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It's a week before Christmas, and Ross is surprised to find Monica letting
the others help her decorate the tree, but their side is messy. The neat
joke is that at the end, she rotates the tree so that only her beautiful
side is seen, but actually the neighbours will see the other side through
the window. Anyway, three ornaments spell out the word JOY, but when the
tree is moved we just see the word JO - is this another message to Jo?
Joey is still bothered by Janine, who is immune to his charms, but upon
landing a job dancing on the TV show "Dick Clark's New Year's Rocking Eve",
she invites him to partner her. Ross & Monica are gobsmacked as this was a
childhood favourite of theirs, so Janine kindly asks them to come too. But
all through this, Rachel is horrible as she makes snide remarks, first at
Chandler, then at Ross & Monica, and her behaviour does not improve...
Next day, the four arrive at the TV studio. It's been a long time since we
had a sibling story, so it was good fun to see Monica being just as geeky
as her brother. She's looking rather scrawny now, but to male eyes she was
still terrific in her costume, for she displayed lots of cleavage, totally
out-scoring Elle 'The Body' Macpherson.
Though the Gellers push to the front, the cameras ignore them, so they
tour the set, discovering that the best dancers on a platform wear no
underpants. The siblings then harass the director for the spot, but he
scorns them, even when Monica offers to remove her underpants too!
In desperation, Ross reckons they should recreate the dance they had in
eighth grade, and the pair embark on the most peculiar routine. It looks
quite awful, but that is due to the weird choreography. In fact, Ross &
Monica execute it particularly well - they are superbly together, their
movements complementary as well as symmetrical, and they are very strong.
DS & CCA must have worked for weeks to get it right.
At last, this catches the director's eye, but as they clamber onto the
coveted platform, they don't hear him instructing a cameraman to record
them for the blooper reel. As they limber up, Monica & Ross each confess
they have practised their routine over the years, although no explanation
is given of how they managed to do this separately.
In the first ever Chandler/Phoebe/Rachel story, the two girls are quite
appalling, as they take advantage of the Gellers' absence to search both
apartments for the gifts Monica has bought. Chandler is rightly disgusted,
but the girls freak him out by insisting that Monica will disapprove if
his Christmas presents are worse than hers. When will Chandler learn that
Monica is nowhere near as obsessive as his friends keep declaring?
The so-called comedy really began to smell bad when Chandler realises that
Rachel & Phoebe have done this every year, so asks if they've been through
his closet. The girls deny it but giggle, and so in embarrassment Chandler
pretends it contains some stuff of Joey's, but obviously they had rifled
through his porn collection.
Rachel & Phoebe find some presents at last, declaring them to be crap, but
Chandler reveals that they're the gifts that he'd bought for them - so not
only do they continue to criticise his choices, but they make it clear that
they've been through Chandler's closet once again, just to humiliate him.
Imagine the outrage that would erupt if Chandler or Ross or Joey had been
messing about with Phoebe or Rachel's private belongings, and rightfully
he had been told off about it, but then he went & did it again?
The one highlight of this dismal story was to see Dick & Yasmine again,
for Phoebe hopes they'll aid the search. Rachel discovers the window seat
is hollow, though you would think she would know that after living there
for five years, and Phoebe for some years before her.
Since Monica's gifts are inside, Chandler nobly prevails upon the pair to
stop, by promising to buy them better gifts himself. Unfortunately at that
moment Monica comes home, and catches him apparently red-handed. When she
blurts out that she bought Chandler a water purifier, his face falls, and
so Phoebe sneers at him. Thus we were denied the expected resolution where
Monica presumably assures Chandler how much she cares for him, and that
any gift is fine if given with love.
Meanwhile, back at the studio, Joey dances rather well (possibly thanks
to his lessons with Mr.Treeger) and he is delighted as Janine seductively
grinds her pelvis against him. Unfortunately, the director then decides
to split them up. Joey's face is a hoot as his sexy new partner prances
all around him, while the poor fellow only wants to be with Janine.
But when Janine's assigned partner goes to the bathroom, Joey follows him.
If you watch carefully, you can see the real Joey enter through the door,
his face all mature & serious, but then he dons his 'slow' persona in an
attempt to placate the guy into swapping girls again.
When the guy won't co-operate since he wants Janine for himself, and he
lets slip that he's married, watch as Joey drops the act, eyes narrowing,
the happy grin fading away. Then Joey ruthlessly pretends to be stupid
as he cups his hands under the faucet to splash water onto the guy, as
though he'd peed in his pants, getting him thrown out by the director.
At last Joey is with Janine, and as 'midnight' approaches, he prepares
for his long-awaited kiss, but at the last second the director calls it
a wrap, for at that moment the recording will stop as Dick Clark takes
over for the live show from Times Square.
However, when they get home, Janine makes up for Joey's disappointment by
giving him a New Year's Eve kiss two weeks early. Charmingly he shyly asks
if he can kiss her too, and their second embrace is more passionate...
Across the hall, the Christmas decorations are still up, and Ross & Monica
are still wearing their dance costumes. This episode was originally titled
611 "TOW The Rocking New Year", and the following episode was originally
numbered 610, so remember this point for next week's review...
Rachel's bad side is still on display as she taunts the Gellers about their
routine, asserting they can no longer do the original ending, backed up by
Ross reminding Monica that she was bigger & stronger in the days when she
used to catch him. Of course, Monica insists she can still do it, but when
they try she ducks to one side, and Ross crashes. Amazingly, Monica chooses
not to be competitive, by letting this challenge go...
This was not a good episode. Janine achieved what little she was asked to
do, Joey was on form as always, and the Geller dance routine was fun - but
the rest of their comedy did little more than raise a smile.
Still, I would have been happy with these dance stories if the other yarn
had been entertaining - but it was downright awful, with Rachel & Phoebe
at their worst, dragging poor Chandler down with them.
And why was there not a single mention of the Millennium?
Are there any Funny Christmas Presents? |
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Maybe it was a secret message to JOEY. Or.... maybe not. Everything except the catching bit, maybe? hehe I used to always do these
gym routines with my sister, we copied them off of the Olympics (well,
except for the tumbles - I've never progressed past a back flip)Somehow, I don't think so. Maybe it's because I'm younger, but I do find a lot of the visual humour
funny in Friends, it can be the funniest part of an episode sometimes.
Joey's Porsche made out of boxes, Joey headbutting a door.. etc. |
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