Mona, Alison, Ava, Dylan, and Caitlin are hot on Dana’s trail, suspecting her of being the one tormenting them and trying to frame them for Nolan’s murder on Pretty Little Liars: The Perfectionists season 1, episode 8.

On The Perfectionists 1×08, Dana Booker is the prime suspect as the group attempts to come together and make a plan to take her down, so they can continue onward with their normal, drama-free, Beacon Heights lives. Tensions are running high as we inch closer to the season finale, when something deliciously dramatic and shocking will surely happen to keep us on the edge of our seats awaiting season 2.

To me, it’s pretty obvious that Dana isn’t who the Perfectionists should be afraid of (at least, not the kind of afraid they are). Dana is clearly trying to frame them to fit some twisted fantasy in her head, or probably just Ava, but that doesn’t mean she’s ready to torture them. She’s another red herring that has some sort of explanation for why she’s doing this, but it’s not going to satisfy the story at large. Any way, moving on to the real events of the episode…

Mona and Taylor

At last, the two characters who could potentially have the most to offer the series meet. Honestly, I wasn’t very surprised about Mona’s distrust of Taylor; if Mona accepted her into the group relatively quickly, just based off of Alison’s word, that would have been more of a shocking twist.

Taylor is very sketchy, and I’m surprised that Alison has been so quick to accept Taylor into her life and put her faith in the no-longer-dead girl. It’s likely because of the similarities between them, including comparable events of their past, but I truly feel like Alison has given Taylor her trust too quickly.

Alison has known Taylor for all of five minutes and she knows what it takes to lurk in the shadows and how hard and isolating that can be, but Taylor has even expressed to her that she enjoyed it… doesn’t that make a red flag go off in your mind?

Since Taylor’s return, she’s seemed to become even more shady. Her several long-lasting gazes at various characters (like with Alison and Gabriel), calling her mother “Claire” and then “my mother” within the same verbal exchange, and her lack of emotion over the time she’s missed and Nolan’s death are a few reasons why I’m having a hard time trusting her.

Mona: You might be in the circle, but you will never be in the circle.

If The Perfectionists had more than two episodes left before the end of the season, I would expect to see some sort of disagreement between Alison and Mona (lasting for several episodes) about Taylor’s true intentions and whether they can trust her. Mona has been the person watching and waiting to make a move before, so Alison should really listen to her when it comes to being suspicious of people. While their friendship may seem to be blossoming, I am positive that bygones are not just bygones… yet, which explains Alison’s slight reluctance to completely trust Mona.

Also, we finally received some sort of explanation for Mona’s final scene on The Perfectionists season 1, episode 1, but there’s still much more to be explored! It seems Mona isn’t working with anyone — she figured out that BHU was watching everyone and they told her to keep her mouth shut — but it doesn’t explain why she said, “Did we do this?” and felt responsible for Nolan’s death.

I hope that, should the series continue, we get flashbacks and a better sense of what exactly led to Mona’s final moments in the pilot episode. That was much more than just knowing about the cameras; that, and her subsequent breakdown in the following episode, clearly showed that Mona felt responsible, guilty, and she needed help to cope with what had happened. Simply knowing about BHU spying on their students isn’t enough to cause all of that.

Alison and Gabriel

While I won’t go into too much detail here, as you can check out my in-depth piece on this issue from The Perfectionists 1×08 tomorrow, this story was an absolute waste of time.

Instead of helping Mona or her students, Alison went off with a professor at BHU for a little romance, which seemingly had no impact on her character, development, or the story at large. Rather, it was a way to anger fans who are still recovering from Alison and Emily’s divorce, and offered nothing for Alison (or the fans) to learn.

I want to see more from Alison than the trying-to-be-reformed teacher’s assistant. She’s roughly 26, she’s been divorced twice, she has two children, she faked her death, and she’s almost been murdered by more people than she can count (one of them being her new best friend in Beacon Heights). Alison is an incredibly complex character, arguably more so than any other character on TV, and she’s never been fully utilized.

Alison’s been through many traumatic events, has had like four personalities, and she’s really tough (and intelligent), so we need more stories like the end of her tracking Taylor down. Using her skills, smarts, and charm, Alison managed not only to find Taylor Hotchkiss after figuring out she was alive with no proof, but she also convinced her to return to society after she faked her death because she was afraid and paranoid. I don’t know another character who could do that, especially on their own.

It took all four Liars to convince Alison to come back, and they technically didn’t even convince her! She only came back because she thought -A was dead and she was safe. If Shana hadn’t died, where would Alison have ended up?

PLEASE, give us some good Alison material. Sasha has the capacity to do so much more, especially paired with Janel, so let’s see it! We don’t need any more relationship/love stories for Alison right now, she’s had plenty.

Ava and Dylan

Having an odd number of main characters has clearly made pairing them up difficult for the writers. Ava and Dylan are growing much closer with each other than with Caitlin, which is disappointing. When the series started, I was hoping to see more scenes of the three Perfectionists coming together and becoming a group of best friends, and while that may be happening, their relationships with Caitlin are primarily growing off-screen.

As I stated above, I believe it’s clear that Dana is attempting to frame Ava for Nolan’s murder to get back at her and the rest of the Jalali family for “destroying” her career. (Bitch, you did that yourself when you became obsessed with putting her father behind bars and stopped following the rules.) Dana has come to Caitlin and Dylan with ways out of the mess they have created, and that just leaves Ava, though I don’t expect to ever see those two in a scene of that magnitude. If anything, Dana is going to lose it and try to murder Ava herself… if Dana isn’t killed first.

I’m incredibly and totally frustrated with Dylan. He’s just not interesting and has nothing to really offer the show. It’s not my preference to go on and on about how awful his character is being written, but it’s just getting worse every episode. Honestly, I wouldn’t be upset if he got expelled from BHU for cheating and was replaced with his book counterpart, Mackenzie Wright, or maybe Julie Redding if there’s a season 2.

Caitlin and Jeremy

Alas, once again, Caitlin is the most interesting of the bunch and she’s separated from the group’s adventures. This time, Caitlin is suspicious of Jeremy, which is completely understandable. From the pilot, I’ve thought he was responsible for Nolan’s death, and I certainly still believe that. Drilling holes in his computer and throwing it into water? Shady.

Caitlin and Jeremy’s relationship has been cute so far, but we don’t really know anything, at all, about him, other than the fact that he’s a Brit and works for the Hotchkiss family.

The final moments, with Jeremy telling Caitlin to get in the car, are surely going to be a precursor to Jeremy divulging some dramatic, juicy secret to Caitlin that could possibly put her life at risk. Maybe he’s a peeping tom and has videos from BeaconGuard on his computer, which is why he destroyed it? Maybe he’s a law enforcement official undercover, gathering evidence to use against the Hotchkiss family and BHU? We really don’t know anything at this point, but I’m happy that’s (hopefully) going to change.

Final thoughts

All in all, I thought The Perfectionists season 1, episode 8 was decent. Not my favorite, but definitely better than season 1, episode 7. Other than Alison’s story, each character was doing something of importance, which is rare. Seeing Taylor reintegrating to normal life is fun and refreshing, but she’s still missing some depth that we’re going to need should we get another season.

These final two episodes should be so good, and I am 100% convinced that someone is going to die in the next episode (without seeing any trailer). Dana, maybe?

Pretty Little Liars: The Perfectionists continues Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET on Freeform!