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Home / Lifestyle

Sinead In The City: How the TV show Friends would be different in 2019

Sinead Corcoran
By Sinead Corcoran
Multimedia projects leader - entertainment and lifestyle·NZ Herald·
10 Oct, 2019 06:00 PM4 mins to read

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Rachel wouldn't get back together with Ross, she'd watch Hustlers and realise Men Aint Sh*t. Photo / Getty Images

Rachel wouldn't get back together with Ross, she'd watch Hustlers and realise Men Aint Sh*t. Photo / Getty Images

Sinead in the city
Sinead in the city

It's been 25 years since the premiere of Friends, but "Pivot" will live on in all of us.

Whenever I'm sick or feeling a bit mopey - I'll put Friends on. There's something about it that feels like a deliciously cosy, weighted blanket on the brain.

In what was potentially the most relatable story I've ever read, recently a former employee of Robert De Niro's was sued for millions of dollars over allegedly binge-watching Netflix during work hours.

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The lawsuit claims that, "over the 4-day period between Tuesday, January 8 and Friday, January 11, 2019, 55 episodes of 'Friends' were accessed".

I guess you could say that no one told us life was gonna be this way, our job's a joke, we're broke - etc.

While my emotional comfort food will always be Friends, I do however suspect that the show would be completely implausible if it was set in 2019.

As someone who struggles with the cross-scheduling, logistical nightmare that is arranging a dinner with just one person - I truly can't comprehend how they got the whole gang together for hangouts for the majority of each 22 minute episode.

So without further ado, here's what Friends would look like in the real, millennial world.

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Chandler would be patient zero of the vaping disease

He'd also quit his high powered job after having a stress-induced Nervy B (2019 slang for nervous breakdown) and would move to Bali to study meditation at Tony Vietch's wellness retreat.

Time would be Up on Joey

In 2019, at least six women would come forward to accuse Joey of historic sexual misdemeanours. He would be cancelled from the friend group.

Instead of getting skinny, Monica would discover Lizzo

She'd learn to love herself sick just the way she is, and would launch a bad bitch, body-posi Instagram account where she reminds us on the daily to always get extra fries

Central Perk would go into receivership

It's not the thought of spending weekday mornings draped over a coffee shop couch, chin-wagging with our mates and giving zero F's about getting to work that makes those Central Perk scenes seem an impossible 2019 reality.

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It's the idea that in 2019, we'd somehow be able to wrangle five friends for a hangout when one person can only meet on Fridays, one can only do weekends, one can only do every 7th Tuesday, one can only do full moons, and one can only meet up when mercury is in retrograde.

If Friends was made today, instead of Central Perking every morn they'd just send whispery Whatsapp audio messages and Tinder screenshots to each other while bussing to work, They'd go months without ever seeing each other in real life - like normal friends do.

Ross wouldn't accidentally go to the wrong airport

Hello, he'd just use Find Friends

Rachel wouldn't get off the plane to get back together with Ross

Instead she'd watch Hustlers, listen to Beyonce's Lemonade album and realise that Men Ain't Sh*t.

She'd move to Paris and live her best life, eating baguettes, getting day drunk and posting low-cut-dress-by-the- Eiffel-Tower thirst traps on Instagram.

Ross would spent the next 17 years DMing her the flame emoji.

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She'd leave him on "Seen".

Joey and Chandler would not watch TV in the lounge together in their Lay-Z boy chairs

That's just not a thing anymore, sorry.

Instead they'd lie in their own dark, hermity rooms watching Netflix separately and tagging each other in memes.

The "we were on a break" debate would have been shut down in seven seconds

Because the original convo would have taken place over text, so there'd be receipts proving they were not, in fact, on a break.

Ross never would have found Rachel's embarrassing voicemail about how she was jealous he was with Julie

Because she would have sent it via drunken Instagram DM, then woken up at 3am in a hung over panic-sweat and recalled the message. Trust me on this one.

Phoebe would work for Goop

Instead of singing Smelly Cat in a Starbucks, she'd be a wanky, smoothie-bowl-eating influencer, hawking #sponcon Kombucha promo codes. She'd also have a pyramid scheme side hustle, selling Doterra essential oils.

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