One thing that’s obvious about the Friends reunion is that everyone’s aged quite a bit since no matter how good they’re looking, it’s pretty easy to tell that time hasn’t been entirely kind to them. But the next to notice, and wonder about, is why James Corden is hosting the reunion when it would have been far better to have one of the MANY guest stars that have been on the show do the honors. There are plenty of things that are going to be said and have already been said by those that are interested or even simply know about the Friends reunion taking place on HBO Max, and from the most positive and uplifting comments to the types of comments that stem from those that are somehow bitter and cynical by nature, it’s easy to realize that this show inspired and possibly irritated a lot of folks over the years that it was on the air. The reunion was actually opposed by one of the co-creators to start with until she learned that it wasn’t bound to be an actual revival of the show, which would be silly, but was going to be the cast sitting around and reading lines from various episodes and reminiscing about the show. There’s been a great deal of hype at this point about the show and to be fairly honest it’s become something that might actually be disappointing when all is said and done, but there are many that are still waiting anxiously for it air since it’s been talked about for far too long. From a certain standpoint, it’s easy to see why some people are excited and why some are thinking along the lines of ‘let’s get this over and done with’. The former is pretty simple since a lot of people have loved the show for quite a while. The latter, well, it’s mostly because the former don’t often shut up about something like this when it appears that someone might actually do something that leads to a long-awaited reunion. But to be fair, they’re all easy to ignore if one can focus on other things. To each their own and all that.
In a way, it almost feels as though the Friends reunion could have been a quiet affair, something that didn’t need as much fanfare and could have been handled in a very different fashion. Many fans of the show would deny this vehemently, if only because their own love for the show is, as they might feel, enough to justify a reunion like this. It’s true, there are quite a few people that counted Friends as one of their absolute favorite shows, but there’s still a question as to why a reunion show had to be made into this grand of an event. But, oh well, it’s what happened it’s fair to say that it’s a nice presentation for the fans as it allows them to see the group together again, even if it is kind of odd to see people’s desire to watch the six actors of the show sit around and read lines from the episodes and reminisce about the old days. This is something people do apparently, and while to many it might amount to the same feeling as a concert or comedy show, there are those of us that can’t always sit and listen to people simply talking. But some folks are bound to get into this and are willing to sit there and listen to and watch the Friends stars interact with the host and whoever is brought on to talk about the show. Everyone has their own thing after all, and if this is what makes folks happy, so be it.
But from the alternate view, it does come off as something that, despite being nostalgic and even touching, is little more than a chance for the aging stars to do something that they could have easily done in private without the fanfare. It’s even possible that it could have been filmed without a studio audience, but things turned out the way they did and that’s how we accept them since there was really no say in the matter. This almost appears to be how a lot of shows that become this popular are destined to end up since people apparently don’t mind paying the money to see their favorite stars sit there and reminisce in this manner. Like I said before, to each their own, since this is something that people see as a valuable experience and bringing back the stars for a reunion episode is something that’s been done more than once for the sake of the audience, who amusingly enough might not think about the show every day but get goosey when a reunion show is mentioned.
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