As many have seen across social media and the news, the cast of Friends has announced that they will be having a reunion special! This has been extremely exciting for Friends fans of all ages, but many people have questions on what exactly this will entail. The reunion will be a one-hour unscripted special that will be exclusively on HBO Max, available this coming May! Friends has such a huge fan base due to its amazing characters and how they made their audience feel, so Friends fans can’t wait to see what the cast will manage to do with this brief, one-hour reunion.
HBO Max will be a streaming service by WarnerMedia Entertainment. It will be launching in May 2020, and the Friends special will be released with this streaming service. Since this will be the only place to stream this popular special, it is clear that many people will subscribe to HBO Max in order to watch it. It is an incentive for people to try out their streaming service and depending on if people like the service, some will keep it and some may not. In addition to this special, the entire series of Friends will be available on HBO Max. It was taken off other streaming sites, so for people who love to binge-watch Friends, this site will be great!
Economically, WarnerMedia has spent a huge amount of money on this special, and the Friends series, because of how attractive it will make their platform to the public. They are paying 85 million dollars per year for 5 years to keep the ability to stream Friends. The cast members all negotiated together for their payment, and it is rumored that they all are getting from 2.5 to 3.0 million dollars for the one-hour special. Clearly, they think that this series and special will be a game-changer for HBO Max, or they would not invest this much money.
Because this special is unscripted, it will not be like another episode, and it is not leading to a reboot. It will be more like the cast sitting down and discussing the series. The special will be filmed in the original soundstage, stage 24, that the entire series was shot on in the Warner Brothers Studio in California, which is a sentimental aspect for the cast and the viewers of the show. Fans of all ages are looking forward to the reunion, including people who watched the show while it was on TV and those who have watched it since it came off the air. The show is a family classic, and all devout fans have similar feelings on this reunion. Lilly Kleinhandler, a sophomore and Friends fan has said the following about the reunion: “I’m so excited for the Friends reunion and can’t wait to see how all my favorite characters are doing 25 years later! I hope that supporting characters, like Gunther and Janice, make an appearance because they made the show 10 times funnier. The only thing I am not happy about is that it is unscripted and only one episode. I really hope that it is not just the cast catching up, but them reprising their roles and showing the audience where they all ended up.” As a Friends fan myself, I completely agree with Lilly’s sentiments and think that this is exciting, and we all hope that they make the most of this incredible opportunity to do something special.