Not with a bang, but a whimper.
I don't know what I'll do on Thursday nights anymore. Maybe spend some time with needy children, or perhaps I'll read to old people. Or spend time on the Trans-Canada picking up trash. Or maybe I'll do what I've been doing ever since Friends started sucking mercilessly eons ago. Crack a cold one, settle in for Survivor, and count my winnings from the office pool when Amber puts the boots to Bahstan Rahb.
I figured out pretty fast that Friends was gonna el sucko the bigo weinero. Like, try the first season.
Remember at the end when Rachel shows up at the airport with flowers for Ross and he shows up with a new girlfriend? I threw my remote at the TV. Not because I thought that Ross + Rachel = twu wuv for ever!!!!11 but because I knew then that this show was going to hit us over the head with the Ross and Rachel are perfect for each other, but their timing is always off! Isn't that funny??? OMG!!! thing over and over again.
NOOOOOO! No it is NOT funny! In fact, Ross has had TWO good, memorable lines in the history of the show. "It's forming a paste!" and "Pi-VOT" which, as anybody who has ever moved a couch will know, is a valuable couch moving direction. The rest of the time, he's busy being a mopey, annoying �and, let's face it, kind of creepu� fuck who is too big of a loser to get over the dumb, spoiled, coffee shop waitress who didn't notice him in high shool and get his own damn group of friends instead of poaching off his shrill bitch sister.
And the entertainment media can fuck right off too. Friends has not been must-see-TV, see-I-guess-TV, or even Huh-Friends-is-on-and-I-can't-find-the-remote-so-I-guess-I'll-watch-it-TV for a very long time. That's right, faced with the prospect of sitting through this dead duck of a show and getting up off the couch to turn the channel manually, I would actually choose to get up. And I am one lazy motherfucker.
I don't get all the "yeah, it kinda sucked for a couple of years, but it's over now, so we should hurry up and give it all kinds of undeserved accolades." Seinfeld, M*A*S*H*, hell, Three's Company*, those shows were good right up until the end. Maybe not as good as they were in their prime, but still going out on a strong note. The strong note on Friends was...I think and e major. And we're playing minor chords now, babies!
I am sick of the coverage of "our" friends as the glossy rag mags call them. I'm sick of all the "Ooooh! Oooh! Remember when Chandler was funny?" Yeah! I do! That was for about two years back in the mid 90's, right? Before Monica yanked his balls off and ate them with a side of mint jelly, right?
The moment when it all REALLY started to go down hill of course, was the episode titled "The One Where Everybody Finds Out." This was back in...1998? I don't know. Let's say 1999, because I don't really care and I'm too lazy to actually check. That's the episode where the gang finds out that Chandler and Monica are sleeping together. After that, it's all a big, stupid, we're so pretty blur of a merry-go-round ride with occasional stops to let special guest stars on. And George Clooney, Noah Wyle, Brad Pitt and Giovanni Ribisi were the only ones who were actually funny (see, I thought the way Pitt hated on Rachel was funny because I was like "HA! Yeah! Solidarity, brother!") but Ribisi is a scientologist, so he doesn't really count.
Oh, and don't think I forgot you Phoebe and Joey! Phoebe is so frickin' stupid. And she looks tiiiired and old and one peasant skirt short of a complete and utter mental breakdown with her "I'm a sweet dippy hippy! No, wait! I'm a bitch!" split personality.
Joey...well, I'll spare Joey because I still find him funny occasionally and he's the only one I don't want to murder with a ballpeen hammer.
So lets all raise our glasses and give a toast to the one where they finally say goodbye.
Friends. Long may it suck in reruns.
*Not an actual good show.
Tunes: Dolly Parton - 9 to 5. Shut up! Dolly's got my back! Plus, she's a living legend now!
Text: Steve Martin's new book The Pleasure of My Company.
Tube: Anything but the shitty, sucky, stupid, awful, dreck that is Friends.
