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Friends Finale Airs, World Continues to Spin on Axis

New York City shut down last night, bridges and tunnels were closed, garbage went uncollected, streets went uncleaned and citywide Starbucks were temporarily shuttered as citizens of Gotham joined their global comrades in obervance of the finale of Friends.

Like 947 billion other Americans, L and I watched the finale last night with our own group of friends. I was never a huge fan of the show - Seinfeld was more my style - but I remember those many Thursdays in college when my four housemates ate dinner in front of the TV so as not to miss the latest hijinks of the impossibly good looking friends and their impossibly thick hair. Now that L and I signed up for DVR service through our cable company, the idea of stopping one's life for a TV show seems downright quaint.

One problem I've had with the show recently is that marriage, rather than softening the shrill and controlling Monica, only neutered the already-insecure Chandler. What, other than convenience, drove Monica and Chandler together? Who would want to marry either of these people?

Marriage, too, was not seen as compatible with city life on the show. Interestingly enough, an apartment that many New Yorkers scoffed at as unrealistically large for two roommates suddenly became too small for parents and the one infant. No matter how large their apartment, Monica and Chandler ran to the suburbs, leaving their friends to mourn their loss over lattes at the corner coffee lounge. You're married now, the show's New York seemed to tell Monica and Chandler, we don't want you here anymore.

Paradoxically, people on the show who had great difficulty becoming pregnant had a greater responsibility to act like adults than people who had children without abandon - Ross, Rachel and Phoebe alone are responsible for bringing five children into the world, yet with the exception of a few sweeps shows and season finales, parenthood was not a focus of their plotlines. Not that I'm going all Republican or anything, but it's still a conflicting message: irresponsible young urbanites can have their cake and eat it, too, but lawfully-married thirty-somethings have to have it delivered to Westchester.

Some of our friends have joked with us that marriage will change us. I have no doubt that it will. But will we flee to the suburbs? Will single New Yorkers see our wedding bands and ostracize us like fifteenth-century lepers? Stay tuned for the next season.

Posted by The Groom at May 7, 2004 10:05 AM