When Pretty Little Liars began seven years ago, it centered on the murder of a young girl and the friends she left behind. Initially they went their separate ways, but a cyber torturer, not-so-fondly known as A, brought them back together.
Even as the girls reconnected, their friendship grounded a show filled with danger, death and never-ending texts from a psychopathic stalker who knew their every secret. Often on teen dramas such as this, at some point, usually on more than one occasion, we see young women pitted against each other, even if they’re portrayed as best friends the episode before. Think Peyton and Brooke on One Tree Hill, Serena and Blair on Gossip Girl. Whether they’re fighting over the same boy or—wait, yep, they’re usually just fighting over the same boy.
In nearly 160 episodes, we haven’t seen this type of behavior displayed within the core five of PLL. Sure, Spencer, Aria, Hanna, Emily and Alison have had fights. They’ve had days when they didn’t agree on who’s taunting them from underneath a black hoodie. But they’ve never been set up to play into stereotypical teen girl tropes when it comes to friendship.
Pretty Little Liars provides us with one of the only consistently positive representations of female friendship on television. When Spencer and Caleb started falling for each other, it definitely caused tension between Spencer and Hanna. But it didn’t break their friendship. When the Liars learned Alison had let them believe she was dead for years, they rallied around her and made sure she had everything she needed to return home. Never did they pull each other’s hair or egg each other’s houses. (Editor’s note: These two examples are pulled from the previously mentioned shows.)
Has the intensity of being harassed by A for years bonded these girls? Of course. How could it not? And that’s a huge proponent of their dynamic, obviously. But it goes beyond that.
Not only have the PLL writers given us five friends who sidestep the very stereotype that dominates their genre (that, no matter what, women just can’t get along), but they’ve also shown us how versatile an on-screen friend group can be. One of my all-time favorite TV friend groups is the one on Friends. I find this sixsome to be everything you want in real-life and TV friends, but Pretty Little Liars still outdoes them in one major way. There is no limit to the combination of friendships presented.
On Friends tried-and-true combos like Monica and Rachel, Joey and Chandler, and just the girls or just the guys are the norm. You’ll never see Rachel and Chandler hanging out by themselves (unless it’s that one time they ate stolen cheesecake together). PLL, on the other hand, excels in mixing and matching the players it’s working with.
Hanna and Emily are no better friends than Aria and Spencer. Alison is just as likely to answer Spencer’s SOS as she is any of the other girls’. And when they need to split up—a few staking out a much-too-dangerous yet completely vague location while the others break into a dead guy’s apartment—there’s no hesitation over who’s teaming up with whom. All five of these girls are truly best friends, no one pairing more than another.
Till my dying day I’ll be captivated by any A mystery placed before me. The same A storyline can be recycled over and over again—I’ll still want to know who A is. But I’m grateful that Pretty Little Liars has been more than a whodunit. It’s represented female friendship in a way that doesn’t fall prey to what every teen drama before it (and most likely after it) has done. It circumvents the standard that says women can only be friends for so long before they’re ready to kill each other.
This show may be about murder, mystery, bullying and torture, but Aria, Spencer, Hanna, Emily and Alison’s friendship will be what continues to make an impact on viewers, even after all our questions have been answered.
