HBO Max Airs Highly-Anticipated 'Friends' Reunion

LOS ANGELES - After so many years -- and episode re-watches -- could there BE anything left to learn about "Friends"?

As the highly-anticipated, almost two-hour reunion special for HBO Max shows (and with apologies to Matthew Perry for continuing to borrow his lines), "Yes, yes, a thousand times, yes." One thing that we didn't need to learn (because we already knew it) was just how truly there these six characters were for the audience. In the 1990s and early-aughts, the cast of "Friends" provided hours of joy -- first just on Thursday nights when new episodes aired, but soon enough five nights a week in syndication. Within the past decade, diehard and casual fans alike could spend any time of any day with Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Perry and David Schwimmer, as the show became available on streaming services. This sextet has helped their audience get through so much, now including the COVID-19 pandemic. Not only did "Friends" see a spike in viewership in the earliest lockdown days according to Nielsen, but also, just before the world fully reopens, they gathered together to shoot "Friends: The Reunion."