Hanna Marin is an overweight girl who wa extremely loyal to Alison, but was verbally abused and embarrassed by her. After Alison's disappearance, she distances herself from the other girls. She becomes best friends with another unpopular outsider, a girl named Mona. They make themselves over during the summer and become gorgeous, skinny and popular. Hanna takes Alison's place as the most popular girl at Rosewood in her absence. Hanna is something of a shoplifter.
Season 1
Hanna shoplifts -- possibly for attention from her absent father, but gave it up after her mother was forced to sleep with the detective to clear Hanna's name. When her ex-boyfriend, Sean, does not want to have sex with her due to his celibacy oath (which she interprets as him rejecting her) a distraught Hanna crashes his car into a tree, later working at Sean's mother's dental office to pay off the repairs.
Eventually Hanna joins Sean's celibacy club to hang out with Sean, though she finds it cheesy and boring. In the mid-season finale of season 1, Hanna is hit by a car near Mona's party while she was running to tell the girls who "A" is.
Relationships
Friends
Hanna was part of Alison's clique and bore the nickname "Hefty Hanna" which, ironically, her 'friend' Alison came up with. Despite being the sweetest of the bunch, Hanna was often cruelly mocked and teased by Alison, who eventually taught her how to make herself throw up to lose weight. Following Alison's disappearance, the new, thin, reinvented Hanna became the most popular girl at Rosewood alongside Mona, a fellow former nerd. But once Hanna began receiving messages from "A", she rekindled her friendship with Aria, Emily and Spencer and began to slightly distance herself from Mona. Hanna and Aria seem to be the closest of the Liars, referring to each other as "my best friend."
Hanna begins to bond with the sweet but nerdy Lucas in "There's No Place Like Homecoming." Despite the fact that she was still dating Sean when they met, Lucas persistently tries to get closer to her by doing her favors, showing her videos and complimenting her. While she is in the hospital, he skips school to visit her and waits on her hand and foot and ultimately admits to having strong feelings for her. Though Hanna likes Lucas, she feels she couldn't date him and rejects him in "Moments Later." She attempts to mend their friendship in "Careful What U Wish 4," but "A" forces her to lead him on and break his heart, once again hurting him. After finding out that Mona destroyed Caleb's letter to Hanna, Lucas brings back Hanna's ex-boyfriend Caleb saying Hanna "deserves to be happy". Lucas then begins to crush on the new in photography club, Danielle but is to shy to approach her. Hanna then goes and talks to Danielle about she used to like Lucas but "couldn't compete" with all the other girls, and that he had sold some of his pictures online. Her interest peaked, Danielle asks Lucas on a date. Lucas, thinking Hanna did this because she felt bad for breaking his heart, then tells Hanna she and ex-boyfriend Caleb must double date them or he wouldn't go, due to his nervousness saying "you (Hanna) got me into this mess, you can get me out". During the date, Danielle gets the wrong impression that Hanna is not over Lucas. Hanna then gets Caleb, whom she still hasn't forgiven, to embrace her in front of Danielle. No longer feeling threatened by Hanna, Danielle reaches for Lucas' hand an holds it. Lucas later thanks Hanna for her sacrifice, knowing her mixed feelings for Caleb.
Boyfriends
Hanna and Sean
Sean is Hanna's ex-boyfriend, but at the dance she repeatedly leaves him to try and find Toby's file as well as the missing Emily. Sean, angry at this, holds a grudge against Hanna and starts to hang out with one of Hanna's best friends, Aria (to possibly make her jealous) and proceeds to send her flowers. Aria dislikes what Sean is trying to do and turns him down, telling him how much Hanna has always loved him. Sean eventually sees the error of his ways and tries to make up with Hanna. The two go on a double-date with Aria and Noel in "Please Do Talk About Me When I'm Gone". Their relationship, however, is still quite rocky. Sean breaks up with Hanna in "Careful What U Wish 4" after she spends the Dance-a-thon dancing with Lucas, due to a cash offer from "A".
Lucas is known to be in love with Hanna, and though she has shown no sign of wanting to date him, it has been confirmed she has a slight crush on him. Lucas becomes jealous of Sean, picking a fight with him at Hanna's party in "Salt Meets Wound". He tries to make himself hate Hanna, but finds he can't ignore how sweet she is to him. When she tells him she isn't mad that he destroyed Alison's memorial, he replies, "Don't say that. Don't make me like you again." She breaks his heart in "Careful What U Wish 4 " after dancing with him the whole night. In the season one finale, Lucas finds Caleb after realizing Hanna never got the letter, and picks him up to take him to Hanna because he wants her to be happy.
Shortly afterwards, a new guy arrives in Rosewood, Caleb Rivers. Hanna learns that he's a hacker, and despite his reputation as being "sketchy," decides to use his skills to help Emily contact Maya at reform school. He keeps to himself, collecting money when he can. He begins to enjoy playful banter and teasing with Hanna, flirting with her while she usually responds with insults. When she tells him about her issue with Mrs. Montgomery while they are in detention together, he leaves early and sabotages Mrs. Montgomery's engine to prevent her from going to Philadelphia and finding out about Aria and Mr. Fitz. She is shocked when she finds out that he did this for her, and he asks her to go on a date with him to pay him back. She refuses to do this, but later points out the school's rich kids to him at his request. When Hanna finds out that Caleb is homeless and is living at school, she offers to let him stay at her place, provided he hides in the basement and keeps it a secret from her mother. Later, Hanna is crying on the staircase after a fight with Aria (in which Hanna had told Aria about her betrayal) and Caleb decides to sit with Hanna and comfort her.
Caleb catches Hanna checking him out and quips.
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In "The Badass Seed," Caleb is showering before school in Hanna's bathroom when Hanna comes in to get her makeup. As she is doing so, her mom, who she had thought was already at work, begins knocking on the door, asking to get her phone from inside. Desperate to hide Caleb from her mother, Hanna jumps into the shower with him, covers his mouth and pretends that she is the one taking the shower. After her mother leaves, Caleb catches Hanna checking him out and quips, "You wanna share a towel, too?" For the rest of the day, Hanna acts awkwardly around him, ignoring him and running off when he tries to talk to her. She comes home at night to find that Caleb has packed his things and is preparing to leave, which upsets her. Caleb, who thought she wanted him to leave, asks her why she has been so cold to him lately. She explains that she doesn't know if she was ready to see so much of him, and he replies that it's perfectly fine. Hanna is touched by his compassion and the two of them kiss.
While in their tent in the woods, Hanna loses her virginity to Caleb.
In "A Person of Interest," she and Caleb are now in a secret relationship. Hanna's mother begins to notice that someone has been in the house besides them and suspects Caleb. One night, Hanna and Caleb come home believing that Hanna's mother was out, and begin making out against the wall in the kitchen. Hanna's mother catches them, and drops Caleb's bag in front of them. She tells him to leave, which upsets Hanna. Hanna decides to leave with him, following him out and camping out with him for the night. While in their tent in the woods, Hanna loses her virginity to Caleb. When they return home the next day, Ashley decides to allow Caleb to stay.
Hanna crying.
In "Someone to Watch Over Me," Hanna finds an owl-shaped pendant in Caleb's backpack and believes it is a gift for her. Aria and Emily over hear Caleb talking to someone on the phone, most likely a girl, and tell Hanna that he might be cheating on her. Hanna refuses to believe them, insisting that they are wrong. Jenna walks by, and the girls see her wearing the owl pendant that Hanna showed them from a picture on her phone. Hanna then attempts to call and text Caleb but he won't answer. Spencer learns that the owl pendant is actually a flash drive and that Caleb has been spying on Hanna and passing information about her to Jenna. Later, Hanna, who doesn't know this yet, leaves a note and puts it in Caleb's locker, suddenly remembering the numbers 2-1-4. She goes back to Caleb's locker and enters the numbers 2-1-4 into the combination and it opens, shocking her. Near the end of the episode, Hanna confronts Caleb. Caleb tells Hanna that Jenna paid him to spy on Hanna for money. He thought it was just a "pretty girls rivalry," but once he began developing feelings for Hanna, he quit his work for Jenna and stopped calling her. Caleb sees the disappointed look on Hanna's face and tries to hug her, but Hanna shouts at him and refuses to touch him. Caleb picks up his bag, looks sadly back at her, and leaves. Later, Hanna is seen crying by the window of her bathroom, betrayed and distraught.
Hanna sees Caleb in line to get on a bus.
In "Monster in the End", Caleb begs Aria to talk to Hanna for him and tell her he is truly sorry. Soon after, Hanna reluctantly confronts Caleb to ask about what Jenna wanted, and he tells her she wanted a key. She seems content with this, but is clearly torn by her feelings for him. Caleb gives her a sad look and reaches for her hand, but she pulls away. He tells her softly that he misses her, but she snaps back at him, telling him he'll get over it. Later, Caleb goes to Hanna's house and asks her mom to give Hanna a letter, but her mom refuses and tells Caleb that Hanna doesn't need another person in her life to leave without saying goodbye. Caleb searches for her at the carnival, and upon seeing him coming,Hanna quickly hides then. Seeing Mona, he asks her where Hanna is but she says that Hanna stepped out, and won't come back until he leaves. Caleb asks Mona to give Hanna the letter, to which Mona agrees. When Caleb walks away, Mona opens the letter and reads it, clearly annoyed and upset by its contents. She then rips up the letter, throws it into the trash barrel, and dumps a drink over it. Hanna returns and asked what Caleb wanted, and Mona lies and tells her he wanted change for a twenty. The camera pans over the letter, which is shown to say "Please call me" and "I love you, Hanna." Near the end of this episode, Hanna sees Caleb in line to get on a bus (which is en route to Arizona) and is prompted by Aria to go talk to him. She pauses and considers it as he looks up and notices her, but given that she has not read the letter and doesn't know how he feels about her, she ultimately refuses and leaves to find Spencer.
Caleb and Hanna stage a date in "Blind Dates" to help Lucas be comfortable on his first date with Danielle but she makes certain he realities it is not a real date, and that she hasn't forgiven him. She forgives him and they kiss in "The Devil You Know" she even threatens his negligent foster mother into giving him his money which works. However ironically in "Never Letting Go", she doesn't invite him as her date to the fashion show, insisting to her friends she "doesn't have a boyfriend" because she is having trouble accepting him back into her life romantically. Although after the show Caleb approaches Hanna, having gone to the show to see her. Caleb asks if he can walk Hanna home and she agrees.
Trivia
Hanna is arguably the most developed character out of the four liars.
Hanna has received the most text messages from "A" from any of the four PLL's so far.
Quotes
Hanna (to Mona): I think you're the one who needs a trip to Oz. See if the Wizard can find you a heart.
Book Series - TV Series Comparisons
Hanna met Kate after Alison's disappearance, whilst in the book Hanna met Kate with Alison.
Hanna stole sunglasses in the TV series whilst in the book she stole a bracelet and an earring.
Hanna was fat and dorky in the books whilst in the series she was just considered chubby.
In the book, Hanna acted mean and bitchy after losing the weight whereas in the series her personality remains similar both pre- and post-weight loss.
In the book Hanna has auburn hair whereas in the series she has blonde.
In the book it was mentioned many times that Hanna is bulimic whilst in the series it is suggested that she only forced herself to throw up on one occasion and never had a fully developed eating disorder.
In the book, Hanna had slight amnesia when she was hit by the car, making her forget who "A" is. But in the series, she just has a broken leg.
In the series Alison is the reason for Hanna being bulimic whilst in the book Hanna started throwing up after a comment from her father about her weight.
