Yesterday was the 10th anniversary of the series finale episode of the show Friends. I loved Friends growing up (and still watch re-runs almost every day). I own the box set and quote the characters way more than I'd like to admit. I've always seen a lot of my own friends in the show - even though my circle of friends have changed and evolved over the years, they always seemed to remind me of TV ensembles like the cast of Friends.Growing up watching Friends I dreamed of friendships like those on the show. After Friends ended, I saw a lot of myself and my buddies in How I Met Your Mother and Happy Endings. Now I watch New Girl and Big Bang Theory and even see my friends there. In fact, I've always resonated with the quirky ensembles of friendship-based TV shows probably because I've always resonated with quirky people in real life. (I'm not necessarily sure if this is indicative of my unhealthy obsession with television or my uncanny ability to surround by people who resemble sitcom characters.) On paper, a lot of these friendships don't seem to make sense and yet they totally do and that's sort of how my friendships have usually been too. My favorite thing about most of these shows is the fact that the friendships are so enduring; they come first. Through relationships, breakups, casual sex, fights, new jobs, significant others, children, moving, illness and injury, at the basis of each of these ensembles is true friendship.
In honor of Friends and all the amazing groups of crazy friends who came after them, here is my totally incomplete but totally awesome list of the 20 best TV friend groups ever. (Okay, maybe they're not all the best friends... but these are definitely my favorite TV friend groups.) Here they are in no particular order - except that Friends is obviously #1....
(Click on any image to purchase or view the series.)
Friends
How I Met Your Mother
Happy Endings
New Girl
Seinfeld
Will and Grace
Girlfriends
Golden Girls
Sex and the City
Big Bang Theory
Friends With Benefits
Don't Trust the B in Apartment 23
Cougar Town
Living Single
Rules of Engagement
Community
Friends With Better Lives
Baby Daddy
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Entourage
To avoid making this a top 100 instead of top 20, I excluded any children/teenagers and any best friend "duos" (instead of strong ensemble casts). Did I leave out any of your favorite "friends"?
1 comment:
I would argue that many of my most lasting and valued friendships started as co-workers, so I'd (ahem dump) change some of these to include things like, The Mindy Project, Parks & Rec, The Office, Better Off Ted, Scrubs...God, it's a whole new post so, yeah sorry.
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