‘Pretty Little Liars’ season 5 joins ‘The Fosters’ season 2 with Christmas specials

ABC Family is definitely getting into the holiday spirit this year. While the network typically goes more all-out in order to make Halloween a special time of year for many of its shows, they are changing course this time around, starting with of course their biggest hit with “Pretty Little Liars.”

At the network’s TCA panel today, it was confirmed that Lucy Hale, Troian Bellisario, and the rest of the cast will bring the world of Rosewood to the holidays at some point in December, rather than having the traditional Halloween special. Many other network shows will also feature Christmas episodes this year, including “The Fosters,” “Switched at Birth,” “Baby Daddy,” and “Chasing Life.”

It’s pretty easy to figure out why this is a smart idea for the network to do something like this. It helps out their annual 25 Days of Christmas Series, and it also gives fans of their shows something extra to look forward to. We know that many have wanted to see how Aria and the rest of the Liars celebrate the holiday season, but the airing of new episodes (which happens from June-August / September and January-March) typically does not allow for them to have an episode airing anywhere close to that. It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, either, to have a Christmas episode that is airing at some point in January.

While we are sure that most of these shows will at least stay reasonably close in tone to their everyday episodes, we imagine in particular that “Pretty Little Liars” will probably try to put a little bit of holiday cheer into the story. Nobody wants to have a sad Christmas, after all, where characters are constantly in fear of death. Maybe “A” takes Christmas off for a change.

Stay tuned tonight, since we’ll have a new review of “Pretty Little Liars” up after the episode airs. For more scoop, just be sure to sign up for our CarterMatt Newsletter!

Photo: ABC Family