Talk:A/@comment-24.132.127.61-20140514170412/@comment-121.74.222.45-20140609104552

Gothic literature often has the motif of the twin or the double, and they're not necessarily blood-related or identical.

Jessica DiLaurentis said a while ago that Ali and Cece had the habit of switching clothes and acting as if they were switching personalities. Physically they do look similar but in the regard of clothes/impersonations, they're doubles. Often, it's a case of good twin/bad twin. Moral vs immoral. Civil vs violence.

In Freudian terms they're aligned with the ego and the id: the ego deals with who you are/who you see yourself to be, and the id is more related to the younger person, the one who sort of does what they want to. The ego comes into it as a matter of perception: they try on each others' clothes and personalities as if they are the other girl, and the id is the childish kind of side where they behave uncaring of the consequences - such as when Jessica got the call about Ali posing a risk to herself and it turned out to be Cece.

Consider Single White Female: in its most basic form it deals with two girls who become increasingly alike, physically, which allows for impersonation. Eventually there's obsession, loss of identity and psychological trauma - actually there's a fair bit of Freudian interpretation which could be applied here. Incidentally it's in the episode named for Single White Female where we first start to learn about Cece's friendship with Ali. I don't think they'll do the twin storyline; the motif of the double comes into play with these two and I'd say Cece is the one who influences Ali to the worse side of herself.