Despite being much older, I recall walking through a room where a friend’s roommates were watching Friends around 2016. I was stuck by two things:
First, that I’d noticed that a bunch of people seemed to be getting into Friends for the first time. I think it had just come to Netflix, and in addition to folks nostalgia watching, Gen z and younger millennials were discovering it. Which was why it was on.
Second, it was really watchable. I immediately paused to join them, and the jokes were landing. It had been a very long time since I’d watched a show with a laugh track, but it worked. The show was solidly entertaining.
Friends probably holds up better because the Barney character just doesn’t work today. So much of his humour is just cringe. Friends’ PG-quality ironically makes it more suitable since there are no characters reveling in sexual assault.
Yeah Friends is just a better show I’m sure. It definitely had a deeper bench on screen. Lisa Kudro is probably the best ‘dumb blonde’ of the last 30 years and that kind of part isn’t easy. Cortney Cox and Matthew Perry were really good comic actors and David Schwimmer is good actor if not a good comic actor. And Jenn Aniston and Matt LeBlanc sure were good looking.
Put that up against any other cast in any other sitcom and I think you’d have to go back to I Love Lucy to find a better one.
Weirdly, though, Friends seems to hold up better.
Despite being much older, I recall walking through a room where a friend’s roommates were watching Friends around 2016. I was stuck by two things:
First, that I’d noticed that a bunch of people seemed to be getting into Friends for the first time. I think it had just come to Netflix, and in addition to folks nostalgia watching, Gen z and younger millennials were discovering it. Which was why it was on.
Second, it was really watchable. I immediately paused to join them, and the jokes were landing. It had been a very long time since I’d watched a show with a laugh track, but it worked. The show was solidly entertaining.
Friends probably holds up better because the Barney character just doesn’t work today. So much of his humour is just cringe. Friends’ PG-quality ironically makes it more suitable since there are no characters reveling in sexual assault.
Yeah Friends is just a better show I’m sure. It definitely had a deeper bench on screen. Lisa Kudro is probably the best ‘dumb blonde’ of the last 30 years and that kind of part isn’t easy. Cortney Cox and Matthew Perry were really good comic actors and David Schwimmer is good actor if not a good comic actor. And Jenn Aniston and Matt LeBlanc sure were good looking.
Put that up against any other cast in any other sitcom and I think you’d have to go back to I Love Lucy to find a better one.