Pretty Little Liars Season One

 Alright, let me just say, first of all, that the show is better than the book.

So, Pretty Little Liars. You've probably heard of it at some point. It was a pretty big deal when it was running, and a lot of people watched it. The show was based on a series of books, and I reviewed the first few here [spoiler alert: I didn't have a very high opinion of them].

After getting HBO Max to watch Doctor Who, and seeing that Pretty Little Liars was on there, I decided to give it a try [mostly so I could make a book vs. TV show post on it].

Alright, let's get started.

Cast: Troian Bellisario, Ashley Benson, Lucy Hale, Shay Mitchell, Sasha Pieterse, Holly Marie Combs, Ian Harding, Laura Leighton, Chad Lowe, Keegan Allen, Tammin Sursok, Tyler Blackburn, Bianca Lawson

Creator: I. Marlene King

Rating: TV-14

Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Drama

Summary: Four friends band against an anonymous foe who threatens to reveal their darkest secrets, while also investigating the disappearance of their best friend.

My Thoughts: 

I was actually surprised by how....not totally awful this show was. Don't get me wrong, it definitely has flaws, but it was significantly better than the books. 

Spoilers are ahead, so read at your own risk.

What I Liked:

The mystery. 

The mystery was my favorite part of the books by far. I mean, who's this creepy person sending the girls texts? Who killed Alison? Is it the same person or a different person? It's all very intriguing, and I personally think that the mystery works better in a TV format. Some of the A moments were downright creepy.

-The liars themselves

I....kind of hated all the main characters in the book, because they just all seemed like horrible, heartless caricatures of mean girls, and I didn't care at all about them. While, in the show, they're definitely flawed, they all seem a lot more....human. I'll explain it more for each of them in the character sections, but for example, in the books they all gladly went along with Ali's mean girl antics [and even came up with some of them themselves], whereas, in the show, they participate, but much more reluctantly. By the end of the season, I had come to genuinely care about Spencer, Hanna, Aria, and Emily. 

-[Some of] the supporting characters

Okay, Maya is an absolute gem, and I adore her, and wish we'd seen more of her. I also ended up liking Toby [who, FYI, is much, much less creepy in the show than he is in the books]. Also, Aria's mom! Loved her.

-A lot of the elements I hated in the books were changed in the TV show. Aka: no name brand references every five minutes. There were other, bigger, changes that I was pleased with, too. For example, in the books, it didn't seem like the girls were friends at all. In the show, they seem like actual friends, and their friendship is actually pretty sweet.

What I Disliked: 

-While changing the time from Ali's disappearance from three years to a year mostly made sense, it also created some problems. For example, they try to make it Hanna's transformation as shocking as it was in the books, and it just doesn't work as well. 

-Ezra Fitz.

I know that he's supposed to come off as creepy, but that doesn't stop me from wanting to skip every scene he's in. Seriously, Ezra, you do not start a relationship with a sixteen-year-old girl. Should she know better? 

Sure, but she's also sixteen. You're her teacher, and you're an adult, so start acting like one. 

-Also, there were just way too many creepy romances. Toby's stepsister, Jenna, was sexually abusing him, and Alison dated an older man, plus the Ezra/Aria thing. I mean, the first two were presented as a bad thing. It just felt like it was a little much for one season.

Characters

The Liars

Spencer

Spencer is a massive overachiever, and [probably] the smartest of the main characters. She was the only one who regularly stood up to Ali when they were all friends, and lives in her older sister, Melissa's, shadow. 

I had issues with Spencer in the book, but I think she was actually my favorite of the main characters in the show. She came across as a lot less mean than in the books, and her actress just embodied the character perfectly. She was flawed, and definitely more uptight than the rest of the girls, but she was likable...and seemed to actually have a moral compass. For example, in the books, she and Melissa's boyfriend, Wren, have an affair that she kind of initiates, whereas in the show, Wren kisses her, and she pulls away, and tells him that it's wrong. There are more things like that, so that's just one example.

She also had this very dry, very witty sense of humor, so, of course I loved that. 

Hanna

Hanna becomes the new ''It Girl'' after Alison's disappearances, and I absolutely loathed her in the books because she was a typical mean girl. She was super shallow, really mean, and made so many awful, cringe-worthy decisions just because it would help her stay popular. While she's still a little shallow and self-absorbed, she's not nearly as horrible in the show. She's actually a pretty good friend who is genuinely kind to people who are less popular than her. For example, in the books she befriends [and dates] Lucas only after she becomes unpopular, and she sort of ditches him once she becomes popular again. In the show, she's kind and friendly to him, and completely shuts Mona [another popular girl] down when she tries to insult him. 

Also, while she does shoplift in the show, it's only once, and she just steals a pair of sunglasses instead of jewelry, and it's pretty clearly related to her father leaving her and her mother. Also, Hanna was just fun. She brought a sense of levity to the show, and I liked that. 

Aria 

Aria is the ''quirky, artistic rebel'' of the group, and, while she was infinitely better than in the books, I think she was still my least favorite of the Liars, which I am extremely bitter about [give me good artsy girl representation, please]. I did love her artsy side, and the fact that she was a literature nerd [apparently, she's a writer, too, but we never see any storylines about her writing, which is kind of disappointing]. I also loved that she had lost her snobbishness and Not Like Other Girls traits from the books, and that she was so much nicer here. She made a lot of mistakes here [most of which stems from her impulsiveness because, oh my gosh, this girl is so impulsive], but she was friendly and cared about her family, and seemed to have a good heart. 

Honestly, my issues with her mostly stems from the Aria/Ezra thing. Aria is incredibly indecisive about the whole thing, and she just seems to....lean on Ezra in a super unhealthy way. To be fair, he caused a lot of that, and should have promptly shut it down, but it made her storylines way less enjoyable. Like, being a hopeless romantic doesn't mean you're super needy [said the extremely bitter hopeless romantic].

Emily

Emily's the sporty one, and the ''sweet good girl'' of the group, and I liked her quite a bit. She seemed the most....human in the books, and, while she wasn't my favorite in the show [mostly because several other characters received some much needed character development], I did like her. Even though she's ''the sweet one'' she makes her fair share of poor decisions, which I actually appreciate. It would've made her annoying if they tried to have her be nice all the time. She's also a lot tougher than anyone would expect. I would describe Emily as a definite Hufflepuff---sweet, hardworking, loyal, and slightly naive.

Alison

Can I just say that Sasha Pieterse is so talented? She was really young when the show started, and she was so great as Alison. She was mysterious and manipulative, and, while I don't like Alison, I get why she's there. 

The Love Interests

Toby Cavanaugh

Toby is Spencer's major love interest for the first season. At first, he was kind of creepy, and I wasn't a huge fan of him, but I warmed up to him. He's a bit of an angsty loner, but he's sweet, and I eventually ended up liking him. I wasn't a huge fan of him in the books, but he was my second favorite love interest in the show. 

Caleb Rivers

Caleb, meanwhile, is Hanna's major love interest, and he was.....fine. He was kind of a bad boy, but he had more development than most bad boys are. He wasn't my favorite, but I liked him. Also, fun fact: Caleb wasn't even in the books, so I can't compare how similar his TV counterpart is to his book counterpart.

Ezra Fitz

Ugh....Ezra. I hate him. I mean, he's an English teacher, which is cool, but, other than that, he's horrible. I mean, he's dating a student, which is a horrible thing to do. But, also, I just didn't like his personality. He just seemed like a jerk, and judgmental. So, in short, Ezra sucks.

Maya St. Germain

Maya is Emily's major love interest for the first season. So, first of all, she's played by Bianca Lawson [who played Kendra in Buffy the Vampire Slayer]. Second of all, I just really like her personality. She's bolder and more adventurous than Emily, but she's sweet. I like Maya. She [almost] made up for the awfulness of Ezra.

My Rating: I'm torn between giving it 3 1/2 stars, and giving it 4 stars. It definitely wasn't perfect, but I did enjoy it. 

Would I Recommend It? If you're into mysteries and/or teen dramas, then yes. I would say that if you're thinking about watching the show vs reading the books, I'd recommend the show. 

So, that's all for now. Have you seen and/or read Pretty Little Liars? If you read/watched both, which did you prefer? Who was your favorite Liar [again, if you read the books/watched the show]?