Hey friends. Today I’m going to speak about Friends. Not my friends, but the TV show Friends. You see, Friends is a show that is never not on. Not only is it available in its entirety on Netflix (I think), it is on one of the Comedy Central channels in the UK 24 hours a day (again, I think). As I mentioned here, this is the reason the stars still earn $20 million each per year.
It’s the perfect show to have on in the background, or to jump into if you have a spare half hour. You don’t need to watch it in any sort of order, whatever episode happens to be on is fine. However, one slight drawback of seeing the episodes over and over is that you start to notice weird things that you didn’t see first time around. I talk about some of these below. Could this be more of an introduction?
Ross and Monica’s Creepy Relationship
Ross and Monica Gellar are brother and sister, and this is the only real family relationship we get a close up look at over the 10 year run. Yes, Rachel has a couple of sisters, Joey has seven (7!), and Phoebe has a twin sister and half-brother. But these characters show up once in a blue moon. It’s the same for the various parents of the six main characters. They pop in now and again, but are never around for long.
Anyway, Ross and Monica are ultra competitive with each other, but they clearly care about each other. They spend way more time together than the average siblings. And as a result, they’re close. Perhaps a little too close.
In a season one episode, Joey and Chandler invite Ross to an ice hockey match. Upon seeing the date on the ticket, Ross gets upset and asks if it is really that date. Monica then says, “Aw, I was hoping you wouldn’t remember.”. It turns out the day was a significant date for Ross and his ex-wife.
What was this anniversary that was making Ross sad? Their wedding anniversary? The anniversary of the day they met? The anniversary of their first date? No, it was the anniversary of the first time they… you know. Joey being Joey, he doesn’t get the hint and needs it spelt out for him, so Ross confirms it was the first time he had sex with Carol.
My question is, why does Monica know this date? That is surely not the sort of information a brother should be sharing with his sister. Best case scenario, Monica caught Ross planning something elaborate for this anniversary a few years prior and asked him what they were celebrating, and he couldn’t lie for some reason.
Finding out the date is one thing, but the truly mind-boggling thing is that she committed it to memory. Upon finding out, what did Monica do, did she rush home to write it in her calendar (this was pre-mobile phones, kids)? Did she buy them gifts to celebrate? I know Hallmark have cards for every occasion, but do you think they have one “For my Brother’s Lover”?
And it doesn’t end there. A couple of seasons later, Ross is now dating Rachel, who is roommates with Monica. During a babysitting session for Ross’s son Ben, Monica accidentally bumps Ben’s head. Whilst Monica and Rachel discuss ways to distract Ross so he doesn’t notice the bump on his son’s head, Monica suggests to Rachel, “As soon as he walks in, you take him in [the bedroom] and do whatever it is you do that makes him go “Reeeeeeeee”.”.
So Monica knows (at least one of) Ross’s sex noises. Again, best case scenario, the walls in the apartment are thin and she can’t help but hear what happens in the next room. Worst case scenario, she actively listens to what’s going on in Rachel’s bed.
This would be somewhat understandable if Ross and Rachel had nowhere else to go. But Ross has his own, empty apartment nearby. Why would you choose a room next-door to your sister when you have a whole apartment for privacy? Very creepy.
Add this to the fact that Ross was the first person Monica kissed (a long story involving a dark room at a college party and what Ross thought was a pile of coats) and you have one of the icky-est sibling relationships on TV.
Suicide is Apparently a Big Joke
Phoebe has one of the saddest upbringings imaginable. If her story was an origin story for a comic book super villain, you’d probably say “fair enough”. Where to start? Her birth mother gave her and her twin sister – Ursula – up when they were born. They were instead raised by friends of the birth mother. Though after a couple of years, the adoptive father walked out on them.
When Phoebe was a teenager, her adoptive mother killed herself. Phoebe ended up homeless, living on the mean streets of New York. On top of all that, she and her sister basically hate each other, and she finds out as an adult that she also has a half-brother. It’s a pretty rough childhood.
But you wouldn’t really know it by watching the show. Whenever the subject of Phoebe’s mum’s death comes up, it is always spoken about in a very matter-of-fact – and often humorous – way. Phoebe never seems to be upset about it, or never talks about missing her mum.
And look, I get it; Friends is a sitcom and they have to keep things relatively light. But it’s not as if the show didn’t have touching, emotional moments. Ross and Rachel’s break up, Monica and Chandler’s proposal, when Monica and Chandler found out they couldn’t have children etc. What Friends was great at was blending in some comedy into these scenes, finding the balance between heart and humour. But not for Phoebe’s mum.
If this show was made in 2022, I think this storyline would be handled very differently. I feel like the show would focus more on the mental health aspect of suicide, perhaps suggesting that Phoebe’s mum was struggling but refused to speak to anyone about it. An interesting angle might also be that Phoebe regularly attends therapy sessions, to deal with the trauma of her childhood.
I guess Friends just wasn’t ready or able to handle heavy storylines like that back in the day. When it comes to emotional range, it feels like Phoebe was the smelly cat of the group; I don’t know what the writers were feeding her, but it wasn’t juicy, dramatic material.
Phoebe’s Bird-Killing Boyfriend
Sorry, it’s another Phoebe entry. Around season five, Phoebe is dating NYPD cop, Gary. After only a month, they decide to move in together. During their first morning together, they’re laying in bed and both seem perfectly happy. Then out of nowhere, Gary pulls out a gun and shoots a bird that’s somewhere outside of their bedroom window. The relationship – along with the bird’s life – is over.
It’s been over 20 years since I first saw this, and I still can’t fathom what Gary was thinking about in this situation. Yes, they had only been dating a month. But surely that would have been enough time to ascertain that not only is Phoebe a vegetarian, she is also a peaceful, nonviolent person? That he thought she’d be fine with him shooting a bird is absolute madness.
Putting aside the moral implications of shooting a bird, there are surely legal ramifications for firing a weapon in a public place? It is unclear whether the weapon Gary uses is a private weapon, or his service weapon. If it was his police-issue gun, this is a huge problem right? I thought cops in America were only supposed to discharge their weapons when apprehending unarmed black people. Oh yes, I went there! In all seriousness though, don’t police officers have to fill out reams of paperwork every time they fire their weapon? That hassle alone would surely make him think twice about using his gun for such a small inconvenience?
So let’s assume it was his own personal gun. A quick Google search reveals that New Yorkers are allowed to own a gun, assuming they have the requisite permits. There must surely be laws around when you are and aren’t allowed to fire your gun. Firing a gun in an apartment block – presumably with people living above and below you, as well as the other people on your floor – is very dangerous.
What if he’d missed the bird? What if the bullet had flown into the building opposite? Not only did he deserve to lose Phoebe over this incident, he should have lost his job and possibly been brought up on charges. That maniac should be nowhere near law enforcement. The NYPD really dropped the ball there (to anyone who knows Friends as well as I do, you’ll recognise the brilliance of this final sentence).
Thank you all for reading. If you enjoyed it, I daresay there may be a sequel to this; I’m sure I’ll find more weirdness with Friends as time goes on. Until then, we are on a break!
Rob Recommends
House of the Dragon – TV – 7/10
It’s fine. If somehow Game of Thrones didn’t exist and this show was a standalone effort, I’d likely give it a higher score. But the reality is that GoT does exist and I can’t help but compare the two.
As you’d expect, the episodes look great; HBO clearly spent a lot of money making this. The performances are also good. But I just couldn’t really get into it. When a character was killed, it didn’t affect me. When an episode finished, I wasn’t desperate to see the next one. It was all just a bit blah.
There were some wonderfully tense scenes, particularly in the last few episodes. But I ultimately didn’t care enough about the characters. Maybe that says more about me than the show. Give it a watch for yourself, as I know plenty of people who really enjoyed it. I just wasn’t one of them.
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