Entertainment

Watch Aria's 'PLL' Breakdown

by Christine DiStasio

Aria's so done with this shit. Tuesday night's episode of Pretty Little Liars dropped a frustrating and heartbreaking bombshell — Ezra's been using Aria to write a book about Alison and her disappearance and he's not "A". Why do you do this to us, ABC Family? Why are you such a huge jerk, Ezra? We'll never know those answers — but we do know that Aria's heartbroken and she's going to trash Ezra's apartment during next week's episode. Good for you, let it all out, girl.

Everyone on PLL has been put through emotional hell — including sad, Ali-lover Ezra, apparently — but Aria's really put up with a lot of crap and she's kind of folded under the pressure each time. She lived with the guilt of not telling her mom that her dad had cheated on her, she lived with the guilt of hiding her relationship with Ezra (only to learn that all of that drama was in vain), she also lived with the fallout of actually telling people they were together, and she dealt with the Maggie and Ezra's alleged illegitimate lovechild Malcolm. And she's basically just made excuses and forgiven everyone anytime they've done something remotely terrible. Which has just been really sad, honestly.

So this week when Ezra was all like, "Sorry, I've only been dating you to keep you close so you could be a part of my Alison case-study," we were pissed — and so was she. FINALLY. Like, Ezra has always been the worst, Aria. We definitely wouldn't have been surprised if she made some excuse for his behavior and tried to stay with him (because she would totally do that but we are surprised that little Aria can pack such a huge punch. Honestly, we're proud of her. Actress Lucy Hale, who plays Aria on PLL, told E!:

Girl goes a little crazy. You get to see Aria really angry. She's upset about a lot of things. She has pent-up feelings and bottled emotions, and somewhere in the middle of the season, girlfriend just loses it.

Well hell yeah she goes a little crazy — the "love of her life" just told her that he's only been with her because he was in love with her BFF. Showrunner Marlene King also revealed that Hale was as excited to show fans a whole new side of Aria by unleashing such a huge, aggressive amount of emotion as we are to see it. It's a huge step for the character to act out and release her anger in such a big way. Watch a clip here:

She's pissed so she goes to confront Ezra — who conveniently isn't home — she starts reading one of his "field journals" and sees physical proof of what he confessed to the on the ski lift which sends her over the edge. First, we're thankful that Ezra wasn't there because he undoubtably would've tried to convince her to make an excuse for him. And second, GO ARIA — TRASH ALL OF HIS LYING, SCHEMING CRAP AND SHATTER THAT PICTURE. Because you deserve it.

Aria hasn't had a mental breakdown like Spencer or lashed out like Hanna and Emily, so in this one moment, any and all of her frustrations that have been bottled up for the entire series are exploding out of her in one, big destructive wave. And we love it. King compared Aria's destructive breakdown to a trainwreck that you just can't look away from — it's not that we can't look away though, it's that we don't want to. Aria's allowed herself to be manipulated and bent backwards by other people, especially Ezra, for so long that it's empowering to see her lash out this way.

There's going to be fallout and one massive act of destruction won't change what Ezra's done, but at least we get to cheer for Aria for a change — even if she might actually be "A".

Watch the promo for the episode here:

Image: ABC Family