{"id":507324,"date":"2026-01-11T00:25:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-11T00:25:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/507324\/"},"modified":"2026-01-11T00:25:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T00:25:11","slug":"24-years-ago-today-friends-most-divisive-story-started-a-key-character-completely-disappeared","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/507324\/","title":{"rendered":"24 Years Ago Today, Friends\u2019 Most Divisive Story Started (& a Key Character Completely Disappeared)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Friends<\/a> had many divisive storylines that didn\u2019t quite work out the way the writers would\u2019ve hoped, though one is more controversial than most. Whether it\u2019s ongoing arcs, like Ross dating his student, Elizabeth, episodic gags that don\u2019t land, like Joey not being able to speak French, or guest actors being hastily written off to avoid having to pay them more for a recurring role (Gary shooting the bird takes the win here), there\u2019s plenty to dislike. That\u2019s inevitable when there are 10 seasons and 236 episodes, after all.<\/p>\n

Typically, at the very top of the list of Friends\u2018 most disliked or at least divisive storylines is Joey and Rachel\u2019s romance, a major late-in-the-day swerve away from the ultimate sitcom will they\/won\u2019t they couple, Ross and Rachel. Although it was more prominent in Season 9, this truly started with Season 8, Episode 12, \u201cThe One Where Joey Dates Rachel.\u201d It begins innocently enough, as Joey takes her on a fake date because she\u2019s frustrated by her pregnancy, with the pair showing each other their best moves. However, it concludes with him realizing he has developed genuine romantic feelings for her, which are reciprocated a season later.<\/p>\n

Why Joey & Rachel\u2019s Romance Was So Divisive Among Friends Fans<\/p>\n

\"JoeyImage via NBC<\/p>\n

Joey\u2019s feelings for Rachel were a surprising, sudden twist, and given Friends\u2018 audience largely expected and wanted her to end up with Ross, it was seen as an unwelcome and unnecessary deviation away from the obvious endgame. That said, Joey\u2019s unreciprocated attraction to her wasn\u2019t the real problem, as it\u2019s actually quite sweet for his character, but more so when it started to actually push them together.<\/p>\n

This is where it started to feel more forced \u2013 she accepts his accidental proposal, then develops her own feelings for him after a dream. Season 9 is where the show, while still enjoyable, is clearly beginning to run out of steam (thank God for Paul Rudd at this point). It\u2019s contrived, comes off like a ratings grab, disrupts the dynamics of the main group because of the Ross element, and seems needless since we\u2019ve already had so many main characters paired off together. Joey was already becoming far too dumbed down at this point as well, but it started doing the same to Rachel to make them better fit together, which was another point of contention.<\/p>\n

Still, it\u2019s worth noting that Joey and Rachel has gained more support in recent years, as the series has been re-appraised. It\u2019s no secret that many elements of Friends haven\u2019t aged well, and Ross is the Friends character who has, perhaps, aged most poorly<\/a> of the main group in terms of his behaviour, which can be seen as toxic. With Joey seen as the dim-but-sweet love option for Rachel, and the pairing coming from them being genuine friends, it has garnered more support than it had at the time.<\/p>\n

What Happened To Ross\u2019 Son, Ben, In Friends?<\/p>\n

\"RossImage via NBC<\/p>\n

\u201cThe One Where Joey Dates Rachel\u201d isn\u2019t just notable for being the beginning of that romance: it\u2019s also the very last time we see Ross\u2019 son, Ben, on screen. He\u2019s involved in the Ms. Pac-Man plot with Monica, Chandler, and Phoebe, where they have to erase the dirty high score names, and then he walks in right as Phoebe says one of those bad words out loud. After that, while he was referenced a few times, the character was never featured again.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no definitive explanation for Ben\u2019s absence, but most likely a confluence of different factors. Actor Cole Sprouse\u2019s young career was starting to take off more, so production issues likely played a part. Perhaps even more so, though, was the focus on Rachel\u2019s pregnancy and then the birth of Emma, giving Ross another child to create storylines around, which shifted the attention away (rightly or wrongly) from involving Ben in the series.<\/p>\n

There are also theories that Ross lost custody of Ben. His behaviour in later seasons does, in moments, border on being unhinged, and so the theory goes that Carol was successful in gaining sole custody of him and removing Ross\u2019 access. There\u2019s not really enough to support that, of course, but it would add a dark twist to Friends\u2018 ending. Regardless, Ben\u2019s disappearance is still odd, especially for the fact we didn\u2019t get a single scene of him with his half-sister.<\/p>\n

Friends is available to stream on HBO Max.<\/p>\n

What do you think of Joey and Rachel, and what about Ben\u2019s disappearance? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum<\/a>!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Friends had many divisive storylines that didn\u2019t quite work out the way the writers would\u2019ve hoped, though one…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":507325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[171,72413,2469,173,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-507324","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-friends","10":"tag-regular-feature","11":"tag-tv","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115873626801187165","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=507324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507324\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/507325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=507324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=507324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=507324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}