I’m tearing through my Friends rewatch now. I’m trying to make sure I finish it about the same time that I finish the rough draft of my book, Insomniac Cafe, which is a surreal horror Friends redux. Ergo my relentless Friendsposting on social media lately.
I’m working on season five out of ten. Phoebe’s surrogacy for Frank+Alice is still weird (mostly because Frank+Alice are gross). Remember Frank+Alice? She was his high school teacher? They married when he was 18 and she was 44? I knew people this happened with IRL and I didn’t really grok how repulsive it is at the time. I’m currently 36, and the very idea of hooking up with an 18-year-old, much less someone I have power over like a student, makes me wanna peel my skin off.
I forgot Chandler and Monica got together so early on the show. Although I always kinda think Chandler is a homo so deeply in denial he doesn’t even know it, I still love his relationship with Monica. They’re so freaking cute together. They manage to remain real friends while also being super enthusiastic about each other.
It’s stark contrast to the relentless drama of Ross and Rachel, who I will never stop hating as a couple. Ross just doesn’t have redeeming qualities! (Note I must make on every single post: I adore David Schwimmer’s performance. Just wanna say, all the crap I talk about Ross doesn’t apply to the actor. The actor is hysterical. Ross is probably so loathsome because David’s so good at it.) And when the two of them are together, they are mi se ra ble. When they’re not together, they’re fighting and horrid. He’s so petty. Jealousy is one of my least favorite traits, and he’s *obsessively* jealous.
I find it difficult to believe Ross and Rachel could ever be friends, much less long-term romance partners. She would just be constantly henpecked by the dude. I will not be doing nice things to Ross in my book.
Speaking of names (were we speaking of names?), I decided not to play with the copyright protections of “parody” for Insomniac Cafe. So none of the characters are gonna be named Ross/Rachel/etc — they’re getting names based on the actors’ other comedy roles, mostly. Rachel will be named Joanna, after Aniston in Office Space. Monica is Gale, a la the horror-comedy Scream character. This is similar to Final Girls Support Group, which named actual horror movie characters after their actors (iirc).
But I totally recast Ross because I love David Schwimmer and I’m gonna do bad, bad things to Ross. I call him Adam instead. As in…like…I mentally cast Adam Driver to play Evil Ross. lmao. Can you see it? I think this is the funniest thing in the world. The book is a little funny — black comedy, maybe — but calling Ross “Adam” because everyone is played by the Friends except Ross, who is Adam Driver, kills me every time I think about it.
I’m still waffling about whether I actually kill off Ross and hook up Rachel with Joey, though. I love the pairing, but it’s pretty unpopular, and I don’t want people to be distracted from the ending by something like that? I’d prefer to keep the focus on the book’s themes. And all the really gross stuff in it.
