@@simplyjuannie5128 how so? I think it did. Hanna started to push her away and get closer with the other 3 because Ali’s body was found (or what they thought was Ali) and monas mental breakdown because of the bullying she went through from Alison.
@@jacksonmcnuggets7488 i don’t like that they made A someone who was introduced in season 3. it was ehhhh but it wasn’t good imo. AD was a complete mess
Aria being A would've been ICONIC. And make so much sense?? Because literally the other girls weren't getting harassed at all until literally the day Aria came back to town. lol Literally every time the other girls are away from Aria, A leaves them alone??
I wish Ezra hadn't known Allison beforehand, I wish Allison had stayed evil, I wish Cece wasn't a character at all, and I especially wish Alex Drake was never part of it
Even Lucy Hale thought Aria would be A at the end. I mean if the actor, who played this character for so long thought that, than maybe the writers should have listened.
@@SerenaSkybourne And it woud've been good. Hale played the villain in that dire Fantasy Island movie last year and her acting as the villainous version of her character was one of the few good things.
As I’m watching the show again it also makes some sense. I mean it’s obvious out of all th girls Aria has been targeted the least. Granted she definitely had the most dangerous secrets (affair with a teacher... that can follow you everywhere), but she never really faced any real trauma other than the doll house that all the girl faced and being trapped in a box on the Halloween train. The other girls have been through far worse. Even in season 7 when Aria did betray them, Alison made a comment like ‘how come you get the easy stuff’ which tbh is very true. She never really had to go through much... though the only reason why I feel like the directors didn’t listen and didn’t have her as A was because of Ezra. And they didn’t really want any of the liars to be portrayed as villains because they went through a lot
@@vnhdhs1723 That's for the writers to say. They put the clues in, they should know why. But they dropped everything all together. It would be a big shock though & that would have been a good thing for a mystery.
I imagine the last episode where Aria is revealed as AD and half of the episode is just flashbacks of every Aria being sus moment AND I WOULD HAVE LIVE FOR IT
Someone needs to tell Marlene King that a twist doesn’t count if you introduce a WHOLE NEW CHARACTER that the audience has never met and didn’t even know existed and who was BARELY hinted at - like only a handful of episodes in THE VERY LAST SEASON hinted at it.
Aria as A would literally be perfect the writers must've known they clearly just wanted to outsmart the audience and it's so annoying also I love your videos so much
The most important thing about the show was the unconditional friendship between especially the main four. Having one of them being the ultimate tormentor would’ve ruined it. But that being said, the twin-route was not good either.
I read a lot of great Aria is Uber A theories back in the day and there was soooo much evidence that Aria was A. It’s a shame that the writers ruined everything.
It should have been ezrA fitgeralD 1) would have showed how creepy his and Aria’s relationship was 2) explains how A had some many resources since he was rich 3) could have paved the way for Aria’s involvement on the A team 4) explains the pictures of Aria in the shed 5) explains why Aria’s treatment wasn’t as harsh as the others 6) explains Aria’s clothes and why they stand out so much more than the others bc she stands out more to Ezra
The biggest clue for Aria being A was that scene in Radley where the guy recognizes her. That’s what made me believe Aria was A for sure. Can’t believe the writers fumbled the plot so bad.
Yes!! The reason people were guessing aria was because they had such great details pointing to her like this one. It was good writing and the fans dived into it. Instead Marlene changed it up since fans guessed and went for writing that made no sense
Aria and Allison duo would've been great. "Two can keep a secret if one of them is dead." Allison is "missing/dead" and Aria keeps the secrets now. And so "A" began. Aria still being puppeted by Ali somehow. And so the unconditional friendships come into play. I wouldve loved it if they kept Ali a villain even if they brought Aria with her.
Yes! And Aria wasn’t actually in Iceland, she was plotting with Ali for a year. Maybe plotting with Ali and Ezra since he had the money to make all of it happen
Personally I wish Alison had stayed in the ground because I thought the story was much more interesting when they were trying to solve "who is A" AND "who killed Alison" / "are A and Alison's killer the same people?" but if Ali had to come back then she needed to stay evil because literally why else is she there then ?? her "redeemed" character was so boring
Can I add that in the doll house, Aria was the only one who really wasn’t tortured? I mean I could see the idea that being forced to cut and dye her hair was mental torture but when you compare it to Spencer being tricked into thinking she killed someone, mona was put in the hole, Hanna and Emily being forced to chose which friend gets tortured and which gets food etc. and YES aria was the only girl who really seemed to vibe with Alison’s bullying
For the which friend gets tortured. All 4 of the girls had to pick. Cece mentally tortured them in all different ways. Cece did that to spencer bc she was struggling in s4 prior in the dollhouse by thinking she was the one that killed ali & when she found out she did not it was a doubt in her head that she also killed bethany. It wasn’t until AFTER the doll house that we find out Mona was the one who killed Bethany. Mona was mentally strong & only way she could break down was by starving the girl & making her feel like she was going to die in that hole. They all had mental torture in some way. Cece needed to let them know that she “owned” them & could “control” them with dolls thus by only mentally torturing them & never physically hurting them. Bc none of them were actually picking a friend to torture.. it was all mental, cece wanted them to think they were choosing to hurt one another than saving themselves
That punishment i really feel like it was for emily the torture your friends 1. Bc emily is a LOYAL friend. What else way to mentally hurt her than make HER think she’s hurting her friends!
@@maliablossom7340 A never really didn’t have anything on Aria besides an affair with the teacher but after Aria & Ezra became public nothing A could do. Im pretty sure Mona was that A b4 they went to tell aria’s parents. & she did kill shana i wonderr why cece never exposed that ?? But at the same time cece’s sister didnt expose about archer dunhill murder either.
@@mncdssctn9110 it never happens though!! I want a TV series that doesn’t end with happily ever after it’s boring a lot of us wanted a shock factor I think the issues was there were so many A’s that it just got old at least to me anyway.!
Agreed! Once you're on the Aria is A train you can never get off. I think it would've been cool if Wren was Charles and Aria was Red Coat and that they're half-siblings or cousins. I wanted the Lady in Black and A.D to be the same person, Bethany Young a.k.a Cece Drake. The person in the grave should've been Alison's twin or Sarah Lee Taylor.
What if Vivian was created so both Ali AND Aria could play her depending on who needed it. Because there was that guy who thought Aria in the red coat was Vivian
I think it should have been Aria. She was always so selfish and the more you talk about it the more it comes together. That was a major missed opportunity. CeCe was such a disappointing reveal. I wanted something closer to home if you know what I mean. Both reveals were detached from the story we knew. Aria being A all along would have been more intense cause we the viewers would have to question everything we thought we knew and we would be interested to watch again to reanalysis Aria. I just didn't care much about CeCe. She was just sort of Allison's 'lookalike' to me.
Exactly- CeCe was the less interesting, cheap and knock-off version of Alison, a minion. No one could be as iconic as Alison so therefore CeCe was less interesting straight away. Aria would have been a lot more shocking and personal
Cece being A was dumb because she was getting revenge on the wrong people who she should have been torturing was Kenneth who sent her away not girls who were in diapers when she got sent to the Radley.
hey ive only watched pll through once but im going through again and you seem like u know what ur talking abt can u or someone explain what motive aria wouldve had or like why she would do it to the other girls? im sure i missed something or just dont remember but can someone explain?
I think I Marlene got caught up in pride. She preferred having a shock ending than a good ending. Everyone theorizing good endings she got salty. Such a bad call. Omg Aria & Aly would’ve been such a good ending!!!
@@LaurenKaminski at least in the books, you’re aware from halfway through the series (book 8/16) that there’s a second DiLaurentis twin. They sprung the ‘Spencer twin twist’ in one season which was 7 episodes long. Marlene is absolutely at fault for how bad that show turned out, which was after season 4. The backlash she got from the Cece reveal should’ve been a wake up call not to pull something stupid in the future. She couldn’t even explain the plot holes from the Cece reveal because it was pulled out of nowhere. It was 100% pride. Shes basically a sophomaniac who thinks she’s smarter then everyone else when she’s not and it led to the downfall of her and the legacy of the show. Edit: why’d she need two twin twists? Was the Mary Drake one not enough!?
Aria and Allison being A would have been BOSS! Not only would it have been really iconic but it would also have cemented Alison as one of TVs best villains.
Fr I always thought it was weird how she went from being a manipulative bitchy villain to basically just a weaker version of herself, didn’t do Allison justice😫think they were too focused on all the ships to make the audience happy but we watched for A in the first place
Right? We guessed it AND WANTED TO BE RIGHT. We weren't trying to work against the show, we were working WITH the show as a family. The GIRLS would have been shocked as it should have been. Being betrayed by someone they thought was their friend as opposed to just being tormented by strangers for things that had nothing to do with them
take WandaVision for example, everyone knew Agness was Agatha, even the writters knew we would figured it out by the reveal, so they made the Agatha All Along song. Edit: Then they've tried to be funny and made Evan's character Ralph Bohner, so that how really is a good example of good and bad character revelations.
I think having two A's (aria/alison) could have been such a cool reveal. I read somewhere that the purpose of a plot twist is *not* to outsmart your audience - if people guess the twist, it doesn't nessesarily mean it's predictable or bad, it means you've laid the groundwork to make it plausible and you can have that moment where everything finally falls into place from the perspective of the audience.
It wouldn't be a plot twist if everyone could see it coming - that's just a resolution. Plot twists are the ones where the story takes a different turn from how it was going. If your "groundwork" is leading to it, it literally cannot be a plot twist; that's literally just the plot leading to where it had been leading from the beginning. That said, not everything needs a plot twist, and what PLL did was multiple deus ex machinas . . . not even failed plot twists, which is why the show started feeling wack long before they made it absolutely nauseating with the finale.
@@Su-mx7ix no that’s not true in order to have a plot twist you HAVE to lay down groundwork or else you end up like the pll ending which is the wrong example. In literary a plot twist has to be foreshadowed for the audience to accept it casually. That doesn’t mean you tell the whole plot because it wouldn’t be a twist but instead you’re dropping hints that leads into the twist. If the audience figure it out well number one they’re smart and number two the writer did a good job.
Marlene did us soooo dirty. I can’t believe what started as a creepy and twisted show with excellent attention to detail and clues turned into a cliche ~friends forever~ ending. I don’t know about everyone else, but it’s just so much more interesting to have Aria be A, than to make some stupid feel good ending about how strong the girls’ friendship was
AGREED! Especially after they made Spencer and Caleb date, which made Hanna and Spencer’s friendship so fractured during the last season and a half. So clearly it wasn’t the strongest friendship.
it's so infuriating to me because their friendships were truly toxic, and Aria always cared more about her boyfriends anyway so her being A fits since she was the least invested in the group. If they wanted friendship to be the main takeaway then they should have let Mona in ..........
I remember saying it can't be true that Mary is her mom because she looks like Veronica stupid decision to do. Also I live in the state the show is supposed to take place in you can't get a passport without a birth certificate she would no before the age she was that she was adopted by getting a passport.
The ironic thing is that Torian Bellisario (Spencer’s Actress) isn’t fully white. Her mom is Creole. You can tell in certain lighting when her skin looks tanner than the show. But it is funny how they look alike. And her dad as Nolan North....yeah, her dad is all over video games.
What’s weird is the Montgomery’s never really talked about their life in Iceland what if Radley has other locations and one is in Iceland and she was patient there and byrons job was the real reason they moved but “Ali going missing” and the being away from her dolls triggers a psych break
@@alsterrr93 exactly what I thought because Aria seemed mental and that probably was the Ella didn’t want Mike on medication and Bryon was terrified also i think its like school when you move from one school to another they fax your documents over
@@shoegirl927 Ally because when she puts on a brown wig she looks like Aria or they got back way earlier than it showed in the show and she had to get cleared in rosewood radley
In my opinion, Aria should have been the final A. Who cares if people have already guessed who the vilain is ? Aria as a vilain would have worked, because it made sense. I would have loved watching her turn into the final vilain ! Alison should have remained a mean girl. The evil twin trope is so uninspired that I took it as an insult.
I think the issue about the twins is they didn't write it right :c In the books, Sara Shepard uses this cliche very well in the first half of the series.
It’s literally so weird to me that aria and ezra have a happy ending... the way that the show romanticized a grown man and a minor together is not okay.. even arias parents, they were mad at first but then they just dropped it and supported their teenage daughter being with her teacher? It’s so weird to me.
A was so much more nicer to Aria. Every Liar initially had a secret they didn't want revealed: Hanna being a thief and her eating disorder Spencer kissing Ian and then later Wren And Emily being a lesbian Aria's secret was literally her dad is cheating on her mom. It had nothing to do with her and it was something she wanted to tell her mom anyways but didn't know how. Then A gave her what she wanted. A always gave Aria what she wanted at the end and it was weird how the other girls were in life threatening situations but Aria almost never was.
I think the only threatening situation she was in was the freezer in the ice cream factory. And she came at right moment to help Spencer out of the sauna.
Also Aria’s secret was also the fact that she started developing a student teacher relationship which definitely would have landed her in trouble, but yea I agree. A was mostly easy on Aria
I always figured A was light on Aria half the time deliberately to try and divide the girls or even encourage them to point the finger. OR A being light on Aria would point to someone who cared about her being A (Ezra, one of her parents, Mike, Holden, i dont know how else). I love the Aria being A theory but as someone who's watched PLL start to finish and for the first time this year I saw either Aria or Alison being A as too obvious. For example, my Dad watched a few episodes with me here and there and he straight away said Alison is alive and is A, or she's got an evil twin. (His next guess was Ezra because he hated him lol). Obviously a lot of the fans guessed Aria early on so that might have been reason for the writers changing their minds, or things pointed to Aria deliberately to throw us off (if the writers were clever enough, they seemed to be seasons 1-5 but then got stupid with the A.D. business).
I'm currently rewatching PLL S1, and the thing I noticed in the Pilot is this: In the scene where Aria shows up to Ali's funeral, shes walking down the aisle, and she has the moment where she just stares at the casket, her facial expression is so weird, like she doesn't look at all sad or upset, she just looks so neutral, and for a second I genuinley thought she was going to start grinning, ugh it was just so weirdddd. Also, out of the four girls, in this scene all her smiles and laughs seems off key and weird
I just imagine the very final scene where Ali and Aria had been AD the whole time, using people like Mona as their puppets. Since friendship was a key part in the show it ends with the 5 liars going to hang out at the Radley for the last time before they go their separate ways. Spencer, Emily, and Hanna leave first and Ali and Aria smile at each other before Aria does the signature 'shush'. Then they both turn and follow the other three and the screen goes black.
Also they were the most annoying couple! I hated them since day one. And how Ezra got away with dating a Teenager, which is also odd. Also Aria forgave him sooo fast after they found out, he was writing about them.....
I think it should have been Alison, they could have justified turning her into a weak verison of herself, and reveal the whole "Suburban Housewife" act was just a cover for her ultimate Sociopathic plan, that would have been sooooo cool. Also, Because she loved Charlotte and wanted to know who killed her. Like Ali should have been AD, the initials also fit! Also, I also only saw Ali as like half a liar, not a true Fifth Pretty Little Liar, she was just so seperated from the original four.
It would explain so much, including that terrible wardrobe they gave “nice Ali” is if Alison was mean the whole time but just pretending so she could come back and continue the game and watch the liars suffer firsthand.
She was one of my favourite characters, I couldn’t believe it when she died for no reason🥺 she’s my favourite girlfriend Emily ever had...also Emily and Allison are not made to be together at all imo😖
The big mistake of this show was to let the writers ands espacially Marlene King use social media. I really think they had a better story plain from the beginning, but unfortunately they spent their free time on twitter speaking with fan and reading fan theories who have zero knowledge in story telling. And they gave up their story to make the fans "happy" with their favorites couples and their "final twist". I think Aria was plan to be A from the beginning, from a writting perspective I don't see everything else (or maybe Wren could have been ok). Or Marlene king is just stupid and a bad writer.
I feel like a good motive for Aria to be A is that she had convinced herself in her year away that it was one of the other three Liars who had killed Allison, and she was torturing them as revenge because she and Allison had such a close bond/ were equally malicious, manipulative people. It would have made sense for her to work with and later discard Mona after she was revealed as the first A (perhaps without Mona realizing it fully). Also once A was revealed to be Aria, it would have returned the emphasis to "who killed Allison?", "who was she really?", and "how did she really die,?" and honored her legacy as an extremely manipulative, charismatic person. And if Allsion HAD come back, maybe she had teamed up with Aria to figure out who had TRIED to kill her.
Yeah omg or like she saw the three other liars ‘killing Alison’ and her and Allison could have been closer than usual and by the time she found out Alison was alive she would have probably grown to resent the liars and continued playing the game. This would also explain the memories spencer and Emily had with with shovels and ‘killing’ Alison with the shovel
Something felt weird about aria especially when she threatened her parents by saying she was gonna tell her dad's college that he had an affair with his graduate student just because they weren't comfortable with her and her TEACHER being together
aria being A would’ve been brilliant- we see her do the “shh” from the very first title sequence so it’d just be the biggest slap in the face if it had been her the whole time. i would’ve loved that.
They had so much potential with Aria. There. Were. So. Many. Clues. It started out as a brilliant show and by the end, in hopes of redemption it fell so flat. I wonder if the network (ABC FAMILY) said no to the A reveal? It is so disappointing they did not go with that.
I bet she got it in her head about the friendship thing and switched gears, and now she regrets it but she has to double down on the denial because it would be kind of embarrassing to admit you had an iconic ending and ended up going with something else. It would make sense that A was Aria from the beginning because as a writer she would've wanted to make it different than the books, but also more iconic so it would become a legacy for her.
aria as -A makes so much sense... so naturally, the writers went in another direction. before this video, i had my money on wren and i believe that the reddit leak prior to the cece reveal was true, so they changed the finale and made cece -A, which explains why her reveal episode was so terrible. the set looked like it was pulled together literally overnight. awful writing, they ruined this once-iconic show.
I would have loved Mona to be the final A. It would have been full circle. Cece stole the game from Mona. Mona got “better” and then finally snapped. She kills cece and steals the game back for herself.
Aria should've been A, and they should've somehow weaved Ezra into it as well. Like, their relationship was so creepy and wrong, I didn't care at all for the Ezria wedding, I would've much rather Aria been A or Ezra should've been written off of the show after season 4. Aria's character was just so odd and I just wish they had done something more with her, either making her A or just GETTING RID OF EZRA!
Yess!! I personally would have liked if it turns out that Aria was using Ezra, like she knew he was investigating and that he was obsessed with Alison so she needed to keep an eye on him. Just because the relationship is the worst thing on television, the only way to explain is that aria is an evil master mind.
I never had an issue with CeCe as Big A, except for the whole transgender thing (that was really tone-deaf). But I *hated* the Uber A reveal. I watched the entire last hour of the series finale with the biggest glare on my face... I was so angry.
Yeah the CeCe thing was fine, but the transgender storyline could have easily been avoided. It added to the storyline and the mystery (her dad not approving, her mum being on her side, the grave stone, the added mystery of nobody knowing who Charles is) but it was unnecessary tbh
I still think it should've been Aria, no matter if we guessed it or not. The point of these programs is going back and looking at all the clues we missed and oh yeah that makes sense now. But instead, we got an A that nobody cared about or shocked by. WE DESERVED A FOR ARIA.
They could’ve still worked in something shocking with Aria, like her not working alone, or her having a certain reason for doing all of it (like she left for Iceland and felt like the other girls didn’t miss her or whatever). They could’ve made Aria A AND had it be shocking and good but noooo. We fans got screwed over.
my biggest gripe with the alex drake situation is that she could've been a pretty good villain and a plausible AD had we been aware of her existence and had she been solidly hinted at much earlier, the potential was there but as far as execution goes the ball was dropped so hard it shattered
It would've been so cool if we were told from the start that Spencer had a twin, and if we had a few scenes where "Spencer" just seemed very "off". But nah they just made shit up lol
It would of been great if the girls thought Spencer was A all along and the half of the season the girls went after Spencer only finding out that it was her twin all along.
Aria double personality would have made sense.... espially when she was taking creepy doll photos she could be a secret friend with wren go against Cece instead or Alison
i’m rewatching and i think that eddie “knew” aria because he was in communication with ezra for his book. i’m thinking that maybe ezra had mentioned her to eddie before and that’s why he felt like he knew her when she volunteered at radley. just a thought !
They should do a re-do ending to make up for the silly ending they gave us. They should make it into a movie. That would save the entire show. And ARIA should be the main A- after all. She was supposed to be the original main A- villain it’s plainly obvious that she was the star of the show because she was going to be our main A- all along. It makes me annoyed that they didn’t make her A-
AGREED I was just thinking they should do a soft reboot kinda like Gilmore girls and fix the ending of PLL once and for all. The fans would be here for it, that’s for sure. We’re owed a better ending than Alex Drake BS. Just make the finale we got one of Aria’s dreams, and she wakes up and we get the REAL ending.
Okay but aria having a personality disorder would have been epic, it also explains how Eddie lamb recognised her, maybe she was visiting mona in radley to plan something. She also had a motive, Alison writing that secret in her journal blew up her family which also powers the motive to do it to spencers. When she was talking to the body in the car was also a PERFECT clue, AND there were SO many hints about aria being one of the twins in the story but maybe Ali was mentioning arias two personalities, as she walked past that house it showed the radley van, the same one that was shown by the story of the twins that ALISON told and she said “I feel like something happened here” what if her evil personality took over and killed the nicer one and she got put into radley because she was so mentally Ill, they really missed a perfect opportunity also with the pig mask whilst Alison and Toby along with Caleb were getting away from the house to go by the Campbell farm ( the mask was a pig ) and it was black A Clothes!!! We know she likes pigs right? Her puppet and a few other references I love this theory ( my own ) and think it would have been PERFECT
It would’ve been cool, but on the flip side incredibly insensitive. DID or “multiple personality disorder” isn’t something like depression which is transferred genetically, and something you develop later on. DID is the result purely and only from severe horrible trauma from a very young age, often times severe s***al abuse, physical abuse, and extreme childhood neglect-often done by a primary caregiver or someone close to the family. It’s a deeply vulnerable and stigmatized disorder, and tbh it doesn’t need anymore help being stigmatized in the media. Would’ve been super cool if we found out that Aria was somehow Ali’s twin (twins don’t have to look alike) or maybe a sibling?
@@katie5998 agreed! Aria could have been an evil mastermind without diagnosing her with a specific mental illness, it doesn't even matter why she was in Radley just that she is a disturbed girl and that's it about that.
@@tvddamonlovernina I agree. There was A LOT they could’ve done with her character that they unfortunately wasted. Tbh, I think Pretty Little Liars would be a lot less criticized if they ended it after the third season, like they’d initially planned.
A good twist is always better then a shocking twist A should of been Alison or Ezra or someone who was a lot more present in the show Cece should of been in season 5 helping out the girls or something so we remembered who she was before the reveal. And AD definitely should of been Aria she was always getting away with things the other girls could never and always more concerned with boys instead of finding out who A was
Maybe thats why when Alex drake took Spencer Place and she says to aria sleeping that she think they are going to to be the closest. I don't know but I always thought that was weird and I always wanted to know why she said that
In my opinion they should've let Aria be A, like it was originally planned, I mean all the hints make this clear and then ended it shortly after the reveal in season six. I always thought that season seven was not needed and I also didn't like it at all. Changing it just because a lot of people guessed it (which is partly their own fault because they gave us obvious hints on twitter) is exacly like George RR Martin described it: If you write a mystery where the butler did it, you set up the hints and did some amazing foreshadowing but then someone figured it out and you change it up to the chambermaid who did it, then all this previous foreshadowing, all the hints will be for nothing. Now you have to set up new hints and debunk the old ones, come up with new foreshadowing... It's a giant mess. That's unfortunately exacly what happened in PLL. It became a mess. I personally rather have a great story even when the reveal was obvious but makes sense than a story where it's so shocking because it doesn't make any sense at all. And seriously, what is up with the Rosewood genetics? Why do so many people have twins they never knew about? What is up with PLL and twins? I don't understand lol
To be fair, if your mother is a twin, chances are higher she also gets twins. However this doesn't apply if we're talking about identical twins. Besides that the whole "The twin did it" - twist thing is just lame.
@@pollypeachum9566 to be fair the original book series did a twin thing but instead of whatever the show did it was that Ali’s institutionalized sister switched places with her and the real Alison killed her twin because she had taken her place...it made a lot more sense than a secret twin who lived in another country with no connection to the girls but for some reason does this whole elaborate thing to fuck with them
@@brynniefresh9746 I didn't read the books. I'm sure the ending made more sense, though. I mean it can't be worse.. Nevertheless I'm not a fan of twin-twists in general. It's usually not a sign for a good story, because it's too easy and it's almost impossible to do it in a way that the reader is involved in the story.
Knowing Lucy thought Aria was A makes me feel better about the scene where Spencer tells Aria "I know who's helping Mona" and then Aria does the floating-calculations-thousand-yard-stare face, because obviously Lucy felt that she should act as though she was worried that her cover was blown. (If it's not clear, that's the episode where Aria shows up out of nowhere to rescue Spencer from her shower that was locked and trying to kill her.)
Nothing involving Melissa was explained or made sense (to me at least), she just pops in, does something with a suspicious look on her face and mysterious music in the background and dipps
@@tvddamonlovernina same with Jenna, why was Jenna always in the center of very A story, she was never actually A or even knew who A was????it made no sense
I’m rewatching the pilot with the mindset that Aria is A and there’s just so much there. For instance, she’s the first one to receive an A message. This could be interpreted as a test, or something like that. She’s also acts very suspiciously. When Emily brings up getting a note, Aria immediately asks if it was from A. Almost like she knew exactly what happened. Though Emily doesn’t say what was on it, Aria knows it’s something personal. She also turns down Emily’s idea to tell somebody about the notes. Probably so she can keep the game going. This also happens at the funeral. She’s the one who mentions A out loud by name both times. She also “heard” that Hanna was at the police station even though it was portrayed as just moments earlier, which is when Hanna got the text. Since they aren’t close at that point, I doubt that Hanna and Aria would’ve messaged each other about that. Something else I noticed is that Aria only gets messaged by A for things that are happening in the present, while the other 3 get targeted for things that happened in the past. You can also see that Aria is kind of a great manipulator. She’s great at leading people on with just words and getting exactly the reactions she wants out of people. Especially with her dad and Ezra. She keeps her dad on edge about his secret. And with Ezra she keeps pursuing him and leading him on even though she knows she shouldn’t. If anything, these feel like Aria going on a power trip similar to A’s style of threats. She’s the only one other than Alison that is shown to blackmail or threaten others with information she has. As you mentioned, Alison didn’t really bare any of Aria’s secrets so she doesn’t really have anything going against her. It sets her up as this blank slate mysterious main character with obscure needs. Perfect for a master manipulator who can stand on a pre-established perch. From the first episode, the only characters we know about that could reasonably be A are Aria and Mona.
I would have loved aria and Allison to be teamed up to be A. That would’ve been so interesting and a way better ending. And it makes a lot more sense. To me, the worst A reveals were Shawna, Cece and Alex. The audience didn’t care much for those characters and hadn’t had any attachment to those characters.
I always thought it could Melissa, Spencer’s older sister that could be A, also aria was kinda the main character over the other liars in the first few seasons 🤷🏼♀️
They shouldn’t have changed it. They should’ve taken it as a huge compliment that the fans were so obsessed and then given the fans (us) the ending we DESERVE.
To be fair, in the pilot when Alison was ignoring Mona, Aria said "maybe we should wait". But that was removed in a later episode using the same flashback so maybe she was just trying to think of herself as being nicer than she really was in the past
I’ve actually noticed that Aria didn’t really get as many consequences/injuries as the other girls, she really did just do her own thing… so that is a question that is unanswered in my mind.
PLL is genuinely one of my favorite tv shows of all time. Rewatched multiple times looking for clues. I for sure remember going online and reading everyone’s A theories. Aria, Alison, and Melissa were the most common A theories by far. I mean, E lamb recognizing her in Radley? Aria’s obsession with dolls? Why did A never expose her relationship with Ezra? Why did Ali allegedly take photos of only Aria when she was sleeping? Mona calling her Big A in the hallways? Arias outfits always seeming to have a deeper symbolic meaning? The photos of the twins in her bedroom? Aria seeming to be the least tortured by A throughout the series? She always seemed super suspicious and had a natural fascination with dark stuff that lined up with who we as an audience thought A was. One theory from before the ending of the show pointed out that there were always hints of aria having some kind of bipolar disorder or mental illness that would have justified her hypothetical A behavior along with being part of the group - she had 2 personalities. The clues were ALL there. It would have made us empathize with her character even IF she turned out to be A due to Aria being bipolar. I remember watching season 7 and right from the beginning, knew that the A reveal would be absolute shit. Alex Drake only solidified how bad the writers screwed up the ending that would have been revolutionary in tv history.
You are 100% correct on this, I stopped watching after season 4B or season 5 I can’t remember but I remember everyone definitely assumed Aria was the mastermind on Reddit and RUclips and now that PLL is on Hulu I just finished season 1 and so many clues point to Aria
Just the way you talk about Allison and Aria being AD together makes me have goosebumps just thinking about it. God, I really wished the writers went that route, would’ve been absolutely amazing!
i am rewatching and currently on season one and on one of the first episodes ezra is teaching a class literally talking about UNRELIABLE NARRATORS and staring at aria a lot. i think that was supposed to be a clue too on aria as an unreliable source in this narrative.
Back when I was watching the show when it aired, I was always convinced that Aria was A or somehow involved. There were multiple clues, the community was full of fan theories about it. I think the show writers should have stuck with it and made her A So what if part of the fandom figured it out? Proper plot execution is all that matters. All they had to do was execute it well.
Yes!!! Aria could’ve been A the whole time without knowing she was A. That would’ve kept the friendship thing intact too. Good Aria had no idea why bad Aria was up to
I always thought Aria was going to be revealed as A. When I decided to drop the show, it was when we learned Ezra wasn’t that innocent. At that time I really thought it was going to happen and we’d see Ezria as the evil couple. Unfortunately I was wrong 🥀
This video inspired me. PLL could have been this intriguing story about grief, friendship, and the real repercussions of bullying. I think the final A should have been Aria with the help of Ezra, Jason, and Noel. Like Serena said the love between Aria and Alison could have been unconditional. I believe it’s implied if not explicitly mentioned that the girls didn’t have many friends before Alison came into their lives. In the book Aria is described as the weirdo of Rosewood. Perhaps she had some mental disorders (I don’t have much knowledge on mental health problems so bear with me) that led to her being a patient at Radley and she didn’t have many opportunities to make friends. So when Alison brought all the girls together Aria felt like she belonged for the first time in her life. She had good friends and a good life all thanks to Alison. After Alison’s disappearance the girls drifted apart and maybe this caused Aria to again be consumed by her mental disorders but her parents didn’t want to send her back to Radley because other people in town might find out and it could lead to more problems for Aria so instead they went away to Iceland. A year later when Aria came back to Rosewood Mona began the A game because she was afraid that the girls would bully her again, like she did in the show when Alison returned. Unfortunately for her this only brings the girls closer and suddenly Aria has her old friend group again. As for Ezra maybe Aria knew that Alison had a thing with him since they seemed the closest out of the five girls, and in some warped way in her mind being with him meant having a connection with Alison. And kind of the same thing with Jason. Once it’s revealed that Mona is A Aria worries that she will lose her friends again. She thinks that the only way her friendship with the girls work is if they have a common “enemy” to fight against. Originally it was Alison who knew all their secrets and manipulated the girls with them, and then later Mona did the same thing as A. So Aria picked the game up from Mona, adopting this Alison-esque persona and pretended to be innocent the entire time. She did feel betrayed that Ezra was writing his book the entire time but figured she could use the information he collected to her advantage. Like Alison she manipulates Jason and Noel to do her bidding. Here we have our A team. On the other side we have the three girls; Spencer, Hanna, and Emily. Caleb, Toby, and whoever Emily is with at the time, I lost track. Mona later becomes an ally to the girls once out of the A game for good, her brilliance a match for Spencer’s. And then there’s rogue Jenna that always seems to have her own handful cohorts and only acts on her own behalf. And the show could have gone on for 2-3 seasons with the girls trying to figure out who A is. Finally it would be revealed that Aria is A when Noel, after secretly working for both Aria and Jenna unbeknownst to each girl, told Jenna the truth when things had gotten too far (Aria planning on kidnapping the girls in the Dollhouse.) When the girls confront Aria through much difficulty she confesses to everything. She reveals that she had not only killed Maya for knowing the truth but also killed Alison, on the night she disappeared, in a fit of rage when she found out that Alison was blackmailing Aria’s father. Mona then found Alison’s body that night. Thinking that after all the terrible things the girl had done Alison didn’t deserve a proper burial and in a rash decision Mona buried her in the backyard. The girls would struggle with the idea that their close friend was their tormentor for so long but ultimately they’d sympathize with Aria and tell her that they all miss Alison but they have to move on and they can do that together. Ezra would go to jail (for obvious reasons), and Aria (and maybe Mona too) would go back to Radley this time with her friends to support her as she gets better. The moral of the story would be that mental illnesses can cause you to do terrible things in the wake of grief or other traumatic catalysts but with the right help and support you can live a good and happy life. Additionally, the show would be a prime example of the repercussions of bullying being that Alison tormented all these people including Aria and the girls but even after she died these people had to deal with the trauma long after she was gone. Your actions don’t end with you, they affect others regardless of your presence in their life. PLL still could’ve been this salacious teen drama but it also could’ve had all these morals that would be beneficial for younger generations for years to come. Thanks Serena for the great video! I’ve forgotten how much fun it is to theorize about shows especially shows like PLL. Keep up the good work!
Agree with you on EVERYTHING you said in this. The finale was so so so bad and honestly ruined the show for me in a lot of ways. It should have been AriA :( subscribed!!!
Imagine the last scene like this you get the classic happy ending, the wedding all are happy and well and then, Aria turns around gives us the most creepy smile ever and does the shh. i mean that would have been an ending that you'd remember. Great video, thanks!
such good ideas! I think it would have been the best to reveal that Alison and Aria were working together but Aria actually took it further than Ali intended and then Alison went back to the girls to help (and that could have explained her poor redemption arc and Aria 'working for A in season 7) and then Wren and Cece could have been in on it and Ezra and Mona were like Aria's puppets
I hate that they ruined one of my favorite shows, I never watched the 10 year later version because it already was so dragged out I was tired of it. It is annoying how shows about high school emphasize the friendships lasting forever when honestly most people I know talk to like one or two people from high school, if that. I feel like watching these kinds of shows in high school made me subconsciously worry about keeping my friends from high school or even normalized the idea that the longer your friendship, the stronger it is, when time means nothing. Anyways the fact that they threw out the idea of Aria being A to keep a lowkey toxic high school clique alive is dumb and unrealistic
G_xoxo on RUclips had the best pll theories during the show’s run. Her Aria theory was the best! So sad all the clues were just red herrings :( Btw love your videos 💕
Aria is the only A that makes sense. Even if the fans guessed it, who cares! Better than the ridiculous reveals we got. Im still not over this tragedy of a show...
I remember how Lucy Hale was the only cast member who didn't know who A was and a lot of people assumed that's because they didn't want her knowing it was Aria to change her acting. It would've been awesome
As a writer who is writing something similar to PLL i would’ve made aria & alison the villains! Alison was a ICONIC mean girl and she didn’t deserve a redemption arc she was a gaslighting manipulative toxic person and friend it would’ve been cool if she was the villain and aria was a villain too and they both were revealed to be these horrible people who pretended to be friends with the girls i would’ve been so much happier !
Also everyone makes it seem like the girls fell apart as a group when Alison disappeared, but they are reunited by A as soon as Aria appears back in Rosewood. It would have been so much more chilling to find out that Aria had been the puppet master of the group, even to the extent that she convinced Ali that she was the glue that held them all together.
Who I’d pick as A- 1st- Mona. I think her reveal was amazing and the most shocking to me. Everyone had motives and hers was one of the ones that really changed her. Like Jenna, she went blind, but her personality stayed the same. 2nd- Wren. I think Wren would have been an amazing Charles. He could’ve changed his name to Wren and this would be appropriate for the time were Jessica could’ve had an affair someone else. 3rd- Arlene (My OC). I think Arlene would have been Aria’s twin sister. She would be introduced in the last episode much like Alex, but this would make much more sense than Spencer having a twin. Especially because Eddie Lamb recognizes Aria at Radley but what if he recognizes Arlene but thinks it’s Aria. This would make even more sense because in his book, Ezra wrote that he thinks that one of the girls are A, but what if he was wrong and it’s actually one of the liars siblings. This would make sense because if Arlene doesn’t want to hurt her sister, she would just hurt her friends and that’s why Aria doesn’t really get hurt much in the dollhouse
What truly ruined this show was social media. I think the writers kept trying to satisfy people by not doing something bad to their favorite characters and put themselves in a corner to keep all the liars safe from being A.
I have watched PLL all the way through multiple times... but I still ALWAYS forget who A actually turns out to be hahah. That shows how stupid it was... someone who has watched it multiple times... and I can’t ever remember how it ends😂😂 because it didn’t make sense!! I think I blocked it from my memory lol it was SO underwhelming. If it was Aria it would’ve been PERFECT. A character we knew and liked but also had weird feelings about... ugh. So mad at the writers.
Tbh in my mind Aria is A, but she actually suceeded as a villain, because nobody ever found out what she did. I think that Allison and Aria manipulated Mona into torturing the other girls and then let her take the fall (since they were bullying her before, too). Afterwards Aria continued as A without Allison, which was kinda the reason she had this redemption arc (basically just becoming a weaker person compared to being a sociopath like before) because she realised what she had done by manipulating Aria. At this point it's too late for Allison to come clean, because of everything they've done to Mona and the other girls, so she just keeps quiet even though she knows that Arias A. And for the final season, maybe Aria found out about Spencers twin Alex and manipulates her into thinking that her only chance of being with her sister and part of the friend group is by becoming A. Since Alex is mentally ill she believes Aria and plays the villain, but in the end Aria lets her take the fall and makes everyone believe that it was Alex all along. Especially if you look at the end scene when all the girls are together before Aria leaves, you notice Allison holding back (walking behind the group, etc.) while Aria is the center of attention and Emily, Spencer and Hanna are all crying and saying their goodbyes to Aria while as Allison says "For some reason i feel like this is the end of something" because she knows that Aria was A and hopes that with her leaving the whole torturing finally stops. Okay, thanks bye
Aria as A would go a long way to make the aria and Ezra relationship feel less creepy too. He was writing a book and that’s creepy but she actually was the one manipulating the relationship to be with him because Ali liked him. And maybe he never realizes she’s A
Ah gosh I know. The ending was even more shit because I’m British and the accent was just shocking. She sounded like someone doing a joke cockney accent not like she was trying to really portray a serious character
I got the impression the writers overheard Troian putting on a funny accent in her dressing room or something and thought "omg, what brilliant acting, it's like she's a completely different person...eureka!"
For me Aria and Alison were perfect for A. And maybe some help from Wren - the doctor who has acces to all that files and Redly's documents is perfectly matching. And of course some other people could help them like Mona did because I loved her on the screen way better after season 5 compared to Alison
Aria being A had to have been the original plan. There’s no way it wasn’t. There is no way in hell if she wasn’t planned to be A from the beginning that her and Ezra could have lasted. He would have been exposed 1000%. She also forgave Ezra SOOOO QUICK.!!!!! Like huh.???? The worst thing that happened to him was Mike socked him in the jaw lmao. The writers 100% changed it bc we all guessed it too many times.
Aria being the Big Bad of the show made so much sense. -A didn’t start stalking them until Aria came back from Iceland. Even Mona said “Miss Aria, Your A Killer, Not Ezra’s Wife” and there’s just so much evidence piled proving that Aria would be the best Big Bad.
First of all, living for this channel! I’m getting into PLL again for the first time since high school so this is a lot of fun. Second, I would have loved to see Ezra be AD. Alison’s obsession with Lolita by Nabokov fits in perfect with the adult man who obsesses over and abuses a young girl. Plus I think if given the opportunity, Ian Harding could have been truly terrifying in his role. Probably would have been a wonderful portrayal!
You fixed it!! Thank you 🙌
the show had so much potential 💞💞
@@paula275A.D is Alison Dilaurentis. Alison was meant to be A, A.D or etc. And A must have been Aria also.
mona as the original A was the only reveal that made sense.
I wish she became the 5th liar
Maybe. But, her reason for being A didn't make sense at all.
@@simplyjuannie5128 how so? I think it did. Hanna started to push her away and get closer with the other 3 because Ali’s body was found (or what they thought was Ali) and monas mental breakdown because of the bullying she went through from Alison.
Cece was great I just wish AD was right there with her since season 3
@@jacksonmcnuggets7488 i don’t like that they made A someone who was introduced in season 3. it was ehhhh but it wasn’t good imo. AD was a complete mess
Aria being A would've been ICONIC. And make so much sense?? Because literally the other girls weren't getting harassed at all until literally the day Aria came back to town. lol Literally every time the other girls are away from Aria, A leaves them alone??
haha I know, its so obvious
And Aria was the one that did the "shhhh" in the intro right from the beginning. Would have been such a full circle if it had been her!
@@janeryan2709 😂😂 I totally remember watching the pilot premiere and being like, "Oh, well it's her. We've figured it out."
Aria also got off easy A was never as mean to Aria as all the liars in fact sometime A help with her problems.
I wanted it to be her sooooo bad
I wish Ezra hadn't known Allison beforehand, I wish Allison had stayed evil, I wish Cece wasn't a character at all, and I especially wish Alex Drake was never part of it
I wish Courtney DiLaurentis was in the show
yess i wish alison stayed evil
Alison really should've stayed a sociopath. She actually should've been A ..
@@qj9673 YESSS
See, I think after that Ezra reveal there was no other way to take his character but to make him Uber A
Even Lucy Hale thought Aria would be A at the end. I mean if the actor, who played this character for so long thought that, than maybe the writers should have listened.
Exactly- and it even came through in her acting in my opinion, you could see that she thought Aria was A
@@SerenaSkybourne And it woud've been good. Hale played the villain in that dire Fantasy Island movie last year and her acting as the villainous version of her character was one of the few good things.
As I’m watching the show again it also makes some sense. I mean it’s obvious out of all th girls Aria has been targeted the least. Granted she definitely had the most dangerous secrets (affair with a teacher... that can follow you everywhere), but she never really faced any real trauma other than the doll house that all the girl faced and being trapped in a box on the Halloween train. The other girls have been through far worse. Even in season 7 when Aria did betray them, Alison made a comment like ‘how come you get the easy stuff’ which tbh is very true. She never really had to go through much... though the only reason why I feel like the directors didn’t listen and didn’t have her as A was because of Ezra. And they didn’t really want any of the liars to be portrayed as villains because they went through a lot
Are y'all serious?? Why would Aria torture her friends lmao y'all on crack or something
@@vnhdhs1723 That's for the writers to say. They put the clues in, they should know why. But they dropped everything all together. It would be a big shock though & that would have been a good thing for a mystery.
I imagine the last episode where Aria is revealed as AD and half of the episode is just flashbacks of every Aria being sus moment AND I WOULD HAVE LIVE FOR IT
YESSSSSSSS
Why AD? Would it be bc she wanted to be Alison?
YESSS OMG
@@rahbeeuh no because A was cece drake and AD was just the name that was used because AD is alex drake/alison d could be either way
@@areyouapisces I was asking about Aria's reasoning for using the initials if she had been revealed to be AD.
Someone needs to tell Marlene King that a twist doesn’t count if you introduce a WHOLE NEW CHARACTER that the audience has never met and didn’t even know existed and who was BARELY hinted at - like only a handful of episodes in THE VERY LAST SEASON hinted at it.
💯
Aria as A would literally be perfect the writers must've known they clearly just wanted to outsmart the audience and it's so annoying also I love your videos so much
I agree, I think they were trying to trick us so they could seem ahead of the game, but it was a HUGE fail.
And awww thankyou I love to hear that! 💓
The most important thing about the show was the unconditional friendship between especially the main four. Having one of them being the ultimate tormentor would’ve ruined it. But that being said, the twin-route was not good either.
@@mncdssctn9110 Yes I know what you mean, that is a risk if Aria was A
Agree aria would be a good A
I read a lot of great Aria is Uber A theories back in the day and there was soooo much evidence that Aria was A. It’s a shame that the writers ruined everything.
It should have been ezrA fitgeralD
1) would have showed how creepy his and Aria’s relationship was
2) explains how A had some many resources since he was rich
3) could have paved the way for Aria’s involvement on the A team
4) explains the pictures of Aria in the shed
5) explains why Aria’s treatment wasn’t as harsh as the others
6) explains Aria’s clothes and why they stand out so much more than the others bc she stands out more to Ezra
YESS this would have been such a good idea tbh
yes i was thinking the same!! i thought aria and alison should team up and aria could use ezra to help
Yes!
Yes, it should have been Ezra!!!!!!
i always thought it was ezras mum idk why, just a vibe from her, she obviously didnt like aria, but ur right ezra would make so much sense
The biggest clue for Aria being A was that scene in Radley where the guy recognizes her. That’s what made me believe Aria was A for sure. Can’t believe the writers fumbled the plot so bad.
what episode is this???? for when I eventually re-watch it all over again :P
@@xmichaelwood it’s season 5 episode 7.
@@s1n_eater thank you!!
Yes!! The reason people were guessing aria was because they had such great details pointing to her like this one. It was good writing and the fans dived into it. Instead Marlene changed it up since fans guessed and went for writing that made no sense
Well, she had already been there to see Spencer before that. That's how Eddie Lamb recognized her.
Aria and Allison duo would've been great. "Two can keep a secret if one of them is dead." Allison is "missing/dead" and Aria keeps the secrets now. And so "A" began. Aria still being puppeted by Ali somehow. And so the unconditional friendships come into play. I wouldve loved it if they kept Ali a villain even if they brought Aria with her.
Yes! And Aria wasn’t actually in Iceland, she was plotting with Ali for a year. Maybe plotting with Ali and Ezra since he had the money to make all of it happen
This would have been awesome!
Personally I wish Alison had stayed in the ground because I thought the story was much more interesting when they were trying to solve "who is A" AND "who killed Alison" / "are A and Alison's killer the same people?" but if Ali had to come back then she needed to stay evil because literally why else is she there then ?? her "redeemed" character was so boring
@@tiffanyquasnitschka1901 OMGG
Can I add that in the doll house, Aria was the only one who really wasn’t tortured? I mean I could see the idea that being forced to cut and dye her hair was mental torture but when you compare it to Spencer being tricked into thinking she killed someone, mona was put in the hole, Hanna and Emily being forced to chose which friend gets tortured and which gets food etc. and YES aria was the only girl who really seemed to vibe with Alison’s bullying
THANKYOU!!! Aria seemed fine in the dollhouse
For the which friend gets tortured. All 4 of the girls had to pick. Cece mentally tortured them in all different ways. Cece did that to spencer bc she was struggling in s4 prior in the dollhouse by thinking she was the one that killed ali & when she found out she did not it was a doubt in her head that she also killed bethany. It wasn’t until AFTER the doll house that we find out Mona was the one who killed Bethany. Mona was mentally strong & only way she could break down was by starving the girl & making her feel like she was going to die in that hole. They all had mental torture in some way. Cece needed to let them know that she “owned” them & could “control” them with dolls thus by only mentally torturing them & never physically hurting them. Bc none of them were actually picking a friend to torture.. it was all mental, cece wanted them to think they were choosing to hurt one another than saving themselves
That punishment i really feel like it was for emily the torture your friends 1. Bc emily is a LOYAL friend. What else way to mentally hurt her than make HER think she’s hurting her friends!
Actually all the girls had to choose which friend got hurt but I still agree Aria went through the least
@@maliablossom7340 A never really didn’t have anything on Aria besides an affair with the teacher but after Aria & Ezra became public nothing A could do. Im pretty sure Mona was that A b4 they went to tell aria’s parents. & she did kill shana i wonderr why cece never exposed that ?? But at the same time cece’s sister didnt expose about archer dunhill murder either.
Ugh A being Aria would have been incredible. The writers really ruined PLL, it's so sad.
It had so much potential!!
Aria (or any of the main four) being A would’ve been terrible.
@@mncdssctn9110 Well clearly many people disagree with you lol. I don't think it could be more terrible than Spencer's evil twin.
@@mncdssctn9110 I would have preferred it to Spencer's british twin 😂
@@mncdssctn9110 it never happens though!! I want a TV series that doesn’t end with happily ever after it’s boring a lot of us wanted a shock factor I think the issues was there were so many A’s that it just got old at least to me anyway.!
Let's all collectively agree, that it was aria. She found Spencer's twin to come out as A instead of her, so she can stay in the group
Agreed! Once you're on the Aria is A train you can never get off. I think it would've been cool if Wren was Charles and Aria was Red Coat and that they're half-siblings or cousins. I wanted the Lady in Black and A.D to be the same person, Bethany Young a.k.a Cece Drake. The person in the grave should've been Alison's twin or Sarah Lee Taylor.
Honestly make her the dam long lost cousin if they want the incest going on. It would have been GOLDEN
Yes! This is perfect
Totally perfect 👍
Also after Season 6B Aria became extremely aggressive and rude and kind of mean girl. Big A characteristics
What if Vivian was created so both Ali AND Aria could play her depending on who needed it. Because there was that guy who thought Aria in the red coat was Vivian
thats JUICY
I think it should have been Aria. She was always so selfish and the more you talk about it the more it comes together. That was a major missed opportunity. CeCe was such a disappointing reveal. I wanted something closer to home if you know what I mean. Both reveals were detached from the story we knew. Aria being A all along would have been more intense cause we the viewers would have to question everything we thought we knew and we would be interested to watch again to reanalysis Aria.
I just didn't care much about CeCe. She was just sort of Allison's 'lookalike' to me.
Exactly- CeCe was the less interesting, cheap and knock-off version of Alison, a minion. No one could be as iconic as Alison so therefore CeCe was less interesting straight away. Aria would have been a lot more shocking and personal
Cece being A was dumb because she was getting revenge on the wrong people who she should have been torturing was Kenneth who sent her away not girls who were in diapers when she got sent to the Radley.
Yeah she didn't care about anyone but boring old Ezra
hey ive only watched pll through once but im going through again and you seem like u know what ur talking abt can u or someone explain what motive aria wouldve had or like why she would do it to the other girls? im sure i missed something or just dont remember but can someone explain?
@@christineatieno614 ezra doesn’t even care about her either... he wrote a book on her. They could have made her kind of go off the rails after that
omg Aria and Alison as AD would have been SCARY GOOD
RIGHT!!? It would have been terrifying. Even Alison, Ezra and Aria as a trio would be cool
OMG!??!?!?Nooo!!!
I mean SPARIA!!!!!!!
It would have been badass.
I think I Marlene got caught up in pride. She preferred having a shock ending than a good ending. Everyone theorizing good endings she got salty. Such a bad call. Omg Aria & Aly would’ve been such a good ending!!!
I think that she just wanted to keep to the books except switch who had the twin,as AD.
@@LaurenKaminski at least in the books, you’re aware from halfway through the series (book 8/16) that there’s a second DiLaurentis twin. They sprung the ‘Spencer twin twist’ in one season which was 7 episodes long.
Marlene is absolutely at fault for how bad that show turned out, which was after season 4. The backlash she got from the Cece reveal should’ve been a wake up call not to pull something stupid in the future. She couldn’t even explain the plot holes from the Cece reveal because it was pulled out of nowhere. It was 100% pride. Shes basically a sophomaniac who thinks she’s smarter then everyone else when she’s not and it led to the downfall of her and the legacy of the show.
Edit: why’d she need two twin twists? Was the Mary Drake one not enough!?
Yep. Arrogance.
Aria and Allison being A would have been BOSS! Not only would it have been really iconic but it would also have cemented Alison as one of TVs best villains.
YESSSS it would have been game-changing
Fr I always thought it was weird how she went from being a manipulative bitchy villain to basically just a weaker version of herself, didn’t do Allison justice😫think they were too focused on all the ships to make the audience happy but we watched for A in the first place
Yes I loved manipulative, sociopathic Allison. @@tiffanyrose526
alison always favored aria too for some reason they hung out more. not emily- it always seemed like she was playing her lol
even if the audience guessed it, it wouldn’t matter. a smart and clever reveal is always better than a shocking one. ❤️ love this video
💕💕
Exactly...I hate when writers try to outsmart the audience at any cost!
Right? We guessed it AND WANTED TO BE RIGHT. We weren't trying to work against the show, we were working WITH the show as a family. The GIRLS would have been shocked as it should have been. Being betrayed by someone they thought was their friend as opposed to just being tormented by strangers for things that had nothing to do with them
take WandaVision for example, everyone knew Agness was Agatha, even the writters knew we would figured it out by the reveal, so they made the Agatha All Along song.
Edit: Then they've tried to be funny and made Evan's character Ralph Bohner, so that how really is a good example of good and bad character revelations.
Exactly everybody was guessing that cece was A before it was revealed and they still did that
I think having two A's (aria/alison) could have been such a cool reveal. I read somewhere that the purpose of a plot twist is *not* to outsmart your audience - if people guess the twist, it doesn't nessesarily mean it's predictable or bad, it means you've laid the groundwork to make it plausible and you can have that moment where everything finally falls into place from the perspective of the audience.
Exactly- when will people get this? Unexpected doesn't mean good.
completely agree with you, it’s going to be received better than a stupidly outlandish plot twist
It wouldn't be a plot twist if everyone could see it coming - that's just a resolution. Plot twists are the ones where the story takes a different turn from how it was going. If your "groundwork" is leading to it, it literally cannot be a plot twist; that's literally just the plot leading to where it had been leading from the beginning. That said, not everything needs a plot twist, and what PLL did was multiple deus ex machinas . . . not even failed plot twists, which is why the show started feeling wack long before they made it absolutely nauseating with the finale.
Exactly! it isn’t always about the who but the WHY
@@Su-mx7ix no that’s not true in order to have a plot twist you HAVE to lay down groundwork or else you end up like the pll ending which is the wrong example. In literary a plot twist has to be foreshadowed for the audience to accept it casually. That doesn’t mean you tell the whole plot because it wouldn’t be a twist but instead you’re dropping hints that leads into the twist. If the audience figure it out well number one they’re smart and number two the writer did a good job.
Marlene did us soooo dirty. I can’t believe what started as a creepy and twisted show with excellent attention to detail and clues turned into a cliche ~friends forever~ ending. I don’t know about everyone else, but it’s just so much more interesting to have Aria be A, than to make some stupid feel good ending about how strong the girls’ friendship was
And it wasn't even that strong to begin with!
AGREED! Especially after they made Spencer and Caleb date, which made Hanna and Spencer’s friendship so fractured during the last season and a half. So clearly it wasn’t the strongest friendship.
They literally all should've died or buried alive by Aria / Allison. Or they could live in fear of A forever .
@@SerenaSkybourne right? A straight up trauma bond
it's so infuriating to me because their friendships were truly toxic, and Aria always cared more about her boyfriends anyway so her being A fits since she was the least invested in the group. If they wanted friendship to be the main takeaway then they should have let Mona in ..........
Since season one I was astonished by the Hastings’ casting because they actually look kinda related. Oh was I wrong😐
I remember saying it can't be true that Mary is her mom because she looks like Veronica stupid decision to do. Also I live in the state the show is supposed to take place in you can't get a passport without a birth certificate she would no before the age she was that she was adopted by getting a passport.
Oh my gosh I didn’t realize that the actors and actresses from the Hastings family did all look alike.
The ironic thing is that Torian Bellisario (Spencer’s Actress) isn’t fully white. Her mom is Creole. You can tell in certain lighting when her skin looks tanner than the show. But it is funny how they look alike. And her dad as Nolan North....yeah, her dad is all over video games.
@@adamsmoberly you’re telling me spencer’s dad is richthofen?? 💀
@@LaeTheRagingChick Yeah, i know. He’s really handsome.
What’s weird is the Montgomery’s never really talked about their life in Iceland what if Radley has other locations and one is in Iceland and she was patient there and byrons job was the real reason they moved but “Ali going missing” and the being away from her dolls triggers a psych break
that would have been amazing!
Oooh...I love this. I never had this idea! What a creepy thought, this would be the only excuse for her file being at Radley as well!
@@alsterrr93 exactly what I thought because Aria seemed mental and that probably was the Ella didn’t want Mike on medication and Bryon was terrified also i think its like school when you move from one school to another they fax your documents over
And why did Eddie Lamb from Radley recognize her?
@@shoegirl927 Ally because when she puts on a brown wig she looks like Aria or they got back way earlier than it showed in the show and she had to get cleared in rosewood radley
In my opinion, Aria should have been the final A. Who cares if people have already guessed who the vilain is ? Aria as a vilain would have worked, because it made sense. I would have loved watching her turn into the final vilain ! Alison should have remained a mean girl. The evil twin trope is so uninspired that I took it as an insult.
I think the issue about the twins is they didn't write it right :c In the books, Sara Shepard uses this cliche very well in the first half of the series.
Your idea of Aria being A with Alison's help makes more sense and would've been so much better than the twin
💗💗💗
The twin thing was from the books
@@zaryamoon4906 I know. But they didn't handle that well
@@Mer_girl Yeah
@@zaryamoon4906 no. Allison had a twin in the books. Not Spencer
It’s literally so weird to me that aria and ezra have a happy ending... the way that the show romanticized a grown man and a minor together is not okay.. even arias parents, they were mad at first but then they just dropped it and supported their teenage daughter being with her teacher? It’s so weird to me.
If my daughter/ son was dating their teacher under the age of 18 I would get them arrested and make sure they never see the teacher again
A was so much more nicer to Aria. Every Liar initially had a secret they didn't want revealed:
Hanna being a thief and her eating disorder
Spencer kissing Ian and then later Wren
And Emily being a lesbian
Aria's secret was literally her dad is cheating on her mom. It had nothing to do with her and it was something she wanted to tell her mom anyways but didn't know how.
Then A gave her what she wanted. A always gave Aria what she wanted at the end and it was weird how the other girls were in life threatening situations but Aria almost never was.
I think the only threatening situation she was in was the freezer in the ice cream factory. And she came at right moment to help Spencer out of the sauna.
@@liamstatham3362 And the time she was locked in a wooden box, with the train doors open
@@Mike_M.2002 idk how I forgot that 🙃
Also Aria’s secret was also the fact that she started developing a student teacher relationship which definitely would have landed her in trouble, but yea I agree. A was mostly easy on Aria
I always figured A was light on Aria half the time deliberately to try and divide the girls or even encourage them to point the finger. OR A being light on Aria would point to someone who cared about her being A (Ezra, one of her parents, Mike, Holden, i dont know how else). I love the Aria being A theory but as someone who's watched PLL start to finish and for the first time this year I saw either Aria or Alison being A as too obvious. For example, my Dad watched a few episodes with me here and there and he straight away said Alison is alive and is A, or she's got an evil twin. (His next guess was Ezra because he hated him lol). Obviously a lot of the fans guessed Aria early on so that might have been reason for the writers changing their minds, or things pointed to Aria deliberately to throw us off (if the writers were clever enough, they seemed to be seasons 1-5 but then got stupid with the A.D. business).
We never really seen all of Aria dates with Holden what if she wasn’t meeting Ezra all of the times what if she was meeting Alison and Mona sometimes
i think so too
I never thought of that
this is a great idea girl!
Aria being A makes way more sense than a stupid twin reveal
I'm currently rewatching PLL S1, and the thing I noticed in the Pilot is this:
In the scene where Aria shows up to Ali's funeral, shes walking down the aisle, and she has the moment where she just stares at the casket, her facial expression is so weird, like she doesn't look at all sad or upset, she just looks so neutral, and for a second I genuinley thought she was going to start grinning, ugh it was just so weirdddd. Also, out of the four girls, in this scene all her smiles and laughs seems off key and weird
wait where are you watching it i can’t find it anywhere since is got taken off of netflix
@@lexiringelman4168 it’s on hbo max, I don’t know where else you know find it but you can find it on hbo max
It's in BBC iplayer
Lol! I’ve always said I convinced myself that Aria is A because Lucy hale is just a bad actress and does shit like that
@@lexiringelman4168 ON TELEGRAM YOU FIND ALL THE SEASONS AND IT'S COMPLETE. XOXO DESDE #ECUADOR
I just imagine the very final scene where Ali and Aria had been AD the whole time, using people like Mona as their puppets. Since friendship was a key part in the show it ends with the 5 liars going to hang out at the Radley for the last time before they go their separate ways. Spencer, Emily, and Hanna leave first and Ali and Aria smile at each other before Aria does the signature 'shush'. Then they both turn and follow the other three and the screen goes black.
U should have been the author we were never supposed to get bored with u really
THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN SO GOOD
"ezra and aria had more screentime than any other couples" 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾exactly and that took away so much from the show imo
YES
Also they were the most annoying couple! I hated them since day one. And how Ezra got away with dating a Teenager, which is also odd. Also Aria forgave him sooo fast after they found out, he was writing about them.....
@@marlene670 right like Ezra literally groomed a hole child and the show just let it be and even gave them a happy ending? What?
@@glodymadiamba6064 THANK YOU AND EVERYONE SHIPS LIKE TOUCH GRASS PLSSS
I liked Spencer & Toby much better. Plus it wasn’t disgustingly romanticized.
I think it should have been Alison, they could have justified turning her into a weak verison of herself, and reveal the whole "Suburban Housewife" act was just a cover for her ultimate Sociopathic plan, that would have been sooooo cool. Also, Because she loved Charlotte and wanted to know who killed her. Like Ali should have been AD, the initials also fit!
Also, I also only saw Ali as like half a liar, not a true Fifth Pretty Little Liar, she was just so seperated from the original four.
true, she never fully became part of the group. And it would have been so good to know she never became nice
Just imagine her revealing herself to the liars omg..
OHHH and what if Ali went missing just to ruin the liars lives ngl that would probably be a rlly good plot twist
It would explain so much, including that terrible wardrobe they gave “nice Ali” is if Alison was mean the whole time but just pretending so she could come back and continue the game and watch the liars suffer firsthand.
Alison was meant to be A. That's the truth.
Nothing in a show pissed me off more. I’d rather they bring Maya back to life. That makes more sense
Maya deserved better, and I doubt they would have killed her off if she was white
She was one of my favourite characters, I couldn’t believe it when she died for no reason🥺 she’s my favourite girlfriend Emily ever had...also Emily and Allison are not made to be together at all imo😖
@@SerenaSkybourne i think it was bc the actress thought she was too young to play a teenager
The big mistake of this show was to let the writers ands espacially Marlene King use social media.
I really think they had a better story plain from the beginning, but unfortunately they spent their free time on twitter speaking with fan and reading fan theories who have zero knowledge in story telling. And they gave up their story to make the fans "happy" with their favorites couples and their "final twist".
I think Aria was plan to be A from the beginning, from a writting perspective I don't see everything else (or maybe Wren could have been ok). Or Marlene king is just stupid and a bad writer.
😂 I honestly agree with this 100%
Yup 100%
I feel like a good motive for Aria to be A is that she had convinced herself in her year away that it was one of the other three Liars who had killed Allison, and she was torturing them as revenge because she and Allison had such a close bond/ were equally malicious, manipulative people. It would have made sense for her to work with and later discard Mona after she was revealed as the first A (perhaps without Mona realizing it fully). Also once A was revealed to be Aria, it would have returned the emphasis to "who killed Allison?", "who was she really?", and "how did she really die,?" and honored her legacy as an extremely manipulative, charismatic person. And if Allsion HAD come back, maybe she had teamed up with Aria to figure out who had TRIED to kill her.
Yeah omg or like she saw the three other liars ‘killing Alison’ and her and Allison could have been closer than usual and by the time she found out Alison was alive she would have probably grown to resent the liars and continued playing the game. This would also explain the memories spencer and Emily had with with shovels and ‘killing’ Alison with the shovel
this is so good!!!! ughhh
Something felt weird about aria especially when she threatened her parents by saying she was gonna tell her dad's college that he had an affair with his graduate student just because they weren't comfortable with her and her TEACHER being together
She’s so delusional
aria being A would’ve been brilliant- we see her do the “shh” from the very first title sequence so it’d just be the biggest slap in the face if it had been her the whole time. i would’ve loved that.
They had so much potential with Aria. There. Were. So. Many. Clues. It started out as a brilliant show and by the end, in hopes of redemption it fell so flat.
I wonder if the network (ABC FAMILY) said no to the A reveal? It is so disappointing they did not go with that.
I bet she got it in her head about the friendship thing and switched gears, and now she regrets it but she has to double down on the denial because it would be kind of embarrassing to admit you had an iconic ending and ended up going with something else. It would make sense that A was Aria from the beginning because as a writer she would've wanted to make it different than the books, but also more iconic so it would become a legacy for her.
aria as -A makes so much sense... so naturally, the writers went in another direction. before this video, i had my money on wren and i believe that the reddit leak prior to the cece reveal was true, so they changed the finale and made cece -A, which explains why her reveal episode was so terrible. the set looked like it was pulled together literally overnight. awful writing, they ruined this once-iconic show.
Same I was on Wren train.
Wren would be better, but Aria would be stupid.
I would have loved Mona to be the final A. It would have been full circle. Cece stole the game from Mona. Mona got “better” and then finally snapped. She kills cece and steals the game back for herself.
I even like this!! The odds that the girls have 3 completely unrelated tormentors who all play the same game is wildly unbelievable.
Aria should've been A, and they should've somehow weaved Ezra into it as well. Like, their relationship was so creepy and wrong, I didn't care at all for the Ezria wedding, I would've much rather Aria been A or Ezra should've been written off of the show after season 4. Aria's character was just so odd and I just wish they had done something more with her, either making her A or just GETTING RID OF EZRA!
Exactly, what if she was A together with Ezra and Alison? That would have been BADASS
@@SerenaSkybourne or if she found out Ezra had dated Ali and suddenly A outs him for dating a student and he gets taken away
Yess!! I personally would have liked if it turns out that Aria was using Ezra, like she knew he was investigating and that he was obsessed with Alison so she needed to keep an eye on him. Just because the relationship is the worst thing on television, the only way to explain is that aria is an evil master mind.
I never had an issue with CeCe as Big A, except for the whole transgender thing (that was really tone-deaf). But I *hated* the Uber A reveal. I watched the entire last hour of the series finale with the biggest glare on my face... I was so angry.
it affected my mood for days
Yeah the CeCe thing was fine, but the transgender storyline could have easily been avoided. It added to the storyline and the mystery (her dad not approving, her mum being on her side, the grave stone, the added mystery of nobody knowing who Charles is) but it was unnecessary tbh
Nah CeCe didn’t show up until season 3. Big A should have been a character from the very beginning
I still think it should've been Aria, no matter if we guessed it or not. The point of these programs is going back and looking at all the clues we missed and oh yeah that makes sense now. But instead, we got an A that nobody cared about or shocked by. WE DESERVED A FOR ARIA.
They could’ve still worked in something shocking with Aria, like her not working alone, or her having a certain reason for doing all of it (like she left for Iceland and felt like the other girls didn’t miss her or whatever). They could’ve made Aria A AND had it be shocking and good but noooo. We fans got screwed over.
my biggest gripe with the alex drake situation is that she could've been a pretty good villain and a plausible AD had we been aware of her existence and had she been solidly hinted at much earlier, the potential was there but as far as execution goes the ball was dropped so hard it shattered
It would've been so cool if we were told from the start that Spencer had a twin, and if we had a few scenes where "Spencer" just seemed very "off". But nah they just made shit up lol
It would of been great if the girls thought Spencer was A all along and the half of the season the girls went after Spencer only finding out that it was her twin all along.
Aria double personality would have made sense.... espially when she was taking creepy doll photos she could be a secret friend with wren go against Cece instead or Alison
THE RADLEY SCENE OMG i’m so upset that they did not explain all of this 😔😔
i’m rewatching and i think that eddie “knew” aria because he was in communication with ezra for his book. i’m thinking that maybe ezra had mentioned her to eddie before and that’s why he felt like he knew her when she volunteered at radley. just a thought !
"then it makes more sense!" what part of human diamonds, double twin reveals and stolen eggs makes sense to you ????
this made me laugh
They should do a re-do ending to make up for the silly ending they gave us. They should make it into a movie. That would save the entire show. And ARIA should be the main A- after all. She was supposed to be the original main A- villain it’s plainly obvious that she was the star of the show because she was going to be our main A- all along. It makes me annoyed that they didn’t make her A-
AGREED I was just thinking they should do a soft reboot kinda like Gilmore girls and fix the ending of PLL once and for all. The fans would be here for it, that’s for sure. We’re owed a better ending than Alex Drake BS. Just make the finale we got one of Aria’s dreams, and she wakes up and we get the REAL ending.
Okay but aria having a personality disorder would have been epic, it also explains how Eddie lamb recognised her, maybe she was visiting mona in radley to plan something. She also had a motive, Alison writing that secret in her journal blew up her family which also powers the motive to do it to spencers. When she was talking to the body in the car was also a PERFECT clue, AND there were SO many hints about aria being one of the twins in the story but maybe Ali was mentioning arias two personalities, as she walked past that house it showed the radley van, the same one that was shown by the story of the twins that ALISON told and she said “I feel like something happened here” what if her evil personality took over and killed the nicer one and she got put into radley because she was so mentally Ill, they really missed a perfect opportunity also with the pig mask whilst Alison and Toby along with Caleb were getting away from the house to go by the Campbell farm ( the mask was a pig ) and it was black A Clothes!!! We know she likes pigs right? Her puppet and a few other references I love this theory ( my own ) and think it would have been PERFECT
Yes!! I agree with this
@@Viewer777Cole :)
It would’ve been cool, but on the flip side incredibly insensitive. DID or “multiple personality disorder” isn’t something like depression which is transferred genetically, and something you develop later on. DID is the result purely and only from severe horrible trauma from a very young age, often times severe s***al abuse, physical abuse, and extreme childhood neglect-often done by a primary caregiver or someone close to the family.
It’s a deeply vulnerable and stigmatized disorder, and tbh it doesn’t need anymore help being stigmatized in the media.
Would’ve been super cool if we found out that Aria was somehow Ali’s twin (twins don’t have to look alike) or maybe a sibling?
@@katie5998 agreed! Aria could have been an evil mastermind without diagnosing her with a specific mental illness, it doesn't even matter why she was in Radley just that she is a disturbed girl and that's it about that.
@@tvddamonlovernina I agree. There was A LOT they could’ve done with her character that they unfortunately wasted.
Tbh, I think Pretty Little Liars would be a lot less criticized if they ended it after the third season, like they’d initially planned.
the fact that in the books it was Alison always upsets me that this didnt translate to tv because it would just make so much more sense
A good twist is always better then a shocking twist
A should of been Alison or Ezra or someone who was a lot more present in the show Cece should of been in season 5 helping out the girls or something so we remembered who she was before the reveal.
And AD definitely should of been Aria she was always getting away with things the other girls could never and always more concerned with boys instead of finding out who A was
Marlene once said that Aria was supposed to be A but to many fans guessed it so she changed the ending
That's so dumb! Aria would have been the perfect A. Just coming up with a random twin is ridiculous.
A lot of people were guessing it right though too!
Maybe thats why when Alex drake took Spencer Place and she says to aria sleeping that she think they are going to to be the closest. I don't know but I always thought that was weird and I always wanted to know why she said that
She's so arrogant
@Paula27 I wanted it to be them for years and when I found this out I was so sad
In my opinion they should've let Aria be A, like it was originally planned, I mean all the hints make this clear and then ended it shortly after the reveal in season six. I always thought that season seven was not needed and I also didn't like it at all.
Changing it just because a lot of people guessed it (which is partly their own fault because they gave us obvious hints on twitter) is exacly like George RR Martin described it:
If you write a mystery where the butler did it, you set up the hints and did some amazing foreshadowing but then someone figured it out and you change it up to the chambermaid who did it, then all this previous foreshadowing, all the hints will be for nothing. Now you have to set up new hints and debunk the old ones, come up with new foreshadowing... It's a giant mess.
That's unfortunately exacly what happened in PLL. It became a mess. I personally rather have a great story even when the reveal was obvious but makes sense than a story where it's so shocking because it doesn't make any sense at all. And seriously, what is up with the Rosewood genetics? Why do so many people have twins they never knew about? What is up with PLL and twins? I don't understand lol
To be fair, if your mother is a twin, chances are higher she also gets twins. However this doesn't apply if we're talking about identical twins. Besides that the whole "The twin did it" - twist thing is just lame.
@@pollypeachum9566 to be fair the original book series did a twin thing but instead of whatever the show did it was that Ali’s institutionalized sister switched places with her and the real Alison killed her twin because she had taken her place...it made a lot more sense than a secret twin who lived in another country with no connection to the girls but for some reason does this whole elaborate thing to fuck with them
@@brynniefresh9746 I didn't read the books. I'm sure the ending made more sense, though. I mean it can't be worse.. Nevertheless I'm not a fan of twin-twists in general. It's usually not a sign for a good story, because it's too easy and it's almost impossible to do it in a way that the reader is involved in the story.
Knowing Lucy thought Aria was A makes me feel better about the scene where Spencer tells Aria "I know who's helping Mona" and then Aria does the floating-calculations-thousand-yard-stare face, because obviously Lucy felt that she should act as though she was worried that her cover was blown. (If it's not clear, that's the episode where Aria shows up out of nowhere to rescue Spencer from her shower that was locked and trying to kill her.)
A being a twin is not the fundamental problem because the books had a twin reveal but it was actually satisfying and clever.
I know, right?! The A twin in the books is just amazing! I love it so much.
They never explained why Shawna, Jenna, and Melissa met in the woods.
They were all trying to see if Alison really was alive (I think)
@@milliekinsey8455 They made it seem like they were planning something big.
@@milliekinsey8455 they made it seem like THEY were going to kill Ali or something
Nothing involving Melissa was explained or made sense (to me at least), she just pops in, does something with a suspicious look on her face and mysterious music in the background and dipps
@@tvddamonlovernina same with Jenna, why was Jenna always in the center of very A story, she was never actually A or even knew who A was????it made no sense
A.D should’ve been someone they knew since season 1
Alison Dilaurentis.
I’m rewatching the pilot with the mindset that Aria is A and there’s just so much there. For instance, she’s the first one to receive an A message. This could be interpreted as a test, or something like that. She’s also acts very suspiciously. When Emily brings up getting a note, Aria immediately asks if it was from A. Almost like she knew exactly what happened. Though Emily doesn’t say what was on it, Aria knows it’s something personal. She also turns down Emily’s idea to tell somebody about the notes. Probably so she can keep the game going. This also happens at the funeral. She’s the one who mentions A out loud by name both times. She also “heard” that Hanna was at the police station even though it was portrayed as just moments earlier, which is when Hanna got the text. Since they aren’t close at that point, I doubt that Hanna and Aria would’ve messaged each other about that. Something else I noticed is that Aria only gets messaged by A for things that are happening in the present, while the other 3 get targeted for things that happened in the past. You can also see that Aria is kind of a great manipulator. She’s great at leading people on with just words and getting exactly the reactions she wants out of people. Especially with her dad and Ezra. She keeps her dad on edge about his secret. And with Ezra she keeps pursuing him and leading him on even though she knows she shouldn’t. If anything, these feel like Aria going on a power trip similar to A’s style of threats. She’s the only one other than Alison that is shown to blackmail or threaten others with information she has. As you mentioned, Alison didn’t really bare any of Aria’s secrets so she doesn’t really have anything going against her. It sets her up as this blank slate mysterious main character with obscure needs. Perfect for a master manipulator who can stand on a pre-established perch. From the first episode, the only characters we know about that could reasonably be A are Aria and Mona.
And the first ever A text says that it's from Aria's own phone too at the top of the screen. Easily could've been a test.
I would have loved aria and Allison to be teamed up to be A. That would’ve been so interesting and a way better ending. And it makes a lot more sense.
To me, the worst A reveals were Shawna, Cece and Alex. The audience didn’t care much for those characters and hadn’t had any attachment to those characters.
Shawna wasn’t a real A though. There were just 3 real ones.
I always thought it could Melissa, Spencer’s older sister that could be A, also aria was kinda the main character over the other liars in the first few seasons 🤷🏼♀️
I’m 99.9% sure it was Aria but they had to change it when the fans figured it out
They shouldn’t have changed it. They should’ve taken it as a huge compliment that the fans were so obsessed and then given the fans (us) the ending we DESERVE.
To be fair, in the pilot when Alison was ignoring Mona, Aria said "maybe we should wait". But that was removed in a later episode using the same flashback so maybe she was just trying to think of herself as being nicer than she really was in the past
i totally agree, i would like someone else to be A.D
😇
I’ve actually noticed that Aria didn’t really get as many consequences/injuries as the other girls, she really did just do her own thing… so that is a question that is unanswered in my mind.
PLL is genuinely one of my favorite tv shows of all time. Rewatched multiple times looking for clues. I for sure remember going online and reading everyone’s A theories. Aria, Alison, and Melissa were the most common A theories by far. I mean, E lamb recognizing her in Radley? Aria’s obsession with dolls? Why did A never expose her relationship with Ezra? Why did Ali allegedly take photos of only Aria when she was sleeping? Mona calling her Big A in the hallways? Arias outfits always seeming to have a deeper symbolic meaning? The photos of the twins in her bedroom? Aria seeming to be the least tortured by A throughout the series? She always seemed super suspicious and had a natural fascination with dark stuff that lined up with who we as an audience thought A was. One theory from before the ending of the show pointed out that there were always hints of aria having some kind of bipolar disorder or mental illness that would have justified her hypothetical A behavior along with being part of the group - she had 2 personalities. The clues were ALL there. It would have made us empathize with her character even IF she turned out to be A due to Aria being bipolar. I remember watching season 7 and right from the beginning, knew that the A reveal would be absolute shit. Alex Drake only solidified how bad the writers screwed up the ending that would have been revolutionary in tv history.
You are 100% correct on this, I stopped watching after season 4B or season 5 I can’t remember but I remember everyone definitely assumed Aria was the mastermind on Reddit and RUclips and now that PLL is on Hulu I just finished season 1 and so many clues point to Aria
Just the way you talk about Allison and Aria being AD together makes me have goosebumps just thinking about it. God, I really wished the writers went that route, would’ve been absolutely amazing!
Couldn't agree more!
Even Lucy Hale was convinced Aria was "A".
i am rewatching and currently on season one and on one of the first episodes ezra is teaching a class literally talking about UNRELIABLE NARRATORS and staring at aria a lot. i think that was supposed to be a clue too on aria as an unreliable source in this narrative.
Back when I was watching the show when it aired, I was always convinced that Aria was A or somehow involved. There were multiple clues, the community was full of fan theories about it. I think the show writers should have stuck with it and made her A
So what if part of the fandom figured it out? Proper plot execution is all that matters. All they had to do was execute it well.
Yes!!! Aria could’ve been A the whole time without knowing she was A. That would’ve kept the friendship thing intact too. Good Aria had no idea why bad Aria was up to
I always thought Aria was going to be revealed as A. When I decided to drop the show, it was when we learned Ezra wasn’t that innocent. At that time I really thought it was going to happen and we’d see Ezria as the evil couple. Unfortunately I was wrong 🥀
Aww man I agree
This video inspired me.
PLL could have been this intriguing story about grief, friendship, and the real repercussions of bullying.
I think the final A should have been Aria with the help of Ezra, Jason, and Noel. Like Serena said the love between Aria and Alison could have been unconditional. I believe it’s implied if not explicitly mentioned that the girls didn’t have many friends before Alison came into their lives. In the book Aria is described as the weirdo of Rosewood. Perhaps she had some mental disorders (I don’t have much knowledge on mental health problems so bear with me) that led to her being a patient at Radley and she didn’t have many opportunities to make friends. So when Alison brought all the girls together Aria felt like she belonged for the first time in her life. She had good friends and a good life all thanks to Alison.
After Alison’s disappearance the girls drifted apart and maybe this caused Aria to again be consumed by her mental disorders but her parents didn’t want to send her back to Radley because other people in town might find out and it could lead to more problems for Aria so instead they went away to Iceland.
A year later when Aria came back to Rosewood Mona began the A game because she was afraid that the girls would bully her again, like she did in the show when Alison returned. Unfortunately for her this only brings the girls closer and suddenly Aria has her old friend group again. As for Ezra maybe Aria knew that Alison had a thing with him since they seemed the closest out of the five girls, and in some warped way in her mind being with him meant having a connection with Alison. And kind of the same thing with Jason.
Once it’s revealed that Mona is A Aria worries that she will lose her friends again. She thinks that the only way her friendship with the girls work is if they have a common “enemy” to fight against. Originally it was Alison who knew all their secrets and manipulated the girls with them, and then later Mona did the same thing as A. So Aria picked the game up from Mona, adopting this Alison-esque persona and pretended to be innocent the entire time. She did feel betrayed that Ezra was writing his book the entire time but figured she could use the information he collected to her advantage. Like Alison she manipulates Jason and Noel to do her bidding. Here we have our A team.
On the other side we have the three girls; Spencer, Hanna, and Emily. Caleb, Toby, and whoever Emily is with at the time, I lost track. Mona later becomes an ally to the girls once out of the A game for good, her brilliance a match for Spencer’s. And then there’s rogue Jenna that always seems to have her own handful cohorts and only acts on her own behalf.
And the show could have gone on for 2-3 seasons with the girls trying to figure out who A is. Finally it would be revealed that Aria is A when Noel, after secretly working for both Aria and Jenna unbeknownst to each girl, told Jenna the truth when things had gotten too far (Aria planning on kidnapping the girls in the Dollhouse.)
When the girls confront Aria through much difficulty she confesses to everything. She reveals that she had not only killed Maya for knowing the truth but also killed Alison, on the night she disappeared, in a fit of rage when she found out that Alison was blackmailing Aria’s father. Mona then found Alison’s body that night. Thinking that after all the terrible things the girl had done Alison didn’t deserve a proper burial and in a rash decision Mona buried her in the backyard.
The girls would struggle with the idea that their close friend was their tormentor for so long but ultimately they’d sympathize with Aria and tell her that they all miss Alison but they have to move on and they can do that together. Ezra would go to jail (for obvious reasons), and Aria (and maybe Mona too) would go back to Radley this time with her friends to support her as she gets better.
The moral of the story would be that mental illnesses can cause you to do terrible things in the wake of grief or other traumatic catalysts but with the right help and support you can live a good and happy life. Additionally, the show would be a prime example of the repercussions of bullying being that Alison tormented all these people including Aria and the girls but even after she died these people had to deal with the trauma long after she was gone. Your actions don’t end with you, they affect others regardless of your presence in their life.
PLL still could’ve been this salacious teen drama but it also could’ve had all these morals that would be beneficial for younger generations for years to come.
Thanks Serena for the great video! I’ve forgotten how much fun it is to theorize about shows especially shows like PLL. Keep up the good work!
dangggg you sent an essay! 👌
THIS IS GENIUS??
Agree with you on EVERYTHING you said in this. The finale was so so so bad and honestly ruined the show for me in a lot of ways. It should have been AriA :( subscribed!!!
Aria would have been so badass 🥰
It kind of makes sense that Aria was the only one who got a happy ending. *A* always wins.
Imagine the last scene like this you get the classic happy ending, the wedding all are happy and well and then, Aria turns around gives us the most creepy smile ever and does the shh. i mean that would have been an ending that you'd remember. Great video, thanks!
such good ideas! I think it would have been the best to reveal that Alison and Aria were working together but Aria actually took it further than Ali intended and then Alison went back to the girls to help (and that could have explained her poor redemption arc and Aria 'working for A in season 7) and then Wren and Cece could have been in on it and Ezra and Mona were like Aria's puppets
I hate that they ruined one of my favorite shows, I never watched the 10 year later version because it already was so dragged out I was tired of it. It is annoying how shows about high school emphasize the friendships lasting forever when honestly most people I know talk to like one or two people from high school, if that. I feel like watching these kinds of shows in high school made me subconsciously worry about keeping my friends from high school or even normalized the idea that the longer your friendship, the stronger it is, when time means nothing. Anyways the fact that they threw out the idea of Aria being A to keep a lowkey toxic high school clique alive is dumb and unrealistic
the spin off is pretty good i guess it’s nothing in comparison to pll. i was really excited for s2 of the perfectionists but it got cancelled
G_xoxo on RUclips had the best pll theories during the show’s run. Her Aria theory was the best! So sad all the clues were just red herrings :(
Btw love your videos 💕
Thankyouuu 🧡 And yes I saw a few of her videos and they were amazing! Any one of her theories would have been better than the actual finale, sadly
Aria's "shh" being off center is why it's so good. It's off center so it isn't blocking you from seeing her lips.
Ezra being A and Aria joining him later would’ve made a lot of sense too
A.D should have been Aria's stylist, pure evil
Hehe really, i loved Aria's fashion? 😇
HAHAHAHAHAH
Aria is the only A that makes sense. Even if the fans guessed it, who cares! Better than the ridiculous reveals we got. Im still not over this tragedy of a show...
Me either I am so disappointed!
I remember how Lucy Hale was the only cast member who didn't know who A was and a lot of people assumed that's because they didn't want her knowing it was Aria to change her acting. It would've been awesome
As a writer who is writing something similar to PLL i would’ve made aria & alison the villains! Alison was a ICONIC mean girl and she didn’t deserve a redemption arc she was a gaslighting manipulative toxic person and friend it would’ve been cool if she was the villain and aria was a villain too and they both were revealed to be these horrible people who pretended to be friends with the girls i would’ve been so much happier !
Also everyone makes it seem like the girls fell apart as a group when Alison disappeared, but they are reunited by A as soon as Aria appears back in Rosewood. It would have been so much more chilling to find out that Aria had been the puppet master of the group, even to the extent that she convinced Ali that she was the glue that held them all together.
i wish they did a segment of Aria at Radley and made it so she lied about going to Iceland
She spent that year plotting with Alison.
Who I’d pick as A-
1st- Mona. I think her reveal was amazing and the most shocking to me. Everyone had motives and hers was one of the ones that really changed her. Like Jenna, she went blind, but her personality stayed the same.
2nd- Wren. I think Wren would have been an amazing Charles. He could’ve changed his name to Wren and this would be appropriate for the time were Jessica could’ve had an affair someone else.
3rd- Arlene (My OC). I think Arlene would have been Aria’s twin sister. She would be introduced in the last episode much like Alex, but this would make much more sense than Spencer having a twin. Especially because Eddie Lamb recognizes Aria at Radley but what if he recognizes Arlene but thinks it’s Aria. This would make even more sense because in his book, Ezra wrote that he thinks that one of the girls are A, but what if he was wrong and it’s actually one of the liars siblings. This would make sense because if Arlene doesn’t want to hurt her sister, she would just hurt her friends and that’s why Aria doesn’t really get hurt much in the dollhouse
What truly ruined this show was social media. I think the writers kept trying to satisfy people by not doing something bad to their favorite characters and put themselves in a corner to keep all the liars safe from being A.
I have watched PLL all the way through multiple times... but I still ALWAYS forget who A actually turns out to be hahah. That shows how stupid it was... someone who has watched it multiple times... and I can’t ever remember how it ends😂😂 because it didn’t make sense!! I think I blocked it from my memory lol it was SO underwhelming. If it was Aria it would’ve been PERFECT. A character we knew and liked but also had weird feelings about... ugh. So mad at the writers.
Yay another pll video. Aria being A would have been so delicious. We were robbed
preach!!
i’m going to pretend that your aria theory was actually how it ended from now on
hehe thankyou
Lmfao that profile picture! 💀
Tbh in my mind Aria is A, but she actually suceeded as a villain, because nobody ever found out what she did. I think that Allison and Aria manipulated Mona into torturing the other girls and then let her take the fall (since they were bullying her before, too). Afterwards Aria continued as A without Allison, which was kinda the reason she had this redemption arc (basically just becoming a weaker person compared to being a sociopath like before) because she realised what she had done by manipulating Aria. At this point it's too late for Allison to come clean, because of everything they've done to Mona and the other girls, so she just keeps quiet even though she knows that Arias A.
And for the final season, maybe Aria found out about Spencers twin Alex and manipulates her into thinking that her only chance of being with her sister and part of the friend group is by becoming A. Since Alex is mentally ill she believes Aria and plays the villain, but in the end Aria lets her take the fall and makes everyone believe that it was Alex all along.
Especially if you look at the end scene when all the girls are together before Aria leaves, you notice Allison holding back (walking behind the group, etc.) while Aria is the center of attention and Emily, Spencer and Hanna are all crying and saying their goodbyes to Aria while as Allison says "For some reason i feel like this is the end of something" because she knows that Aria was A and hopes that with her leaving the whole torturing finally stops.
Okay, thanks bye
Aria as A would go a long way to make the aria and Ezra relationship feel less creepy too. He was writing a book and that’s creepy but she actually was the one manipulating the relationship to be with him because Ali liked him. And maybe he never realizes she’s A
god why wasn't aria A...it pisses me off. even lucy hale thought aria was A.
“Hellloooo sista”
It was the accent for me - me and my friends just pissed ourselves laughing 😂
i knowwww my ribs were hurting 😂😂
Ah gosh I know.
The ending was even more shit because I’m British and the accent was just shocking.
She sounded like someone doing a joke cockney accent not like she was trying to really portray a serious character
I got the impression the writers overheard Troian putting on a funny accent in her dressing room or something and thought "omg, what brilliant acting, it's like she's a completely different person...eureka!"
Felt like we were being pranked
For me Aria and Alison were perfect for A. And maybe some help from Wren - the doctor who has acces to all that files and Redly's documents is perfectly matching. And of course some other people could help them like Mona did because I loved her on the screen way better after season 5 compared to Alison
Aria being A had to have been the original plan. There’s no way it wasn’t. There is no way in hell if she wasn’t planned to be A from the beginning that her and Ezra could have lasted. He would have been exposed 1000%. She also forgave Ezra SOOOO QUICK.!!!!! Like huh.???? The worst thing that happened to him was Mike socked him in the jaw lmao. The writers 100% changed it bc we all guessed it too many times.
Aria being the Big Bad of the show made so much sense. -A didn’t start stalking them until Aria came back from Iceland. Even Mona said “Miss Aria, Your A Killer, Not Ezra’s Wife” and there’s just so much evidence piled proving that Aria would be the best Big Bad.
First of all, living for this channel! I’m getting into PLL again for the first time since high school so this is a lot of fun. Second, I would have loved to see Ezra be AD. Alison’s obsession with Lolita by Nabokov fits in perfect with the adult man who obsesses over and abuses a young girl. Plus I think if given the opportunity, Ian Harding could have been truly terrifying in his role. Probably would have been a wonderful portrayal!
yess Ian would have been so creepy! So would Wren. Such wasted potential
Ezra + Ali would’ve been amazing too