jessica for lying about Charlotte being dead so she stole Peter’s pills, killed Jessica and buried her in the backyard to try and frame him. He just wants to protect Spencer.

 

Truths & Betrayals

On a video call, Alison updates Aria on her turn. AD sent her some mystery coordinates that’ll she’s going to check out after school. Aria’s game to tag along since she’s hiding from her relationship problems. Ali’s morning sickness gets the better of her so she hangs up. Aria gets a video call from AD threatening to go public with dirt on Aria that’d have Ezra picking Nicole. Aria hangs up and in a fit of rage throws her game piece across the room, shattering a glass.

 

Ali and Aria have been running around Rosewood trying to find AD’s mystery location. They arrive at their sixth location and AD’s phone starts quacking. AD wants Ali to visit the Darling Duck baby clothes store. Ali takes a deep breath and marches inside while Aria hangs back to take a call from “Ezra.” AD’s not pleased Aria took her piece of the game board, they ask is Aria wants to lose but Aria’s over this game. She wants out completely so AD sends her another set of coordinates.

 

In the children’s store Darling Duck, Alison is greeted by Julie who hands her a barcode scanner to pick gifts for her baby registry. AD tells Ali to pick ten items so she randomly starts scanning stuff while listening to a few expectant mothers excitedly chat about their babies. She returns the scanner to Julie and waits for more instructions or her puzzle piece. Much to Alison’s confusion, Julie pulls out a gift bag for the egg donor. Inside is a necklace that spells out Emily. Alison fugues out remembering Emily’s egg donation and the medical procedure she had while in Welby. She rushes toward the door and notices her puzzle piece hanging off a mobile.

 

Aria arrives at the location AD sent her and climbs into the car that pulls up. Inside she’s faced with a black hoodie wearing Sydney (Chloe Bridges). Sydney claims to be AD and offers Aria a seat at the table. Aria notices that Sydney’s taking orders from someone through an earpiece so she asks why Sydney is playing the game at all. Sydney says it’s purely because she doesn’t like being the losing team and Aria’s not sure what the heck that actually means. Sydney drops Aria off and tells her it’s time for her to make a decision.

 

One Last Chance

After swim practice Emily runs into Paige leaving her office. Paige had a call with the coach from Iowa and they need her decision by tomorrow. Emily is happy for Paige but also sad because she thought they had another chance to make things work between them. Paige thought so too but working with Alison and Emily at Rosewood High is sending her back to her high school mindset. Paige doesn’t want to feel that way anymore so she’s going to leave and give herself a fresh start. In the break room, Paige notices a pamphlet about abortions sticking out of Alison’s bag. Curiosity gets the better of her and she pulls it out to take a better look. As she’s doing that Alison walks in and flips out at Paige for the complete invasion of her privacy. Paige stutters and apologizes as Alison spends ten minutes collecting all her stuff and storming out.

 

Paige lets Emily know that she told Iowa she needs a bit more time to decide. She remembered that she’s not the only one dealing with stuff. She’d rather slay her demons than run from them, so she’s considering staying. Paige challenges Emily to a bike race to decide what she’ll do. If Emily wins Paige will stay. Emily is baffled Paige would leave something so important up to a silly bike race but Paige is already peddling away. Emily rushes after her not willing to give up her chance at keeping Paige around. Emily reaches the finish line and can’t find Paige because she stopped early to let Emily win. She runs up to kiss Emily and for a moment the future looks hopeful.

 

Ezria

At the Brew, Ezra explains Nicole’s impromptu visit as best he can. She felt trapped in the treatment facility so she ran “home”. Unfortunately, time didn’t stand still while Nicole was gone so what she considers “home” is gone. She knows about Ezria’s pending marriage and is being as supportive as possible. Ezra apologizes for being a horrible fiancé and claims that Nicole’s departure will sent everything back in order.

 

A while later, Aria returns to the apartment to find Ezra picking up the pages of their book. Nicole found it while waiting for her parents to arrive so she gave it a read complete with notes. When her parents arrived she threw it at them. Aria picks up a page and reads Nicole’s note about the memory on the page is one she held onto in order to survive her captivity. Aria’s beginning to feel a bit guilty for forcing Ezra to write this book.

 

Debrief Time

At the DiLaurentis house, Alison explains to Emily that AD stole Emily’s eggs, fertilized them and implanted them into Alison when she was at Welby. Emily doesn’t believe her at first because it sounds completely insane, but Alison’s not joking. Ali calls the Woman’s Wellness Center to cancel her appointment because she and Emily have some thinking to do.
While waiting for Aria to get back from her meeting with Sydney, Alison and Emily have filled Spencer and Hanna in. When Aria arrives everyone’s a bit annoyed not only has she been radio silent all night but she also abandoned Alison when she needed someone the most. Spencer explains AD’s extreme violation of Alison and Emily. The game board jumps back to life and starts picking its next victim. It’s supposed to be Aria’s turn but surprising everyone but Aria is picks Hanna again. Hanna loses it because she can’t handle another round after her life just got destroyed. Aria receives a text from AD asking her if she’s made a decision yet.