I watched the "Friends" finale last night. It was just as bland and unfunny as I remembered it. Nothing even remotely exciting or interesting happened. Talk about playing it safe. The most shocking development was the fact the girl from "Scary Movie" had twins. Wow.
My absolute favourite part of the episode occured with about 15 minutes remaining. It was another cliched airport scene with Rachel getting on a plane for Paris while dopey Ross looked as dopey as ever watching her depart. Then, I heard those familiar chords. I couldn't believe my ears when Pearl Jam's "Yellow Ledbetter" began playing. For those who aren't Pearl Jam fans, "Yellow Ledbetter" is a classic Pearl Jam concert closer. It's a stunningly beautiful song that never appeared on a Pearl Jam CD until their Lost Dogs double release late last year. I love "Yellow Ledbetter" and I was pretty surprised to hear it stuck in the middle of such a commercial enterprise as the finale of "Friends". They played the entire opening and for a moment I thought I'd hear Eddie Vedder's voice come in but it cut to commercial before that point. I hope Eddie had too much class to allow that. Is nothing sacred?
Speaking of music in last night's episode of "Friends", I caught the last part of the clip show they aired at 8. One of the montages was to Hoobastank's "The Reason". Just yesterday morning I wrote about how I find this tune to be a "sappy, corny, syropy mess". That became more obvious then ever when it served as the back drop to some extremely sappy, corny and syropy "Friends" moments. "The Reason" was obviously intended to act in the same manner "Good Riddance (The Time of Your Life)" acted for the Seinfeld finale. Nice try, but not even close.
I still think they should have killed off Monica. Now that would have been interesting.
