When it rains, it pours -- or maybe I should say when it doesn't rain, it doesn't pour. Both, either, could be true in this case.
Actually, I'm not forcing this post as it's something I've been wanting to mention for a while.
Sometime last year -- it might be as long as a year ago -- I decided to undertake a rewatch of Friends. It isn't the most novel idea in the world, as it's something people who could be my -- grandchildren? yes I could technically have teenage grandchildren -- have already been doing for years now. In case you didn't get the memo, young people love Friends these days. I don't know that they've caught onto old sitcoms generally, but they've definitely caught onto this one specifically.
My inspiration really came, though, from another cinephile, a guy only four months younger than me who I have known my whole life. He undertook this sort of rewatch maybe five years ago? ten years ago?
I couldn't believe it at the time, because this guy is also the most prolific watcher of movies I know. How could he fit in both and still be a dad, a mover and shaker in his career, and also as big a fan of baseball as I am? Especially since he has to watch baseball at night, whereas here in Australia, it's on for me during the day?
The answer: You have more 20-minute pockets of availability in your day than you might think. It's much easier to fit a Friends into the rest of your routine than it is to fit in a movie. It's only when you string four or five of them together that it actually begins to take up the same amount of time, but neither is it as onerous a commitment as a movie can be, because you are always re-upping for one more at your pleasure, and you can "quit any time." I suspect the snackability of the show is what makes it appeal to today's young people.
For the remaining ten days of this month, I'm going to test exactly how snackable.
See, a few weeks ago, I was greeted by a disappointing discovery: Friends is leaving Netflix on March 31st. I think it may already be gone in other parts of the world, but in Australia, it had still been here. I'm not sure if I subscribe to its new home, or even know what that new home is.
If I were almost done with that rewatch, this might be okay. But I was in the comparative infancy of the rewatch. I discovered the imminent departure near the beginning of the month, when I was only on the first episode of Season 3.
There are ten seasons.
It seemed like folly to still pursue the full rewatch. And I'm quite sure it still is. After all, my intention with this rewatch was to slow-walk it, to fit it into my schedule, not to fit myself into the dwindling weeks of its availability. In fact, I was slow-walking it so much that there were months when I might watch only a single episode or two.
Now it looks like I'm going to try to watch all the episodes in one month.
To be clear, I'm not really trying to get through Friends before March 31st. Even with increasing the pace after learning the news, I still only just finished episode 14 of Season 4. We're right in the thick of Chandler's relationship with Kathy (Paget Brewster), and he and Joey just switched apartments with Monica and Rachel. There's still a loooooot of Friends to go.
But sometimes I string together four or five in a single day -- and realize I've got a grin from ear to ear as I do it -- and I think "May-be ..."
So I just looked it up, and there are 236 episodes of Friends. I've watched 87 of them. The math really doesn't work out in my favor.
If I want to try to watch the whole series, I will need to watch an average of 14.9 episodes per day, from now until the end of the month, which is basically between five and six hours of Friends each day. Not gonna happen.
Or is it?
I mean, it's probably not going to happen. But my wife and I have already talked about how we need to have a really quiet day this Sunday, especially as we are going out to a concert on Saturday night. I can watch waaaaay more than five to six hours of Friends on a really quiet day.
I don't need to watch the whole series before Friends leaves Netflix. I can just put a pause on my viewing and pick back up the next time it materializes on a streaming service I have. It's not like I'm never going to subscribe to a streaming service that has Friends on it again. I even considered how I could buy it, if I really wanted to. With that much content, there comes a certain point where you get a price break, and it's probably not even that expensive on a per-episode basis.
Until then, though, it could be fun to give it a go, and see how far I get -- as long as it doesn't start to feel like a chore and ruin my experience of the show. But that's what bingeing it has taught me: I don't burn out on consecutive Friends ad infinitum. Which is one of the proofs of its greatness. Yes, I can binge Bing until the cows come home.
But not without a toll on movies, and that's the part that's really relevant to this blog, and also explains my sudden drop in my usual viewing vigor. There are a couple viewing obligations I still have for the remainder of this month, and there's always keeping up with new releases. But until March 31st comes and goes and Friends just goes, I might as well lift my foot off the pedal of my usual frenetic movie pace. It'll be there for me to resume in April.
So random weekend nights when I'd usually find something appropriately weekendy on one of my streamers? Random weekday nights when I'd usually stream something less weekendy? A short time slot in the morning when I'm drinking my coffee and eating my breakfast?
Friends will get those time slots for the next ten days, and we'll just see how far we get.
I will post here as the time and the inclination allows.
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