S3 Episode 15: Mona Mania

Slightly different approach. Grouping them by events in this episode.

Night Must Fall, At the Montgomery Household

• The episode opens with Aria watching Night Must Fall. Byron disrupts her, telling her that Meredith got a call from the Principal. They caught who was responsible for the fire. He apologizes for accusing her & her friends. He repeatedly tells her that she has seen the movie and makes a reference to the severed head in a box.
• At School, Aria brings Ella some newspapers (Rosewood Observer) for her class. The headlines are of Garrett’s murder. (Why is this in the sidelines??? It’s another murder!) The Montgomeries start talking about the night Ali went missing. Byron and Ella went to an academe party at Hollis, went home early with a bottle of red wine. Ella went to bed early, and slept in. Outside, Meredith overhears them, somehow. (I really think she’s a little Cuckoo. Meredith.)
• Meredith approaches Ella right before she leaves to monitor detention. She told her that she saw her and Aria talking and presumed it had something to do with her injury. (Yeah, right. Someone’s trying to force herself on to other people. Why would they talk about her? Such a self-centered reaction.) Ella is trying her best to act professional and civilized around someone who is deceitful.
• At home, Aria, Em, and Hanna are talking about the day’s events. Em says that Spencer checked with Jason and confirmed that he has been Mona’s internet nanny. Aria tells them that she has been feeling queasy, then tells them what she told them what she found out from Ella re the night Ali went missing. She also thinks that Byron could’ve snucked out and that getting Ella to bed early (intoxicated, really) seemed intentionally. She claims that Byron said he was not seeing Meredith at that time. They start looking for the pages and can’t seem to find it. Byron enters her room and he hints about him knowing Aria hiding stuff in her boots. (Of course, he has it.)
• Later, Aria chats with Ezra when she overhears Byron and Meredith have an argument. She peeks outside her room and witnesses her dad hold on to Mer’s arm too tightly. Meredith leaves and Byron closes Aria’s bedroom door.
• Aria follows Meredith (to The Brew?) and they start talking about Byron. Meredith tells Aria that she caught him searching through stuff twice. First, her bag thinking it was Aria’s (HUH? Really?). When Byron ‘left’, she went around searching herself. She found the pages in Byron’s dresser. (Ok, so how did she know what to look for?). Aria takes the pages, saying they are hers. Then, they talk about the night Ali went missing. Meredith says that she knew about Ali blackmailing Byron, and that he came to see her that night. He accused Meredith of working with Ali (Hmmm). He left Meredith’s apartment to go and meet with Ali.
• Aria and Meredith are back at the Montgomery house. Byron asks Meredith if they could “talk”. (Stomach is churning) Byron apologizes to Aria. (Is this a ploy to get Aria on Meredith’s side?)
• Aria is checking her temp and we don’t really see the results. Meredith hands her tea, holding a cup for herself. Aria hesitates and Meredith explains that it’s her “secret weapon” to get better (Hmmm). Meredith starts talking about the pages in the diary. (We sense her urge to find out more) She wants to keep it a secret from Byron but Aria disagrees. Mer says that the next few days will be “tough”. Aria drinks the tea, Meredith leaves the room but never drinks hers.
• Byron is at his office. As he leaves, Mona in her hoodie makes a call. She tells the person on the line that he just left and continues to follow him.

The Disappearance of Harold

• Em, Hanna, and Spencer are in the basement again. Headed towards Harold’s office. Em looks for the light switch and was unsuccessful. Spencer realizes that someone else was in the room. Hoodie makes a run for it.
  
• They find Ali’s journal, torn with a note left for them.
  
• All of Harold’s stuff are gone. (Does this mean he got blamed for the fire?)
• At the Brew, Mona starts talking to the liars about Harold. That he was stalking her. (LOL, she really thinks they will believe her?) She says that her parents and her are responsible for him leaving the school. Spencer asks if Mona thinks that Harold rigged the explosion during the marathon to hurt her. Blah, blah blah…Mona says that Harold is now “off the grid”. She leaves, the liars are not buying her story. They ask Hanna what she thinks and she obviously is struggling. She says that, “there’s more to the story.”

Academic Decathlon

• At the brew, while talking about anxiety dreams, Spencer’s intent to run for Academic Decathlon Team Captain is mentioned. Mona starts fixing her cardigan and approaches the liar (How long has she been listening? Enough to find out that Spencer is running for TC). Segue here.
• At the Academic Decathlon meeting, Andrew Campbell makes his first appearance. He is the team secretary and tells them that Mona is joining. He also makes the announcement of who is running for Team Captain. Spencer and Mona. They vote, and tied. A Quiz-Off is required, on the next day. (Note: The guy to the right of Spencer looks too old for highschool.) After the meeting, Andrew encourages Spencer. Spencer gets a text.
  
• In the courtyard, Spencer tells the liars about the Academic Decathlon and Mona. With how she is currently acting, it reminds them much of Ali. (Andy Reaser has been posting teasers of SISTERS.) Mona fixes her cardigan (again) and approaches them. She tries to be apologetic about the AcDe but it is obviously coming out fake. Conniving even. (It appears to be on purpose.) She tells them that she has no internet, no cellphone – as part of her ‘leaving Radley deal’. They ask about the video she posted, and she tells them that Jason (HA!) has been ‘monitoring’ her. (Mmmhmm, sure.) They tell her that they know that she has been sneaking out of Radley. She ignores the statement—does not deny it—and tells them that her Dr. thinks it’ll be difficult for other people to understand. (Duh. She tried to kill someone.) The liars are definitely not buying it.
• Spencer is at home studying with Toby. He tells her that he could skip his “meeting with his boss” but Spencer refuses. Then, his boss calls and he says that he is just about to leave. Spencer gets ready for the AcDe.
• At the Quiz Off, Mona appears to still be ‘campaigning’. She tells them that she is preparing another Get Well Soon card to ex-team captain Brad (She is obviously taunting Spencer).
• The quiz off begins. Spencer gets really confident. Eventually, gets over confident and loses to Mona.
• After the quiz off, Andrew suggests taking it to the ‘faculty’ (He is really trying to help her…giving her extra attention as well.)
• Hanna picks up Spencer at the Quiz Off. She asks if Mona cheated and Spencer says yes at first then says no. An angry Hanna approaches Mona and tells her that she is on to her and she knows everything…especially what she has done to Lucas. (Crud. Crud. Crud. Why did she have to do that? Hanna could’ve just told the liars and used it against Mona.) Mona is angry.
• At home, Spencer ices her head. (Mrrrp) She and Hanna talk about the quiz off and how she lost because she got cocky. Hanna gets a text: “Cut Mona off? Big mistake. You’re not the only one who can slice and dice… -A” Hanna says that there are “more people out there”, referring to a possibility of more As. They also think that Mona showed a weak spot on purpose. (Uh, that’ called a lure.)

My Name Is Lucas

• At School, Hanna approaches Lucas and tells him that she knows it was him in the basement.
  
  He “cracks” and tells her that he was looking something. (What?) He also says that they shouldn’t be seen together. Hanna asks by whom…he replies with “who do you think?!”
• Lucas claims that he tried to stop Mona at the marathon. Hanna tells him that she doesn’t trust Mona either. She offers to help Lucas but he says that she can’t. As long as Mona is back, no one is safe.
• Hanna visits Lucas at home and tries to offer him help…and get more information about Mona. Lucas tells Hanna that he is leaving Rosewood High for homeschool (and he thinks he’ll be safer because?). Lucas tells Hanna when he first got associated with MonA. He got an anonymous text to distract Jenna at the Masquerade. Then, another text when Mona was in Radley—to pick up an envelope from Jason and bring it to Mona (Prolly the same time Caleb and Hanna ran into him at Radley). He also thinks that it was Mona who tried to run him over when he was skateboarding. When asked what Mona had against him, Lucas said that he had been selling test answers.

Pailey

• Paige seems to be avoiding Emily at school. She says her parents are as freaked out as Em’s parents, since Halloween. Em mentions the Party In the Woods and Paige agrees to go with her.
• Paige and Emily are headed to the party, using their GPS which seems to be getting them nowhere. Paige pulls over, due to anxiety attack. She tells Em that she has been pretending that her parents are freaking out too when she’s the one having trouble since Halloween. Emily tells her to calm down and take a walk with her.
• When they walk back to the car, they noticed that the car had a flat. Paige tries to replace the flat (Someone needs to teach her how to do it right) but after Em examines it closely, says that someone slashed the tire. Em runs after someone into the woods, Paige follows. When they thought that someone got away, they head back towards the car. We are then shown that it was Toby. (Was he following them or did Paige know?)
• Paige sleeps over Em’s place. Em recommends Paige go see someone. (Ahhh, the Sully comeback)

A’s Antics

• Masks, masks, masks. Hoodie hides the masks of the Queen of Hearts and the Phantom around the campground area.

My Thoughts

These are more like rants and inquiries …

• Although we may seem to believe to think that Hoodie-A is hiding or burying the masks, I think they are being planted. Planted for who to discover?
• What in the tea that Meredith gave to Aria? Why did she not drink hers?
• Aria may have been queasy before the “tea”, but what caused it?
• Does the tea have something to do with an upcoming Ali-cination? (Hallucination)
• The appearance of Andrew Campbell. Big A must have something to do with this. Does Big A think that Toby’s personal feeling is clouding his judgment and affecting his A-team performance?
• Are Byron and Meredith working together – to find out more about what the liars might know?
• In an interview with KA, he mentions that Paige and Caleb were also shot in scenes wearing a hoodie. IMHO, this mention could mean that they want us to think that these two can not be A-Team members because it was mentioned in an interview.
  
• Does Mona really think she’s not that obvious? It’s hard to believe that she thinks she is getting away with stuff. It makes me think that, granted she is not Big A, she is being used as bait for something bigger.
• Jason’s involvement with the A-team makes me cringe. Check out this tweet from Andy Reaser. Antiseptic, huh?
  
• Bring back Jenna.
• Melissa is back on 3B, 3.20.
• I think having Meredith join in the taunting is genius.
• Are all murders in Rosewood just a side-story? Where is Wilden? Why isn’t he investigating Garrett’s murder?
• What was Lucas looking for when he was in the basement???
• Why haven’t they confirmed that the body found in the A-Train was Ali’s???