Alison DiLaurentis and Aria Montgomery are two of the main characters on the popular teen drama, Pretty Little Liars. The duo has one of the more complicated relationships in the series. While Alison has defined relationships with all the other girls, she and Aria were always a little more distant.
Out of everyone, they probably have the least strong friendship foundation, but there are plenty of other reasons the two never made very good friends to begin with. The following list looks at some of the reasons Aria and Alison may not have been real friends.
Alison Openly Played Games With Aria And Noel
In the early days, before Ezra came along, Aria had a crush on Noel Kahn. Unfortunately, he was dating another girl at the time. At one point, we see a flashback where Alison called Noel “immature,” she then added, rather cuttingly, that he would be “perfect” for Aria.
Alison was the queen at backhanded compliments. Then she broke up Noel and his girlfriend so Aria could have him. Everything was simply a game to Alison, including her friends’ feelings and romantic interests.
Alison Emotionally Blackmailed Aria
In the episode, “The First Secret,” we see the incident that led to Alison and Aria discover that Aria’s father, Byron, was having an affair. Upset, she decides not to go to a Halloween party with her friends.
Alison pretends to understand, but when the two girls are alone again, she emotionally manipulates Aria into going by saying she went through so much trouble to get the invitations, and makes Aria feel bad for being a “downer.” Alison doesn’t show much compassion for Aria’s circumstances.
Alison Tricked Aria Into Wrecking Her Dad’s Office
Alison was heavily involved in the whole Byron affair, constantly coaxing Aria into doing underhanded things. The girls visit Byron’s office when he’s out, and Alison subtly plants one of Meredith’s earrings to make Aria believe that the two were, in fact, having an affair.
She tricks Aria and persuades her to wreck Bryon’s office, obviously causing more problems for the Montgomery family in the process. It was bad enough that Byron tried to force Aria to keep his secret but even worse that her own friend had a hand in manipulating her, too.
Alison Never Told Aria About Ezra
Ezra Fitz is an established predator, despite the fact the series tries to make him seem like a romantic hero. He dated Alison when she was only a teenager and he was in college. It’s not Alison’s fault that Ezra was a creep, but she could have warned Aria about him.
At the time Aria and Ezra got involved, Alison had faked her death, but considering how she was still watching her friends, one would think she could have found a way to let Aria find out about Ezra’s real intentions in the beginning when he hoped to do research on her. By the time she comes clean, it’s too late and her apology doesn’t feel completely genuine.
Aria Easily Lets Mona Manipulate Her Into Believing Alison Is “A”
In the fifth season, Mona manages to turn the table against Alison and get everyone to believe that she is the real “A.” The liars are easily convinced, and it doesn’t take much for Aria to turn against her supposed best friend.
At one point, she even blows a rape whistle to try and keep Alison away from her after the blonde attempts to get Aria to listen to her side of the story.
Aria Helps Get Alison Locked Up In A Correctional Facility
Building on how easily Aria is coerced into turning against Alison, she even aids in getting Alison thrown into a correctional facility. Eventually, the two make up, but that’s not exactly something you would expect someone you believed was your real friend to do.
She also tries to ask Alison for favors while she’s in the facility, despite everything she had done to get her to put in there in the first place.
Alison And Aria Never Had Much Of A Strong Personal Bond
When you look at the friendship between Alison and Aria, compared to Alison’s relationship with the other girls, it doesn’t feel as personal and profound. Alison and Spencer were competitors, Alison and Emily had romantic feelings for each other, and Hanna always wanted to be like Alison.
There was an established repertoire between all of them until you got to Alison and Aria, whose story mostly revolved around Byron’s affair and Ezra. Otherwise, the two didn’t have many scenes where they were bonding together.
Aria Destroyed Emily And Alison’s Nursery
In one of Aria’s worst moments on the series, she destroyed the nursery for Alison and Emily’s twins. She was manipulated into doing it by A.D,. who had blackmailed her, but it was still an awful deed.
Aria used fake blood and various other things to totally wreck the room and create a horror show for her supposed best friends. It’s bad enough it was something she did to them, but even worse when you realize she had to target their children.
Aria Joined The A-Team
Again, one of the reasons Aria joined the A-team is because she was forced to by A, who had a letter she had once written about Ezra sexually assaulting her. If Aria didn’t do what A wanted, they would use the letter to get Ezra arrested.
But she could surely have found some way to let her friends know what was going on so that they wouldn’t be completely caught off guard later on. It ostracized Aria from the group and put a lot of her friendships in jeopardy, especially with Alison.
Alison Abandoned All Of Her Friends
Alison faked her death before the show even began and she let her friends believe she was really gone for a long time before finally coming back. She had her reasons for doing so, but it’s hard to argue that they were all real friends when a secret like that was being kept from them for so long.
Alison watched them and let them suffer in silence at the hands of A without at least giving them a sign she was still alive until much later in the series.
