What are you currently watching on TV?

[Anders]

Followed Friends closely in the 90s.

Chandler
Monica
Rachel
Ross
Joey
Phoebe

[epilogue]

Friends From College is fucking GREAT. Fucking. Great.

I'm surprised. I found it unwatchable.

I... really? It's like the Mad Men of romantic dramedy!

[epilogue]

I know Friends is objectively bad, guys, but dammit those people are so likeable (except for Rachel and Ross.) We'll put that or Rules of Engagement on when we just want to watch bad TV after long days.

Friends is/was a fantastic show. It was shockingly progressive for the early 90s and it's still more progressive than a lot of sit-coms out there. The first 7 seasons are a gold standard in TV comedy. The last three seasons are wonky. Each season has bad episodes, sure. But overall it's one of the most consistent and interesting sit-coms America has produced. Don't let these dingdongs tell you differently.

[epilogue]

Let's all rank the Friends.

Phoebe
Chandler
Monica
Joey
Ross
Rachel

Chandler
Phoebe
Joey
Monica
Rachel
Ross

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[Simple Torture]

Trag is woke AF today

[epilogue]

How is Friends "shockingly progressive" when it's about six financially comfortable straight white people living in Manhattan, engaging in silly consumerism and casual heteronormative sex? The Jeffersons, Roseanne, The Cosby Show -- THOSE are progressive network sitcoms. Friends is literally as safe as network television comes.

Friends biggest flaw is that it's white-washed. Absolutely. But taking race out of it, how many other shows were there in the early 90s that featured complex women, that featured homosexual characters, that tackled trans issues? Now, it's not as progressive. If the show started airing today we wouldn't be having this conversation. But for 1994? Are you kidding me? And the way that it dealt with so many of those issues, issues that a lot of network shows today still won't touch, with such a lack of judgement was so interesting.

I'm not saying it was perfect. But for what it was: a major network sitcom in 1994, I think you have to acknowledge what the show did and how well it did it.

[Jorge]

Could it BE any more progressive?!

[Jorge]

How YOU doin?

[Jorge]

SMELLY CAT, SMELLY CAT

[Jorge]

*whatever the hell the 3 other adult-children repeated over and over on that garbage show*

[epilogue]

Could it BE any more progressive?!

I know we're not supposed to say this kind of thing... but this was great.

[LetMeSleep]

Could it BE any more annoying?!

[epilogue]

I'll still argue to this day that The One With The Holiday Armadillo from season seven is one of the funniest half hours of TV I've ever seen. I watch it every year and it never stops slaying me.

[tragabigzanda]

Whenever there's active promotion on the part of somebody else, whenever I see somebody all dolled up for a fancy photograph and someone's handing out flyers or whenever there's active promotion for something like that, as an imposition on my day, I hate all those people and I want them to fail. I have a visceral reaction to advertising and promotion. There's just something about salesmanship that grates on me on a very base level and I react very negatively towards it. I want those people to suffer and I want their enterprises to fail.

[BurtReynolds]

How is Friends "shockingly progressive" when it's about six financially comfortable straight white people living in Manhattan, engaging in silly consumerism and casual heteronormative sex? The Jeffersons, Roseanne, The Cosby Show -- THOSE are progressive network sitcoms. Friends is literally as safe as network television comes.

Friends biggest flaw is that it's white-washed. Absolutely. But taking race out of it, how many other shows were there in the early 90s that featured complex women, that featured homosexual characters, that tackled trans issues? Now, it's not as progressive. If the show started airing today we wouldn't be having this conversation. But for 1994? Are you kidding me? And the way that it dealt with so many of those issues, issues that a lot of network shows today still won't touch, with such a lack of judgement was so interesting.

I'm not saying it was perfect. But for what it was: a major network sitcom in 1994, I think you have to acknowledge what the show did and how well it did it.

Practically every sitcom on tv in 1994

[BurtReynolds]

Was Married With Children still on tv? Now THAT'S real progress.

[LoathedVermin72]

Friends is just as unwatchable as The Big Bang Theory or 2 Broke Girls or any other piece of shit sitcom on TV today

[@SkitchP]

I respect Joey's opinion on everything... except TV comedies. He doesn't even like Arrested Development.

[epilogue]

How is Friends "shockingly progressive" when it's about six financially comfortable straight white people living in Manhattan, engaging in silly consumerism and casual heteronormative sex? The Jeffersons, Roseanne, The Cosby Show -- THOSE are progressive network sitcoms. Friends is literally as safe as network television comes.

Friends biggest flaw is that it's white-washed. Absolutely. But taking race out of it, how many other shows were there in the early 90s that featured complex women, that featured homosexual characters, that tackled trans issues? Now, it's not as progressive. If the show started airing today we wouldn't be having this conversation. But for 1994? Are you kidding me? And the way that it dealt with so many of those issues, issues that a lot of network shows today still won't touch, with such a lack of judgement was so interesting.

I'm not saying it was perfect. But for what it was: a major network sitcom in 1994, I think you have to acknowledge what the show did and how well it did it.

Friends biggest flaw is that it developed six great characters, and then beat them into the ground for the entire series by never letting them behave outside their prescribed roles...

I wouldn't say that Friends "dealt" with issues at all; it was never even remotely an "issues" show. The show's inclusion of LGBTQ side-characters was somewhat refreshing in its lack of judgement, but when did it ever elevate any of those characters into something more than one-note archetypes?

And "complex women"?! Are you bonkers? There was not one single complex character on that show. Phoebe was flighty and sexually empowered. Monica was uptight and sexually empowered. Rachel was career-oriented and sexually empowered. They are cartoon characters next to Edith Bunker, or Laurie Metcalf's Jackie character on Roseanne.

I completely disagree with your first point. It sounds to me like you're mistaking natural character development in spite of writing for "never letting them behave outside their prescribed roles." This characters change in major ways. And it's entirely organic. But if you bailed on the thing in S2, then maybe that's why you never saw it.

No, it wasn't an issues show. And that's my point. I think all the LGBTQ characters were more than one-note. Even Chandler's father, which is arguably the one to take the greatest issue with, was still a rounded person.

It sounds to me like you have your preferences and your mind is made up. Which is fine. I'm not going to argue preference with you. And I'm not here to tell you that All in the Family and Rosanne aren't amazing shows. They are. But if you think the ladies you mentioned are so much more complex than the ladies on Friends, then that to me just reads like pure bias. Or rather that you're keying into aspects of those other characters which were never meant to be part of the Friends and you're holding against the show for not aping those aspects.