Entertainment

Mona's Job Must Be Thrilling On 'PLL'

by Lindsay Denninger

Mona Vanderwaal is undoubtedly my favorite character on Pretty Little Liars. She’s an enigma, and Janel Parrish plays her so well. Mona goes from prim and proper to completely unhinged at the drop of a hat. First, she was getting locked up in Radley for trying to kill the Liars, and then she was disabling computer security systems and confessing to attacking Bethany Young. You never know what you’ll get with her. At the beginning of Pretty Little Liars Season 6B, Mona shows up at a rally for Veronica Hastings' Senate run. She was dressed nicely and didn’t look diabolic, so what is Mona's job after the time-jump?

Given her wide-ranging talents, Mona could do a lot of things. But during that aforementioned Hastings rally, she and Spencer, who now works on Capitol Hill, had a conversation during which Spencer made a reference to Mona being on “the other side” of things in Washington, D.C. Spencer is basically a coffee fetcher for her lobbyist bosses, so her comment about Mona being the opposition is interesting. We don’t know what kind of group Spencer works for, so it's hard to pin down Mona from just that clue. Here are a few careers she may be pursuing in Washington.

A Fixer

If anyone could out-Pope Olivia Pope, it would be Mona Vanderwaal. Mona is second only to Charlotte DiLaurentis when it comes to resources, cunning, and the ability to outwit the enemy. Perhaps Mona is working against Spencer’s lobbying cronies for a client. If I found myself in trouble, I would totally hire Mona to help me out. She may not have a spy agency father and a terrorist mother, but she went head-to-head with A and made it out alive. That means something. Mona did mention something about starting a career in the public eye...

The CIA

Sure, she could have a desk job in the Pentagon as her cover (and maybe Spencer works for a pacifist lobbyist who is inherently opposed to the Pentagon), but I’m willing to bet that Mona is like, the youngest secret agent ever to be trained in the CIA. She probably got the job because she hacked into their computer system and showed them all of their vulnerabilities, all while being a perfect agent of disguise. Mona was only in Rosewood as a holdover to investigating some weapons-grade plutonium and keep it from heading to the black market.

A Lobbyist — In The Same Place As Spencer

Ooh, plot twist! Maybe Mona isn’t in the opposition at all, really. Maybe she and Spencer are actually on the same team, but always at odds. Mona is really good at making Spencer look bad, so maybe this rivalry traveled from Rosewood to Washington, D.C. With these two, not much would surprise me.

Let’s face it — Mona needs more than a standard, everyday job. She’s the smartest person we’ve ever seen in Rosewood, and she’s going places.

For more on Pretty Little Liars, check out Bustle's podcast Taking This One To The Grave.

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