Second Look: Friends Season 5, Episode 1 – “The One After Ross Says Rachel”

Friends Season 5, Episode 1 “The One After Ross Says Rachel”
Written by Seth Kurland
Directed by Kevin S. Bright
Airs September 24, 1998 on NBC

“The One After Ross Says Rachel” unintentionally puts Friends at a crossroads to begin its fifth season – and not only because half of its highly-anticipated season premiere (the highest-rated of the entire series, outside of the series premiere itself) takes place in London, before making its way back across the Atlantic to set up season five’s major arcs. Though the split locales certainly play into this feeling, it’s really the episode’s two main plots that place Friends at a bit of creative crossroads; half of “The One After Ross Says Rachel” feels indelibly stuck in the past, while the other half presents the series with the most exciting creative opportunity it’s had since “The One with the Embryos”.

It makes for an incredibly weird episode, even though it strictly focuses on resolving the two big plot twists to end season four; Ross saying Rachel’s name at the altar, and Monica and Chandler hooking up. Coincedentally, foregrounding both of these stories for the course of 22 minutes creates a huge dichotomy in the episode it isn’t sure what to do with; while it gives its prominent opening and closing moments to Ross and the ‘big’ developments around his marriage to Emily (which is basically already over before it began), where “The One After Ross Says Rachel” really shines is in between those moments, when it shifts its attention to Monica and Chandler, who spend the entire episode trying to shed the rest of the group to have sex one more time before they leave London and return to their “normal” lives and friendship.

Ross’s story, unfortunately, just feels inevitable; one doesn’t need to read too far into the episode to see how little of a presence Emily has in the episode, and how much of this plot focuses on Ross’s miserable attempts to try and pick up the remnants of his shattered romance. And while there’s certainly some good humor to be pulled out of Ross’s growing frustration (and desperation) in trying to find Emily after she escapes out a window during the reception (something the group learns after Rachel remembers her own experience, in the moments before “The Pilot” begins), it’s pretty obvious Friends is immediately ready to shed Emily’s presence, and indulge itself with another wistful Ross/Rachel moment, this time at the airport where Ross is waiting for Emily to appear for their honeymoon.

The Ross/Rachel scene, the one “The One After Ross Says Rachel” ostensibly builds to, really lacks energy, the spark between characters lost after 30+ plus episodes of conflict and regret between the two of them. Rachel trying to convince Ross to go on his honeymoon isn’t disappointing or out of character – but it just feels perfunctory, a situation I’m not sure Rachel would really put herself through after the events of the past 24 hours. When she goes on the plane and Ross conveniently runs into Emily, there’s no real excitement in the moment – just amusement at Rachel over the closing credits waiting for Ross to get on the moving plane, leaving the premiere without any sense of resolution for a romantic conflict that is started to feel at least a bit tired, especially when the episode shifts away from the long-running Ross/Rachel story, to check in with Monica and Chandler, as the experience post-hookup clarity.

It’s hard to believe these two stories exist within the same episode; as resigned as Friends feels to get back on the Ross and Rachel train, there’s a palpable electricity when “The One After Ross Says Rachel” observes Monica and Chandler trying to find a place to sneak in a quickie before they head back to New York (they try a wine cellar, the honeymoon suite, and an airplane bathroom, interrupted each time by another member of the group). At first, the two agreeing it was just a hookup between two lonely friends in a strange place – but once Chandler reveals they’d had sex seven times already that weekend, the tone of the story shifts a bit, their amusing failed attempts to have sex anywhere they can find a place leads to an unexpectedly potent scene where the two talk about the experience and what it meant to them.

It’s undeniable just how much energy their interactions have in this episode; paired alongside a Ross plot trying to uncomfortably extricate itself from a half-season of plot (to return to a plot it’s spent the better part of 98 episodes on), their scenes crackle with both the chemistry of the performers and a renewed sense of wonder in the writer’s room, as they begin to poke and prod at a new interpersonal dynamic and romantic tenor, the first time since Ross and Rachel’s breakup the series presented such a dramatic shift in the Central Perk Six.

And it works like gangbusters; when Chandler and Monica agree they’re still on “London Time”, it solidifies their growing entanglement as one of season five’s central stories with a fervor the series hasn’t showed in a long time (even during its resurgent, if occasionally uneven, fourth season). One can feel Friends tapping into something it never knew it had; smartly, it leans into this pretty quickly, and helps set the stage for the season in exciting ways that Ross’s depressing, nearly-failed second marriage can’t – or even try to, given that it’s really just a catalyst for more of the same Ross/Rachel material.

Thankfully, Monica and Chandler’s scenes are more than enough to gloss over some of the less engaging Ross material (I mean… does anybody get excited to see sad, pouty Ross appear?), and help give Friends something to do other than flail as it tries to undo the work of season four’s second half. Some of this is to be expected, given the writers had expected to keep Emily on the series (it’s been well-discussed how Helen Baxendale’s pregnancy and reluctance to film in America ultimately undercut their plans for the character), and now had to figure out how to extricate themselves from the story; but there’s no denying how awkward and forced some of it feels, especially when it immediately turns its attention back to Ross and Rachel longingly looking at each other, while the world (aka Ross’s decisions) seemingly conspires to keep them apart. And yet, “The One After Ross Says Rachel” is an incredibly intriguing episode, a shift that stands to reinvigorate the series as it barrels towards its 100th episode.

Grade: B

Other thoughts/observations:

• Welcome to season five of Friends reviews! If you’ve missed season three and season four, welcome! After this season, I’ll be revisiting seasons one and two to unify all my coverage of the series under one roof. In other words, a perfect time to jump in!
  
• Jack: “This is worse than when he married the lesbian.”
  
• Monica, to Rachel: “He’s married. If you don’t realize that, I can’t help you.”
  
• I’m sad we don’t get many more appearances of Emily’s father; his drunken tour of the wine cellar is a great bit, and unfortunately all we get from him this episode.
  
• Joey eating his hand steak is such a funny image – not only the image itself, but how Friends plays into the moment when the Gellars complain about having steaks and no silverware or a table to eat it at.
  
• Another Joey highlight: when Monica returns from waiting in the airplane bathroom for a half hour, to which Joey says “Had the beef tips, huh”.
  
• Ross inviting Rachel to Greece makes absolutely no fucking sense, I’m sorry. It’s so dumb and shortsighted; even if he didn’t have intentions to try and hook up with her, how could he not realize it would be a bad look for him. So stupid – and Rachel agreeing to go, after the emotional roller coaster she spent the last week on, is not a decision well-justified by this episode’s events.
  
• Emily’s mother hitting on Ross is so gross – I understand it’s supposed to be funny, but boy it does not work.
  
• Extended thoughts: Really not a lot here, except Joey offering to get Mrs. Gellar drunk so she’ll dance at the reception.
  
• Up next: Chandler makes an uncomfortable choice to hide his burgeoning romance in “The One with All the Kissing”.