Pretty Little Liars étoile, star Sasha Pieterse On Ali’s Unexpected Future: ‘She’s Reinvented Herself' 

‘Pretty Little Liars’ Star Sasha Pieterse On Ali’s Unexpected Future: ‘She’s Reinvented Herself’

Of all of the reveals in last night’s shocking midseason finale of “Pretty Little Liars,” it was Ali that

At the end of the episode, the show flashed five years into the future to give us a glimpse of where the Liars are now. We see Ali, now a teacher (!), writing her name on a chalkboard, but it’s not Miss DiLaurentis she’s scrawling — it’s

“She’s a changed person. She’s totally reinvented herself,” Sasha Pieterse told MTV News ahead of Tuesday night’s finale. “Where you see her after the time jump is not what you would expect.”

Yeah, that’s an understatement. Did anyone actually think Ali — the girl who mercilessly teased Lucas and called Paige “pigskin” — would end up teaching, presumably, at Rosewood High School?

“I think she’s looking for a normal life, but it’s not in a location that you would expect,” Pieterse teased. “It’s definitely not what I expected, so to see her this way, and honestly be genuine about it — be a genuine person! — it’s a strange thing. What brings the girls together is also really strange.”

Since Rollins is a last name we haven’t heard in Rosewood before, we’re going to assume this is an entirely new character for season 6B. (Of course, we have no idea what Lorenzo’s last name is, so it’s a possibility that the semi-useless, soup-loving cop could still be hanging around.)

Perhaps even more shocking than Ali’s last name, the Liars seem to reunite in Rosewood to help her. When we see them in the final seconds of the episode, they’re warning Ali that “he’s coming.” Who’s “he” and does he have anything to do with A (aka CeCe Drake)? Maybe not…

“It’s starting our show over but not in a way that’s boring or the same thing that we’ve already done,” the actress said. “The writers have done such a good job with showing all of our characters as adults and how they handle things now [in season 6B], compared to when they were teenagers.”

Though the Liars have all gone their separate ways in the five-year time jump, Pieterse said that when they return to Rosewood, they’ll go right back into Liar mode.

“Having these girls all go their separate ways and figure life out, they’ve changed,” she said. “There’s a lot of stuff that they’ve done in their lives that will affect the way they connect with each other now. But at the same time, they still have that love for each other. I don’t think that’s changed. It’s more about what’s happened to them that’s made them the people they are now — the stuff that you haven’t seen.”

“They still interact the way they did before, just more on an adult level,” she added. “You see them do things, and it’s like, ’Oh, right. They can do that now!’ It’s fun.”

And in case you’re having a serious case of FOMO over missing the Liars’ college years, don’t worry. The show will ultimately utilize its flashback formula to fill in the blanks. “You start to learn about what’s happened in the time that’s passed,” Pieterse said.

That includes what’s happened between sisters Ali and CeCe in the aftermath of the latter’s big reveAl.

“In a way, it’s almost like she’s relieved. And then she wants to make up for lost time, and all the things that she didn’t get to do, so she’s had a reboot,” said Pieterse. “I think she’s really enjoying this place that she’s at when we see her — obviously, all hell breaks loose, and that doesn’t really last long. But at the same time, you see that she’s still that new person, and she’s handling things in better ways, not being vindictive about it. She’s not that person anymore.”

She’s also not the kind of person who would be caught

wearing that infamous yellow tank top ever again.

“Knowing Marlene, maybe I will have to eventually… But I’m pretty sure that it’s done. No more yellow shirts,” she said. “They made 13 of those, so there are 13 of them in a closet somewhere. I wanted to burn them, but they wouldn’t let me.”