I have a confession to make.
Despite what some might call better judgement, and despite being almost 30 years old, I am pretty much obsessed with Pretty Little Liars.
There’s something about ABC Family shows. I always assume they will be silly and poorly acted and kind of stupid (Secret Life of the American Teenager, anyone?), but there are some seriously underrated gems. Luckily I am finally getting with the program(s).
During the first couple seasons, I saw more than a few ads for Pretty Little Liars and rolled my eyes and vaguely wondered how many secrets a sixteen year old could possibly have. But I finally decided to give it a chance, binge-watched two seasons in a week, and never looked back. It is so, so good. Like should be guilty pleasure good but is actually smart and well-acted so I don’t even feel bad spending so much time obsessively watching teenagers run amock.
If you haven’t seen the show at all, here’s the gist: Alison was a fifteen year old mean girl who went missing for a year. Her four closest friends have more than a few skeletons in each of their closets that only Alison knew about, and while they miss her, they’re also semi-relieved that she can’t work her mean girl blackmailing magic on them anymore. Which is why they are pretty alarmed when they each begin to receive text messages from a mysterious “A” threatening to tell all. They assume it’s Alison (because really, it’s one of the nicer things she would do), until her body is discovered. Then the messages only get worse. It’s been four seasons of lying, secrets, betrayals, and general mayhem as the girls try to figure out who A is and why he/she/they? is making their lives a living hell.
It’s seriously delightful.
Season 5 premieres tonight, and the story lines are bound to be more nonsensical and insane than ever. But man, is this show fun. A huge, huge part of the fun is following alone with the #booradleyvancullen live tweeting during each new episode. I’m not alone in this sentiment:
But my absolute favorite part of the Pretty Little Liars experience is reading the recap on After Ellen the day after a new episode airs. I briefly considered attempting to write my own recaps, but really, what’s the point? Heather Hogan is perfection. I have forbidden myself from reading them at work because of how hard they make me laugh out loud.
I know I’m probably too old to be this excited for a show about teenagers. Luckily I’m also too old to care. YOLO!
New episodes are on ABC Family on Tuesdays and you can find all four previous seasons on Netflix.