For many people, having a sibling, is almost like having an automatic ally: against your parents, against bullies, and against the world. You always have a built-in buddy, even (or especially when) times get tough. In the case of Jason and Alison DiLaurentis on Pretty Little Liars , they’ve gone through quite a bit. Besides the fact that they are both jerks, to each other and the world, they’ve learned (and so have we viewers) that Jason is actually Ali's half-brother (as Peter Hastings is Jason's biological father) and that they possibly probably have another brother, Charles, who appears to have severe mental issues and extremely violent tendencies.
Though Mr. DiLaurentis denied knowing about a Charles DiLaurentis at first, at the end of the last episode he spilled the beans (but of course we couldn’t hear it). Now that Charles is pretty much confirmed to be their brother, we have to confront one more fact about Charles DiLaurentis: He’s a dead man. No, I mean literally. Charles DiLaurentis is actually dead. Do I believe he’s not of this world? Absolutely not — he’s been pulling all kinds of crazy stuff with the Liars, and it is too easy to have Andrew Campbell be Charles DiLaurentis. This Charles is real, y’all, and he is fabulous.
So how does the addition of another Hastings/DiLaurentis sibling change the family structure? He could make Alison feel super alienated. You see, if Jason is Mr. Hastings’ son genetically and Charles is Jason’s twin, well, it’s a boy! Congrats to Mr. Hastings, because he has another son. That also means that Alison has no full biological siblings, no mother, and a crappy father. Jason, of course, shares exact parentage with Charles. Spencer and Melissa, as much as they are like oil and water, also have the same parents. Ali could feel really alone in this world, but I hope she’s grown up enough of the course of the past two seasons to recognize that she’s not.
Conversely, Charles could make Jason and Ali grow closer together. I don’t know about you, but if I found out my dead estranged brother/half-brother was a raging psychopath who had held my friends hostage for over a month, I don’t think I would be so willing to welcome him into my home. Jason and Ali are going to need explanations from a lot of people — their father and Charles included — and they’re not going to recover easily from a bombshell like this.
Hardly anyone in the world could understand what it’s like to have a hidden evil sibling (let alone a twin), so Ali and Jason are not only going to need years and years of steady therapy: They’re going to need each other, too. Maybe that will be the silver lining of Charles' villainous deeds, a stronger bond between the other DiLaurentis siblings. For more theories on Charles, Jason, and Ali, check out Bustle's PLL podcast below.
Images: ABC Family/Eric McCandless; Giphy (3)
