'Pretty Little Liars' Stars Dish On Connecting With Fans & How 'PLL' Influenced Other Teen Shows

Let’s get real here — Pretty Little Liars paved the way for a lot of other teen shows that popped up after the premiere.

Not only that, but the other shows took a cue from the hit Freeform show and tried to emulate it — and all the Liars saw it happen.

“I watched both the pilots of 13 Reasons Why and Riverdale, and I’m not saying that we influenced their shows, but you can definitely see lots of similarities,” Lucy Hale revealed to Vulture.

“All of us, the writers and producers, have paved a way for a lot of new shows. To take on stuff that young-adult shows wouldn’t normally tackle.”

Ashley Benson added that, “We took a lot of risks. The great thing about our show was that because there were five strong, female leads, we’re all dealing with different issues that teens nowadays go through – we each had a specific issue that we dealt with or overcame.”

“For all of us, I feel like our fans really connected. There would be an episode where I would get a message, they would get a message, everybody gets a message [from the fans]. Especially with Emily, I know Shay has gotten an outpouring amount of support from fans just being like, ‘Thank you so much, I’ve been able to come out to my family and friends.’” she adds. “With Hanna, when she was dealing with the eating disorder earlier on in the series, I got a lot of nice messages about that, too.”