Pretty Little Liars Series Finale Ending Gets Honest Response From Spencer Hastings Actor 7 Years Later

Seven years after the finale of Pretty Little Liars, Troian Bellisario, who portrayed Spencer Hastings, gives an honest response about its ending. Pretty Little Liars was centered around a group of teenagers in Rosewood, Pennsylvania, following the mysterious disappearance of Alison DiLaurentis (Sasha Pieterse). Airing on Freeform (formerly ABC Family) for seven seasons, the show focused on uncovering the identity of A, an unknown adversary threatening to upend their lives. Although season 6 revealed CeCe Drake (Vanessa Ray) to be behind a lot, the final installment of Pretty Little Liars introduced an entirely new antagonist in A.D.

According to People, Bellisario discussed her thoughts on the series finale of Pretty Little Liars during a recent Epic Cons panel. She expressed mixed feelings about the surprise reveal of A.D. and explained that CeCe’s backstory might have made for a better conclusion since audiences “could kind of understand the motivations.” Read Bellisario’s quote below:

I wish that we had gotten to introduce Alex [Drake] a lot earlier. My only frustration was that it felt like a total bait-and-switch because we waited until the very last episode.

So it wasn’t as fun, I imagine, for audience members as when it was CeCe Drake… So when all of a sudden, it had to in an hour, make sense and also close up all the storylines that everybody loved so much — that was the only thing.

I loved that I had the opportunity to do that, but I wish that we had threaded it out a little bit more so that it didn’t take away from the more important storytelling points of the finale.

Pretty Little Liars’ Final “A” Reveal Explained

Following the time jump in Pretty Little Liars season 7, audiences put a face to A.D. There had been theories, particularly among those familiar with Sara Shepard’s novels, that a narrative surrounding twins would be integrated, and the show had already established that CeCe’s mother, Mary Drake (Andrea Parker), was Jessica’s twin sister. However, the finale revealed that she was also Spencer’s mom, and that Bellisario’s character had a twin of her own. Alex Drake had impersonated Spencer multiple times, and planned on taking over her life, but the revelation might have come too late.

There were several As throughout Pretty Little Liars, and it’s worth wondering how the show would have concluded if CeCe remained the primary antagonist. Having appeared in various episodes, and claiming to be a friend of Alison’s, CeCe might have flown under the radar, but Bellisario mentioned that audiences “knew the character.“ As the series progressed, viewers discovered that she was born as Charles DiLaurentis and spent years in a sanitarium, before eventually familiarizing herself with the Liars.

Bellisario’s thoughts on the Pretty Little Liars finale are interesting, especially because audiences have expressed similar views over the years. While it makes sense to keep some mystery in the show, and there were signs that might have cast suspicion on “Spencer,” the explanation of A.D. received fairly mixed reactions.