Tuesday nights on Freeform (previously ABC Family) have been dominated by the hit TV show Pretty Little Liars since June of 2010. The show is an adaptation of the book series written by Sara Shepard which follows the lives and lies of four girls from Rosewood, Pennsylvania after they start receiving messages from a mysterious person, "A." They have to uncover secrets of their presumed dead friend, Alison, and pay for their own transgressions in the hands of the villainous "A." This show has just made it to its seventh season, but should have stopped a long time ago. My prayers have been answered and it was announced on Facebook that the show is ending in the spring. Now I have compiled a list about why the show needs to end because there are probably some people out there that don't want it to end, but it really really needs to.
*disclaimer: there are a couple spoilers in here from the new season, but I will try to make them not that bad.
1. How much more can these girls go through?
Spencer had a drug addiction, Emily had a car drive through her house, Hanna had an eating disorder, and Aria had a plethora of bad boyfriends. Why can't we just let the little liars have a happily ever after? I think they deserve it. Karma has run its course and they need the break. It is actually really surprising that only Spencer ended up in Radley when all of them could have snapped at any minute.
2. The storylines are getting more ridiculous.
*Super spoilers*
Mrs. D has a twin sister who was in Radley and she is Charlotte's real mother and Mrs. D adopted her and the sister's last name is Drake like Charlotte's alias, CeCe Drake, and Charlotte loved the doctor who pretended to have feelings for Ali and then Ali and the doctor got married so then he could put her in an asylum.
Yeah, why does this need to happen?
3. We know who "A.D." is.
The entire fun of the show is guessing who "A" really is. But in the new season, we have a very good idea about who is mostly pulling the strings, so what are we supposed to do now? Also, why do we always have to steal Alison's identity? First "A" and now "A.D."
4. How did they even graduate high school?
They graduated high school and even went on to prestigious colleges. When did they have time to focus on school work? When they were hunting down "A" until the early hours of the morning or when they were being hit by cars? I know they are smart, but come on, they must have great tutors or something. Also, they were trapped in "the doll house" for a month at the end of their senior year. How did they make up for that?
5. Secondly, how did Ali become a teacher?
This is what I don't understand. Ali was missing for about two years. She missed sophomore, junior, and half of senior year. The first thing is, when she came back to Rosewood, how did they just put her into senior classes. I'm pretty sure Ali wasn't taking tests about Shakespeare on her hiatus. So she has two and a half school years to make up for and then at least four years to get a teaching degree. There is almost no way she could get all of that done in five years. She might be superwoman and I'm just bitter about it.
6. They strayed too far from the original book series.
I understand why the television show is so different from the actual books, but come on. We don't want people to find out who "A" is by cheating and reading the books. Sara Shepard basically wrote two book series because there is almost no correlation whatsoever by this point.
7. They are adults now, can we stop with the childish antics?
The girls are now about 23 years old. They are stuck in the same role that they were in as teenagers. It is getting all very repetitive. In the "Five Years Forward" part of season 6, the girls make many jokes about not being in high school anymore but they do the same things that they did in high school.
8. The actors are old.
I understand that casting people older than their character is done almost everywhere, but Troian Bellisario (Spencer) is turning 31 this October. She was playing a teenager up until last year. That's kind of insane. At the beginning of the series, the actresses were believable in their roles, but getting into seasons five and six, the realism is lost. In the "Five Years Forward" the girls are roughly 22-24 depending on birthdays. Ashley Benson (Hanna) is 26, Shay Mitchell (Emily) is 29, and Lucy Hale (Aria) is 27. So their ages aren't too bad in comparison right now. Sasha Pieterse (Alison) is the only one of the five that is playing a character who is older than her in "Five Years Forward" seeing as she is only 20.
9. The storylines are too hard to follow.
Who is on the girls' side and who wants to kill them? That list can be overwhelming. It is difficult to know what is going on when there are four different schemes happening at the same time.
10. PLL has taken over your Tuesday nights.
Sometimes we enjoy doing something on a Tuesday night, but we can't because if we don't watch Pretty Little Liars live, then someone is spoiling it on Twitter.
11. They keep pulling you in.
I tried to hop off the train with this new "Five Years Forward" business, but I ended up hopping right back on once I got let out for summer break. The show is like a car crash, you can't look away. I've invested so many of my Tuesday nights to this show, I just want to make sure the liars are alive and doing semi-okay. Another thing is the storylines are so out there that, as a fan of plot, are left sitting there thinking about how they can possibly bring everything back.
12. The girls just need a happy ending.
I realize that these girls are fictional, but after you spend five years with them, you become attached. They have been through so much and I think that it is time for them to be able to go onto their own lives and leave Rosewood and "A" behind them for good. They deserve it and the audience deserves it as well.
I still love the series, but I can't wait for it to end.
