Discussion for all things Monica.

(Got a better "Monica" label? Please give suggestions!)

I also like Monica Gellar: I know!

But this is good too.

"Monica Gellar: I know!"

I'm with Guinevere34.

I think I understand Monica better these days. (Having a girlfriend who's like her helps.) She's not so much a neat freak as someone who wants to be in control of her living space. She pays her bills exactly on time, the apartment is whistle clean, the food has to be prepared just SO, and if the living room table is even an inch out of place, she knows it.

I stepped into that last one a few days ago.

I wish they could have done more with her freakish upper body strength. Why couldn't we have seen Monica beat the crap out of Joey's snooty supermodel?

I KNOW!!! I love Monica so much, because she's liked an amped-up version of myself. I'm not a chef, but I love to cook. I'm not OCD, but I can be a little obsessive. I'm a bit of a "mom" to my group of friends, and I like older men. (Mmmmm...Richard...)

Another vote for Monica Geller: "I know!" Could I SAY any more of the Friends' catchphrases in everyday life?

(And is it Geller or Gellar? I always thought the former.)

Geller, for sure.

I'm greatly impressed on how both Monica and Courtney Cox developed as the show went on. I never thought Courtney Cox was funny before the show. I think she was the least comedically talented cast member when it started, but as the character became more neurotic and all her OCD tics emerged, she became as funny as the other five. I would never have imagined her to be so hilarious like when she had a cold and still tried to be sexy to Chandler:(nose all stuffed up and rubbing her body) "Are you saying you don't want to get with this?" LOL!

Word, DreadNok. I will forever laugh at that scene where Monica is sitting on the couch and draws a diagram of <ahem> key locations on a woman's body, numbers each of them, and describes to (I think) Joey how a man needs to vary the order of his, um, attention to each area. As she reaches the end of her description...what was it? "Seven, seven, seven, SEVEN..." Still makes me crack up whenever I think about it.

PsychMiner, I think it was Chandler that she was teaching. I think this was when he was dating Kathy.

It was definitly Chandler she was teaching while he was dating Kathy because at the end of the episode Kathy runs into the girls apartment to thank Monica.

So, when Chandler told Monica that she made him the "best sex she ever had," it was really true, wasn't it? Monica wound up benefiting from her own lessons in the end.

Does anybody try and figure out which parts she's refering to? You know: Where is 7 exactly and 2-4-6 (or something like that)...I always wonder which parts they are, because I would like to know too!

I don't think too closely about it, blobbygirl, but I love it when she's first pointing out the parts and Rachel says "Seven?" and Monica shows her and she says, "Oh yeah." The interaction between the three of them in this scene is outstanding.

The best part is Monica's "It's kind of an important one."

Chandler: (Points to one) That’s one?

Monica: It’s kind of an important one!

Chandler: Oh, y’know-y’know what, I was looking at it upside down.

Rachel: Well, y’know, sometimes that helps.

Aniston's expression when she says that is great.

Haha, JulesP, that is also priceless. As is the look on her face after Monica's big "seven! seven! seven!" finale.

Excellent ensemble work.

Monica's 7!7!7! is one of my favorite Friends quotes/expressions/moments. My friends and I constantly reference this, usually when playing cards. Whenever anyone says the number 7, we all immediately do Monica's 7!7!7!

I also love her "I KNOW!"

I also love her "check" thing from TOW Ross's Wedding. I find myself doing that all the time, and my roommate finds it quite weird.

Has anyone else ever been bothered by the personality transformations of the characters through the years? I notice it the most with Monica, but to some degree it's there with all of them. Whenever the cycle of syndicated shows jumps back to the beginning I feel like Monica in particular is a completely different character. That lack of consistency bothers me. Or maybe I just like the more normal Monica from the beginning as opposed to loud, obnoxious Monica towards the end of the series.

Monica wasn't that funny in the beginning. If a show makes it to ten years, I really prefer that the characters grow and change as opposed to being the same and one dimentional.

A few title suggestions for this thread (each one following "Monica Geller:")

I'm Breezy!

11 Categories of Guest Towels

Our Little HarMonica

Fallulah?

The Empty Vase

How about Monica Geller:Freakishly Strong?

Oh, and how about how she's in reality Fred Sanford, with the stuff crammed in that back closet? Every time I see that door I hear the Sanford and Son theme song.

I really prefer Monica in the later seasons. I think she's at her best when she's obnoxious and all crazy. Earlier in the series she didn't really stand out next to the other 5 friends but later she developed into a much more funnier character. As she's probably my favourite of them I prefer the newer seasons. For some reason I just can't make myself watch season 1. It has it's moments and all but I just can't help but replace the season 1 DVD with season 9...yes NINE. I guess that's probably because I started watching 'Friends' during season 8 and got so used to the characters that now I have problems with getting used to the characters from season 1. But I guess I'm going a little off topic here.

I agree brightside89, Monica wasn't that funny in the beginning, but hysterical later on. I don't think it was Courteney's fault, just the writers didn't know what made Monica funny. She was basically the straight man for the first few years. I think I read once where Courteney has pretty much said the same thing. Once they found the funny though, it was hilarious. I think Rachel was like this too in the beginning though not to the same degree, plus she had the added bonus of being part of Ross n Rachel....which helped bring more funny.

A lot of people say the later seasons is when she became unfunny.I dont agree with that but sometimes she was over the top like when she planning Phoebe's wedding. I actually thought she was funniest seasons 3 through 5 when she was still crazy but also still normal.

The episode where Monica gives the toast was just on - and as a speech teacher, I have to say it's one of my favorite moments. I think my favorite part is where she gives her parents the dead-eye look and says very intensely "I love you" - all for the sake to get people to cry! CC really grew on me as the seasons went on. She was definitely one of my favorites when the series ended. It's a shame she's the only cast member not to land an Emmy nom.

I definitely prefer the later seasons Monica. I never particularly liked Monica before she hooked up with Chandler.

I actually found that Monica was at her funniest and most likable when she was with Richard. 'Cause you know, I wasn't really a Chandler/Monica fan.

How about:

Monica Geller: Don't Steal Her Thunder

I think Monica was at her height of comedic talent at Season 5. Okay, I think everyone was, but with Monica it's very obvious as she wasn't ever funny after that.

Seasons 3-4 she's pretty adorable too, like with her short haircut! That era she was still pretty funny.

I love in the one with Ross's board game, and Rachel is flipping out, Monica says "Okay. Shhhhhhhhhh." She was quite calm and controlled back then.

I think she peaked at season six, and then it was downhill quickly after that, though she did occasionally crawl back up. The writers were never consistent with her after season six. She was either harsh, shrill, bitchy, overbearing, cruel, and pissy, or she was kind, funny, sarcastic, and cute. It irritated the hell out of me.

My personal favorite Monica is season four, when she was rational but still compulsive. She was adorable at times, too.

The best scene I can talk about to demonstrate it is the tag scene in TOW the Dirty Girl where Monica shows up at the girl's apartment with a cleaning bucket. She calmly says she can't sleep thinking about a dirty apartment, and it's funny because we know she's crazy. But she's not shrill or mean about it like she would have been later. It's a perfect scene.

I love when she's spinning uncontrollably on that floor waxer machine. Or any time she's dating Pete.

Sometimes Courteney has this really sexy thing that her voice does, almost like a high throaty squeak or something... it's so cute!

Like when Ross was out all night, and he came back, and she said "Oh my gawwwd."

Or when Chandler picked her up to carry her off to have sex, she said, "Oh my!" So cute when she says stuff like that.

This is a small, kind of random thing, but one thing I really liked about Courtney Cox/Monica was that there were times when after one of the characters said something funny, CC/Monica would smile and/or laugh. I really liked it because I hate that a rule of the sitcom world is that when a character says something funny and there is anyone else in the scene, the reaction is NEVER laughter. Obviously, most of the time this is intentional and just the rules of sitcoms, but there are lines that should be funny within the sitcom universe that the characters should laugh, and CC got that. Ok, wow, that isn't the best way to phrase it and I hope people get what I mean, but I just thought her reactions were really natural in those moments.

Monica did get really shrill towards the end (as did all of them - e.g. become a cartoon of themselves, but that's true of most sitcoms), but I still feel CC never got her due.

ariesblue, I totally agree! It drives me crazy that television characters never seem to laugh at each other's jokes. They will laugh meanly, but never because someone else said something funny. But you're totally right, Friends and especially Courteney Cox and Jennifer Aniston would usually laugh when someone said something amusing (A-moos-ing).

That said, I'm rewatching TOW Ross's Denial, where Monica and Chandler are attempting to figure out the logistics of living together. I really, really, don't like Monica in this ep. Seriously, I kind of want to punch her in the face. Her complete and total unwillingness to compromise is really frustrating to me. She absolutely refuses to hear any of Chandler's suggestions, and even when he calls her out on it, she's like, nope! I'm not going to listen to you! Psyche! I mean, we already saw that analness theme in TOW Heckles Dies, when she refuses to accept the shell lamp or the girlie clock, but that was less strident and annoying- and I also thought justified, those things were fug. Argh! Chandler, you need to tell her that she HAS to compromise! Boo to this new Monica.

I've been watching some bonus footage on one of the DVD's where you can take a tour in Monica's apartment. I really love that apartment. It's my favorite sitcom apartment ever and I really think it added somthing to the show.

It's funny how if it were the other way around, it probably wouldn't have been written like that. In this day and age, sadly, it's easier to find Monica's behavior amusing and funny than if they had Chandler be the controlling one in the relationship. I think her treatment of him borders on abuse at times, and the mere fact that I know if they switched places people would not find it funny at all, proves it.

Monica is actually my favorite female character (and second favorite overall, behind Chandler), but there are a couple times when I can't stand her. Especially during Phoebe's rehearsal dinner in season 10 when Phoebe's trying to make the speech and Monica keeps giving her those evil looks. That really made me cringe. I love that she's super-organized and OCD, but the writers really crossed a thin line in that instance and made her seem just extremely mean.

And then in the end, didn't Phoebe have to go back and grovel to get her to be her planner again?

Yep... and I just thought of another cringe-worthy line of Monica's in that same episode:

Monica: This wedding isn't about you.
Ross: It's not? Then who's it about?
Monica: Well, it used to be about me, but now I have no idea.

AH! That has got to be the most selfish exchange in the entire season. It's Phoebe's wedding for heaven's sake.

I wouldn't call it groveling, all she did was ask once. And of course she needed Monica to take it back, Monica had tossed all of Phoebe's plans in the garbage and remade the whole wedding so there's no way Phoebe could have taken over sucesfully on the last day without Monica's help.

What was good though was that when they showed the wedding it ended up having some of the things that Monica had initially negated - the girl playing the steel drum for instance. And, of course, the whole outside in the snow wedding was way more Phoebe than Monica so it did become "her day" after all. Monica just needed to be reminded that she was out of line - it was nice that she still wanted to help after being publically told off by Phoebe.

I definately liked the end result of Phoebe's wedding. Once Monica was put in her place Phoebe got exactly what she wanted (althougha throwaway line about why her mom wasn't there would have been nice but I don't hold it against the episode). Who else could have put together a last minute wedding that turned out that nice?

I'm not exacly sure why Courteney Cox Arquette was the only one from the show not nominated for an Emmy. In the later seasons, particularly 6-8, her delivery and timing is incredible. That said, I've always found Monica's relationship with her parents to be particularly sad. In the episode where Rachel has Emma, her mom apparently walks right by her in the hospital without saying anything to her. That's just mean! But I suppose they had to give us something -- I find Monica, as hilarious as she is, probably the least sympathetic character in the show.

I agree that Monica's mother was awful to her, but her dad was always incredible sweet to her. A couple things that immediately come to mind are him always sweetly calling her Harmonica and the time he came to visit her after he found out she had broken up with Richard.

Maybe I'm just forgetting the bad stuff, but that's how I remember it: she had a bad relationship with her mother, but a good one with her dad.

Well as much as it was clear that her dad loved her, I think you could tell that he sort of subconsciously favored Ross. Like the whole thing about using Monica's boxes (not Ross's) to guard the Porsche, and in that season 1 episode where her parents come over for dinner, he goes on and on about how Monica doesn't do great things with her life. But he felt really bad about her boxes and gave her the Porsche, and during that dinner I don't think he really realized he was insulting Monica. So I don't know if I'm making sense at all. What I'm trying to say is that her dad sort of unknowingly favored Ross but definitely still loved Monica.

That's the reason I don;t hate Mr. Geller, when he hurts Monica it's entirely accidental and he tries to make amends when he realises he has.

I always thought one of the saddest lines in Friends was when Monica tells Ross that if she could change her parents, she would want his. I know it was meant to be funny, but it still breaks my heart a little whenever I hear it.

Has anybody thought about how Monica's apartment doesn't really match her personality? I mean, I love the apartment, but it's not how I imagine Monica's apartment to be.

I have thought about this watching the show. Don't get me wrong - I like the apt. too. It's just that I would think that Monica would have everything matching. The chairs around the table always get to me.... each chair is different. A different size, color, style. The kitchen is where I wonder... is this really how Monica would keep her place?! It just seems like a lot of clutter. I guess some could argue that if everything was the same it would be boring, but I don't think that's true.

Maybe the layout and furniture was Monica's grandmother's? Monica wouldn't want to get rid of it since it's a tie to a loved one and then she'd just get used to it and have it always like that.


Or maybe it's supposed to reflect her desire to always be the hostess, she wants an interesting and enjoyable home so people will want to come there.

I read an interview with the creators of the show who said they'd have made Monica's apt much more organised/co-ordinated if they'd have known she was going to end up so pernickety/perfectionistic/OCD-ish. IIRC, they mentioned something about the eclecticness of the fridge, or something. I think they said Courtney Cox admitted to being pretty organised & a bit of a clean freak, so it was just something she brought to the character, it wasn't in the original plan.
And ITA with the line about Monica wanting Ross' parents & that always struck me as sad too. I hated the way Monica & Ross were treated so differently, and I didn't even find it funny. Her nickname ("Our little Harmonica") is sweet though.