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rosewood-liars · 3 years

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I’m disappointed that the producers of the PLL TV Series wrote out the fact Hanna is canonically Jewish even if she is non - practicing and had a blended tradition family ( Ashley Marin is not to my knowledge also Jewish ). There’s a whole scene in the books where Tom tries to bond with Hanna again, recognizes that the christmas celebrations are bumming her out & makes it up to her by celebrating Hanukkah. ( I’ll probably transcribe that encounter from the companion novel at the end of this post. )

I mean, maybe I should not be as upset by this as I am - because I’m not religious and have never been Jewish ever in my life.

However, I’ve also had experienced the frustration and big sad™ when something that me and a loved one did together was discarded and this just doesn’t set well with me.

( I think I will make more references to this ( even if she is non - practicing ) as a nod to the fact Hanna felt it was important enough to mention to Isabel during the Christmas party. )

First Reference:

Hanna drove slowly the rest of the way home, taking deep, cleansing breaths. After gunning the car up her family’s driveway, she nearly crashed into a line of vehicles she didn’t recognize. There had to be about fifteen sedans, SUVs, and crossovers parked in the circular drive. Then she noticed something blinking by the garage. Christmas lights. And was that a glow-in-the-dark Santa and an inflatable gingerbread man in the front yard? She took tentative steps toward the house. Dot, wearing some kind of bizarre headpiece, yipped at her feet when she walked inside. Wait. Were those reindeer antlers? Hanna scooped him up and stared at the two plush stalks on his head. Each was tipped with a tiny jingle bell. “Who did this to you?” Hanna whispered, ripping them off. Dot just licked her face. She looked around the living room and gasped. Holly leaves snaked around the banister. A mechanical Mrs. Claus waved from the console table that had once held Hanna’s mother’s austere ceramic vases. A tall, tinsel-laden tree stood in the corner, and the fireplace, which Hanna couldn’t remember the family ever using, was ablaze. “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” played on the stereo at maximum volume, and the whole house smelled like honey-glazed ham. “Hello?” Hanna called out. Laughter floated out from the kitchen, first Isabel’s goose-honk chortle, then her dad’s booming guffaw. Hanna rounded the corner. The kitchen was packed with people holding champagne flutes and appetizer plates filled with mini quiches and wedges of Brie. Many of them wore Santa hats, including Hanna’s dad. Isabel stood in the corner, wearing a red velvet dress tipped with Mrs. Claus white fur on the cuffs and hem, and Kate had on a tight-fitting red jersey sheath and black-and-white Kate Spade heels. Mistletoe hung from the chandelier, a carafe of mulled cider sat on the counter, and plates and plates of the most delicious-looking Christmas cookies and appetizers filled the island. Isabel spied Hanna and glided over. “Hanna! Feliz Navidad! O Tannenbaum! Merry Christmas!” Hanna sniffed. “Um, actually, I’m Jewish. And so is my father.” Isabel blinked dumbly, like she couldn’t comprehend that anyone, let alone her own fiancé, could celebrate anything other than Christmas. Mr. Marin appeared at Isabel’s side. “Hey, sweetie,” he said, ruffling Hanna’s hair. Hanna stared at him incredulously. “Since when do you celebrate Christmas?” She said the word like she might have said Satan’s birthday. Mr. Marin crossed his arms over his chest defensively. “I’ve been celebrating it with Isabel and Kate for the past few years. I told Kate to tell you.” “Well, she didn’t,” Hanna said flatly. “We do the Twelve Days of Christmas every year. We always kick it off with a bash.” Isabel took a sip of champagne. “It’s a wonderful tradition. We started early this year with tonight—kind of a housewarming-meets-Christmas thing.” “And we’d like you to be a part of the tradition too, of course,” Mr. Marin added. Hanna stared at all of the red and green paraphernalia. Her family had never been that religious, but they lit menorah candles every night of Hanukkah. On Christmas Day, they ordered Chinese takeout, watched movie marathons, and went on a long family bike ride if the weather was decent. She liked those traditions.

Second Mention:

She pulled into the driveway of her house, wanting nothing more than to crawl into bed and watch hours and hours of bad TV. Strangely, her father’s car was still in the driveway—not at Longwood Gardens. And the Christmas decorations that had festooned the front of the property were gone. When she opened the front door, it no longer smelled like fresh pine and cinnamon sticks but more like . . . potato pancakes? “Hanna!” Mr. Marin appeared from the kitchen. “There you are! Come in, come in! We have a surprise for you!” He whisked Hanna through the living room, but not before she noticed that the mechanical Mrs. Claus had vanished, the Christmas tree was unlit, and the stockings that had hung over the fireplace—there were monogrammed ones for Isabel, Kate, and Hanna’s dad, and a blank one presumably for Hanna—had been taken down. The old silver menorah Bubbe Marin had given Hanna’s parents sat on the mantel. Three candles blazed. “What’s going on?” Hanna asked suspiciously. Mr. Marin turned Hanna toward the dining room. There was a huge spread of food on the table, and Kate and Isabel were sitting in high-backed chairs, tepid smiles on their faces. “Surprise!” Mr. Marin crowed. “Happy Hanna-kah!” Hanna blinked at the items on the table. There were all the traditional Hanukkah foods her grandmother used to serve: latkes, jelly donuts called sufganiyot, kugel, chocolate coins, and a large brisket. Off to the side were the old dreidels she and her cousins had spun for hours, turning the game into a kind of truth or dare—if the dreidel fell on the gimel side, Tamar, her younger cousin, had to steal a dollar out of her mother’s wallet, and so on. A blue foil banner with Star of David cutouts was draped across the windows, and candles glowed around the room. Small gifts wrapped in silver paper sat on everyone’s plates. “I thought you guys were going to Santa’s Village,” Hanna said slowly. “Oh, we can do that any day,” Mr. Marin said. “I thought you might be a little upset since we’re doing so many Christmas activities, so we thought we’d celebrate our holiday tonight! Hanukkah—or Hanna-kah!” He gestured to the food on the table. “Kate and Isabel did some baking this evening, though some of this came from the kosher deli near Ferra’s Cheesesteaks.” “Your dad says you know all of the Hanukkah stories, Hanna,” Isabel said politely. “I’d love to hear them.” “This is all so nice.” Hanna’s heart expanded, just like the Grinch’s. This was definitely the nicest thing her dad had done for her in a long, long time. Her father passed around plates, and everyone began serving themselves latkes and pieces of brisket bathed in sauce. Hanna took a moderate amount of food, feeling virtuous from boot camp. Wine was poured—even Hanna and Kate got some—and everyone opened their gifts. Kate and Hanna got gift cards to Fermata Spa. Isabel got a small Christmas tree–shaped charm to add to her silver Pandora bracelet. Mr. Marin had given himself a new Swiss Army knife. He immediately unfolded the scissors and cut the tag off of Isabel’s bauble. Then, Mr. Marin launched into stories about Bubbe Marin, who used to make the best potato pancakes in the world. “We used to go over there every night of Hanukkah,” he explained. “She’d always have huge gifts for Hanna.” “Isn’t that sweet,” Isabel trilled, looking surprised, as though she’d never imagined someone would shower Hanna with gifts. “And she had this African gray parrot, Morty,” Mr. Marin went on, spearing a latke. “He knew every swearword in the world.” “He was crazy!” Hanna giggled. “I think I learned some new ones from him!” “And he loved to watch those tabloid shows—what were they called?” Mr. Marin’s face was flushed. “E! News,” Hanna repeated. “He was obsessed with Giuliana Rancic. Remember? He said she was such a pretty bitch in that crazy bird voice!” “Who’s Giuliana Rancic?” Isabel asked, blinking quickly. Hanna’s father was too busy shaking with laughter to answer. Hanna laughed too, also not bothering to fill Isabel in. It felt nice to have an inside joke with her father again, something from their lives before Isabel and Kate. They continued eating, sharing stories about Hanna’s grandmother’s obsessions with yard sales, animal figurines, and her crush on Bob Barker from The Price Is Right. By the time the meal was over, Hanna and her dad kept bursting into laughter but not bothering to explain themselves. Isabel rose to clear the table, but Mr. Marin waved her to sit down. “I can clean up,” he said.

Third Reference:

Now, Hanna sighed. After her new family had thrown Hanna a Hanukkah bone a few nights ago, everything had gone back to normal shortly afterward. The Twelve Days of Christmas nonsense had resumed, though Hanna had been able to get out of a lot of it because of boot camp.

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