After its much awaited arrival on Netflix, the sitcom ‘F.R.I.EN.D.S’ seems to be failing to reach a new audience.
One of the most popular sitcoms of all time, Friends, isn’t connecting well with the newer audiences, after it aired on Netflix. The show starring Jennifer Aniston, Matthew Perry, Courtney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc and David Schwimmer, ran for 10 years until 2004 and was one of the most successful shows of the time with a huge fan following.
However, the younger audiences, dubbed as the ‘Millennials,’ have slammed the show on social media as being ‘transphobic’, ‘homophobic’ and ‘sexist.’ They found many uncomfortable plot points such as Chandler being paranoid about being perceived as a gay man or making sarcastic remarks about his cross-dressing dad.
They pointed out issues such as sexism when Rachel hires a nanny for her and Ross’ daughter Emma, and Ross makes a fuss about the fact that the nanny is a man; Ross takes it a step further to being homophobic by asking the nanny if he's gay.
Millennials also claim that Rachel would have been fired for sexual harassment because she hires an assistant who underqualified for the position but does so only because she wants to date him.
Aside from this, they noticed prevalent body shaming as how the rest of the main cast, who happen to be character Monica Gellar’s flatmates, brother and closest friends, won't let her forget that she used to be overweight. There's even an episode where another character Joey Tribbiani yells, "Some girl ate Monica!" when he sees Monica’s old prom video.
Further, the show has received criticism for depicting a controversial relationship between Monica and her father's best friend, Dr. Richard Burke who's 20 years her senior and was deemed as ‘creepy’ by the audiences who also noticed the characters in the show mocking the age gap, especially considering Monica and Rachel went to high school with Burke’s daughter.
The sitcom has also come under fire for lack of diversity on the series as all six of the main characters are white and people of colour rarely feature throughout the 10 seasons and that, there were only two notable non-white characters on the show particularly Ross' girlfriends Julie and Dr Charlie Wheeler.
