01.21 The One Where We Almost Play the Penis Game

In this episode, Monica brings us on a spiritual awakening of sorts as she befriends someone who steals her identity and lives it better than her, bringing up some deep questions such as: what is holding you back from doing what you want to do?
While we're at it, let's talk about the idea of 'ethnic names' and this colonial lens is harmful and racist. Furthermore, let's talk about why monkeys are not pets and how zoos are sad places. All with a healthy helping of Quinn annoying Emilie... PENIS!!

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Emilie Brunet
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quinn k brunet
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Transcript

0:00

all right okay so hi and welcome to what the phalange the podcast where we watch every episode of friends discuss it deconstruct it and fan over it one episode at a time my name is emily pronouns she and her and my name is quinn pronouns ziziar or they them i literally almost just said my name is quinn okay this week we're talking about season one episode 21 the one with the fake monika this episode aired on april 27 1995 and was written by adam chase and ira ungerleider and directed by gail nancuso in this episode monica's credit card gets stolen and she proceeds to befriend the person who stole it ross has to give up marcel because he's reached sexual maturity and joey is looking for a stage name[Music] all right how's it going going all right yeah i think we should just tell them you think we should just tell them yeah about our super fun new patron yeah so you guys we got a new patreon today and we literally just like got the email as we sat down to record and so we're going to be like okay well we'll we'll do an announcement on instagram first and then we'll announce next week but we're very excited because it's our first patron who's pledged in euros that's right is not in the north american dollar north american as though canada and the us have the same dollar same dollar um if only then i wouldn't have to pay so much more for things in the u.s but our new patron's name is and i apologize if i do not pronounce this last name properly so an i really shouldn't have been the one to do this naturally it's a dutch name i'm assuming which is possib which actually ties into this episode interesting oh my god true well welcome anne um sorry for butchering your last name and also if we got the region wrong we apologize also yeah we have no idea where you're from because patreon doesn't tell us so maybe send us like a little message and we can know more about you if you want or you could just like be anonymous whatever up to you um but thanks so much for pledging and and we appreciate your support and your presence in our community so we'll hopefully see you at our next netflix watch party if you can join um within your time zone and on the patreon note i thought that this week we should announce that we've actually restructured how we're doing patreon uh i noticed this last week too no we didn't yeah we yes we did at the end but we're gonna do it again okay um so we've restructured our entire patron community and so instead of subscribing to tears we just now have one collective community and instead of you getting certain benefits at different levels instead what we're going for is the larger of a community we have that means the more benefits that we can give so spread the word spread the love um and uh also after three months of uh being pledged to us we will send you a sticker yeah so thanks thanks for being a part of us i'm so excited to send a sticker internationally oh wow yeah true i love love snowmeal so this is just snail mail yeah all right um so let's get into the episode for this week um quinn what are your initial thoughts about this episode my initial thoughts are to be honest is that i find phoebe to be very different in this episode that's so weird because i didn't feel that at all and you mentioned that while we were watching it but yeah i just uh i feel like she just has a very different vibe and this director who i feel like we haven't seen yet on direct an episode on the show um i feel like maybe was experimenting with like phoebe's character a little bit and i thought that was really interesting um and then i also um want to point out that like there's a some themes there around like names uh in the episode which i thought was interesting um and then i also i mean and then another kind of like general thing that i want to talk about because i've just blended now how i feel into what i want to talk about is also how many responses we got for um one of our instagram poll questions that people had to write in for nice yeah i guess i'm gonna meld my my initial thoughts of this episode with my things that i want to talk about as well um and i actually only really want to talk about two main things because i think the first one is actually going to be like a large chunk of what we talk about and i think it ties into your poll question um and i want to talk about monica um in this episode specifically and her kind of like identity crisis a little bit in this episode her anxiety um and her like rebelling against who she feels she's has been her whole life um and the ways i like really really relate to monica in this episode and i think that um yeah it's gonna be a good conversation the second thing i want to talk about is zoos and um animal rights so yeah yeah let's uh let's talk about some some cool stuff today a little bit different than like what we've kind of normally talked about like we're talking a little like like we're not talking about misogyny today well like it's gonna don't get ahead of yourself it's gonna be there because it's friends but like it's not a main topic that we have that's a big deal i know mind-blowing but it's interesting because the the episode does mostly um circle around monica's story and then phoebe and rachel sort of like being a part of that story i would say that's like very central to the episode um and then i also want to talk about a third thing so the third thing i want to talk about is um i want to talk about the uh perception of like criminals and um kind of like reformative justice but not really like more just along the lines of like um the villainization of criminals versus recognizing criminals as like real human beings with lives and like reasons for doing things yeah yeah yeah this is a very interesting episode that i find is actually quite different than a lot of other episodes um and especially the character that plays fake monica is just a really interesting character in the show so let's get right into it um the first episode the first scene on netflix is actually different than the first scene on the dvd of this episode so um the dvd version actually has a whole scene that's fully cut out of the netflix version and the cold open for the dvd is that monica is actually at lunch i guess with her mom so judy geller is in this episode yeah um so and i feel like this gives um a much better setup yeah for the episode including like monica's character for like let's say anyone who has not watched any of the episodes prior you know interesting yeah a little bit more into like monica like the concept and like maybe her psychology or yeah interesting yeah yeah so monica's at uh lunch with her mom and as we've met judy geller before we know that judy yeller is super super mean to monica um critical of everything she chooses to do always kind of making her feel bad about literally every choices in her life yeah and it's sort of the the scenes opens up where monica is kind of venting at her mom being like can we have one social interaction where you're not grilling me on you know my who i'm dating or if i'm dating and you know my career choices and blah blah blah and so you can tell that it was like probably a bit of a strained uh lunch you could say and then she goes to pay basically monica insists on paying for the lunch and saying like you don't have to worry about my career like i'm doing well like i'll pay for lunch sort of thing and then her credit card gets denied and then her mom is like super snarky and is like it's okay i'll pay for it and it's like so happy that she's like been proven right that like she had can hoard this over monica again and then that's the cold open and then the first scene is what is the cold open in the netflix version yeah which is you know monica finding out basically sitting on the couch with everyone being like i don't know how they got my credit card blah blah blah blah and then so that's how you find out that she's gotten her credit card stolen yeah yeah exactly um and i love this next scene or like the netflix cold open where chandler is like this nerd spent 69 dollars which by the way for 1995 that is a lot of money for a mop on a wonder mop but might i say that in future seasons yes chandler is going to have a night of bonding with someone where he basically they bond at one point about the fact that he bought the wonder broom was it off of the um whatever the shopping channel um so i just think this is funny that he's making fun of monica now but down the line he buys pretty much the same thing for the record wonder mops are real things and they're pretty expensive how much are they now i don't know i'm i'm trying to find like a general price but somewhere around like 40 to 80 bucks yeah right so it just seems more affordable than back then though 69 in 1995 versus 40 now or even 80 now yeah honestly i can only find the like it's not available on amazon so that's why i don't know how much it is lol classic classic the only way i search anything um you search the pricing there and then you find where else you can get it um okay moving on um so yeah so she's bought this like weird mop um and chandler's making fun of her um and then in this scene also we start to notice that marcel is getting a little notice i think that's an understatement i'm like marcel is humping the lamp um and then he's humping various things in the house um which i guess like dogs also go through this where dogs start humping things and then you get them neutered yeah i'm correct yeah spayed or neutered um and uh and i guess like you just can't neuter a monkey yeah and so he has to give him up i just want to point out here maturity yeah i just want to point out here like how it's interesting to observe this from a perspective of just like let's say we are a thousand years from now looking back like archaeologists looking back at our society today and how like we as humans have a lot of like um like repressed sexualness um like we just have like these ideas around sex and sexuality and and this is like an interesting episode to like see that being projected onto marcel which is an animal which is like no matter what he does it's like it's kind of like he's just innocently humping things you know he's going through sexual maturity um and it's just like you know they say that like the george is very curious yeah curious george is no longer curious and he's humping everything and i mean i'm skipping ahead but like when ross gets so upset at him for like humping his leg when he's saying goodbye and like this is just not like that is us projecting things onto the monkey and our notions and ideas of what this like monkey's sexuality means and what sexuality is and what humping means and i just find that interesting because it's like that's not it's just like they're all so angry and upset at marcel when it's like i think he's more hurt like i think ross at the end of the episode is more hurt like he's like i'm trying to have like this cute bonding moment with my monkey before he's gonna be taken away and he's just humping my leg right but then he himself is projecting marcel humping on his leg being a bad or negative thing it's just right it's just weird right and it took to ross but like i know but like i just feel like that's a valid reaction like for him to be like i don't think it's valid how how would you have reacted if you were like having a body moment with your animal and they start to hump you i mean it's the last time he's saying goodbye to him and he just like gives up and it's like take him away i don't want to look at him um you know like i just think that like there's like very little room for compassion or understanding of like why marcel is doing what he's doing and how it's actually like not the thing that we think it is i i guess yeah i guess i just like like i i just feel like if if an animal was humping my leg i i wouldn't be stoked about it no that's fair like yeah that's fair and and i guess like i just feel as though like ross being kind of like annoyed with it it's like valid when he's like trying to say bye and he had all these like other moments with marcel in which marcel was not humping his leg you know and just kind of wishing that that moment could also be that i don't know right yeah totally i guess popped forward yeah we did hop forward um[Music] i wanted to make a pun there but i feel like it was inappropriate we humped forward yeah i said it i said it for you um okay okay so uh hopping backwards coming backwards um so monica is like staying up really late at night she's like been reviewing all her credit card statements and she's having like what we can kind of perceive as like a bit of an identity crisis she's like this woman is living my life she's doing all these things that i could or want to be doing and i've just been like too afraid or like just like haven't taken the time to do these things um and i like i actually i don't know maybe we could talk about this further as she moves further along into this but like i really understand that feeling of being like why do i need to be in control of so many things why can't i just like chill and like you know buy something when i want to buy it and not have to like like triple check my budget first before i can buy it you know why can't i just like sign up for tap dance classes just because it would be fun and who cares if i suck at it like you know why can't like and i i definitely have a lot of those feelings because like i really if it hasn't been stressed enough on this podcast i really love to play by the rules i am a super big monika in that way like i love when things make sense they're organized they're um put together and like i have a really hard time feeling like i'm not in control and the idea of like doing anything even remotely rebellious or away from the norm can be really stressful for me and so and then but all the time like i think there's a quote and it's obviously super cheesy where it's like you'll regret more um the things that you didn't do than the things that you did do you know and and like whatever cheat as cheesy as that is like i feel as though i often will look back on like a year in my life and be like oh my god like i had all these moments where i could have done all these cool fun things and instead i was like a stickler for the rules and didn't want to do them and it's some it's like super simple things anything's from like you know oh i don't wanna um you know i don't want to like walk the streets late at night with a friend and it could be fun but because i'm like you know i i don't i want to make sure i'm home early and so i want to take like a cab home you know i'm just giving a random example but like you know like wanting to like make sure i'm in bed on time wanting to make sure i have like like i can wake up early to get things done being stressed if like i haven't used my time properly um you know not wanting to spend money for no reason um and so like i i i really understand this whole kind of identity moment that monica's dealing with yeah i think that this is like a really beautiful almost like spiritual awakening for monica in this episode and and i think that it's relatable to everyone on in some way yeah because i think that i mean like i posted up on on instagram like i just sort of like did it without necessarily hesitating um i asked the question what do you think it is that's holding you back okay what do you think holds you back from doing the things you wish you were doing and i just sort of like put it up and i didn't actually leave any space for people to be like actually i don't feel held back because i because i feel like this is like a general sentiment that people feel whether or not you are a monika and you're like a stickler for the rules or not and i think that this is like like monica like this this little kind of emotional like adventure that she goes on is essentially her having to face like what it is that's holding her back from her doing the things that she actually wants to be doing um and i find that really interesting and like taking it too far um in an attempt to do the things that she wants to do which again we'll get into that further in the episode but what did people start to respond did you want to share any answers yeah i got some really great responses and probably more responses than we've ever gotten for one of these like open response type things um and so we got some like really real um responses like money and loans are what's holding me back yeah um which are like very real like that's an actual legitimate systemic thing that can hold people back systemic racism systemic uh misogyny systemic transphobia all of these things can be things that really hold people back yeah and then you know we have um ally rhoden was like the pandemic and i was like yes true i feel that right now definitely um and uh we also got some like you know me doubt um fear needing money letting myself spend too much energy on things that don't nourish me oh that's a good one yeah um i also the one that i really really appreciated was i imagine someone else could do it better and that one hurts yeah yeah i think like especially with like doing any sort of like creative endeavor like i've been feeling that especially since the pandemic where i've been like trying to take on those creative endeavors of like you know us creating this podcast like my attempts at youtube you're sort of like but there's so many people who know how to do this better than me yeah and know the information better like why why would i why would i do it anything worth doing is worth doing poorly yes which is the kind of um i guess phrase or motto we adopted for this podcast to make sure we followed through to make sure we finished it this and also um done is better than perfect done is better than perfect yeah both very important phrases yeah oh all right moving on next scene um so joseph is joseph i just called him joseph joseph my good friend joseph oh god hopefully that does not stick in our brains gosh joey is trying to pick a new name for himself because um his agent thinks his name sounds too ethnic which like let's talk about how [ __ ] that is like are you kidding me um like he's he's only italian too you know and like people get this all the time like especially by poc they get people say like their names are like too hard to pronounce sorry anna sorry and but like people's you know like there's a lot of this common theme where people can't pronounce a name or they won't like choose someone's resume because they have a quote-unquote ethnic sounding name um they won't pick someone to rent an apartment for these reasons um so this happening is kind of weird and [ __ ] up yeah i mean it's also like telling right and yeah um and i want to point out that like some of these you know people who are like oh i'm not going to pick this resume because i can't pronounce the name is not always coming from like a malicious or like consciously racist choice space like i think we also have to acknowledge that sometimes people are like nervous that they don't want to have a language barrier with someone and so therefore will not pick up this resume and we'll choose another one over it and i want to point out that that is like still a racist issue and although someone's not being malicious while doing it it's it's still causing a huge problem and a barrier to people of color or people with names that do not conform to uh essentially you know white colonial yeah colonial white standards yeah yeah um so joseph joseph i just call him joseph again oh my god what is my problem okay so joey is trying to pick this new name and he says specifically that he doesn't want to pick a name that will make him sound like this and he puts his finger his index finger and his thumb really close together um to indicate small and then the waitress is there serving coffee and he like ha feels the need to turn to her and be like but i'm not i'm not like don't worry strange woman i don't have a small penis like oh my god joey take a chill pill like oh my god like that waitress is probably like i just want to go home this is all very uncomfortable for me um but yeah and also to point out that part of body positivity is to help unpack and eradicate this sort of like penis sizeism that exists um is that a word sizes i don't know i just repeated what you said i made it sound really smart it could be maybe i don't know i was questioning it as i said it out loud um but yeah so being body positive also means uh taking the focus away from and you know not making fun of or pro emily help me not making fun of people based on their penis size yeah not like creating like a superiority or like um whatever like a masculine toxic masculinity comparison thing yeah with penis size yeah okay sure and not all men have penises true yep yeah which is why that's even more important to not do penis comparison sizes um okay moving on i think we've had penis like about 16 times here penis penis penis do you remember that game when you were i never really played it and i feel like i've never played it isn't it like this is my my monika side of me i never would want to play the penis game because i'm playing right now with family do you want to embrace okay no we've got our niece who's sleeping in the other room okay penis what's wrong with the word penis there's nothing wrong with the word penis penis i don't want to wake her up yelling penis okay stop it getting uncomfortable quinn you know i'm a monika okay anyways moving on um so joey chandler suggests a variety of different names um and finally he suggests why don't you go with joey stalin and then he's like or even better joseph stalin and joey for some reason doesn't know who stalin is which like it's joey so that makes sense but also i find really weird that he he like does understand the joke that chandler says immediately beforehand which joey says like i need to find a neutral name and chandler goes joey switzerland and so why would joey understand the joey switzerland joke and understand that switzerland is like a neutral country and has been super neutral in like these world wars but doesn't recognize that stalin was like a dictator in some of the world wars like i feel like i know stalin but i wouldn't have known switzerland if it like when i was younger you know okay i'm gonna offer something up here okay okay i okay so joey is always framed as someone who's like not very quick not very smart and they make fun of him for it repeatedly and i mean like in this particular situation you have joey sort of being like this name is familiar but i can't place it and i just want to point out that i resonate very strongly with this yeah because one of like i mean um dyslexia is like a variety of different things and it's really just an umbrella term but one of the things that some people with dyslexia can have is very poor recall and so recall meaning the ability to like place a word or be able to pull up that word um when you need it so like you know seeing your face or you're seeing someone being and not being able to like remember their name very well or like with myself continuously forgetting my own name and and that's just like poor recall it's like the information is there but like the pathways to have it quickly arrive to the forefront so that your mouth can make the sound and put it out is like a whole series of pathways and it it can just be blocked essentially or just like less fluid than other people to varying degrees and so i just want to maybe make an argument point here that the entire show joey has some severe learning disabilities and basically the entire show everyone's just making fun of him for his learning disabilities so yes that is a theory i've always had the theory that they're trying to paint joey as being so um like egotistical that he actually is like does have this knowledge but is just like un able to think of it because he's so caught up in his own life and his own stuff really that's what you get from it like sometimes i i just kind of thought of that now because like there are some situations where it shows up where like everyone's like how did joey think of that you know and it's like they're like how did joey come up with this like crazy smart idea and like to me it's like maybe he was just focused and like he wasn't thinking of himself in this moment right i feel like yeah i almost wonder if like they kind of went halfway with the character like making him like bro but then they also made him like too lovable and so you know like comparing him to like the vulture in brooklyn nine-nine what a great character too um but like i don't know i kind of disagree with that because he does like he is always struggling to keep up and he's like trying to especially like later on down the line there's like an entire episode that in circles around him like really like looking back at him like really struggling and wanting to be able to be part of the conversations um yeah it's and it's interesting because i feel like sitcoms always do this thing where they have this kind of character on it like kind of like this um like quote-unquote stupid character on it but i i do feel like it's kind of a played out trope and i do feel like sitcoms have like started to move in a bit of a different direction in which like the normally quote-unquote stupid character is now more just like the bro-y character and like you see that like what we see on um brooklyn nine-nine like you were saying with the vulture um mind you he's not part of the integral group and they do have two characters on the show who they consider to be more like you know yeah the joker and the end of the joke they angle a lot of their fat phobia towards and yeah yeah um but like for example if you think of the show new girl which is like super problematic i feel weird saying the word problematic now um it's super um like you know has a bunch of issues in a whole bunch of other ways but um new girls like i guess joey character you could say is more just like a bro and they all make fun of him for being like this they have like the douche jar douche bag jar right like a swear jar yeah so i think that's interesting that like some sitcoms have moved away from like the classic trope of someone just being stupid and more moving towards like them being self-centered yeah yeah and like shallow and yeah yeah yeah yeah i agree and i feel like joey was like the beginning of that i guess you know or maybe at the beginning he's somewhere like a character somewhere in between yeah he was like somewhere in that evolution of that style of character that they use yeah like neil patrick harris on how i met your mother is a bro he's not stupid yeah mine junior patrick harris on how i met your mother is just like the worst character of all time and like a horrible person anyway yeah okay i'm really glad you brought up the topic of joey though i think that's interesting because it does come up a lot his like quote-unquote stupidity and they make fun of him a lot for not being like as intelligent as them you know from now on i'm just going to parallel it to various learning disabilities that i know about wow okay moving forward i mean not going to be a ride i'm super interested to learn more about this okay good i'm glad okay so moving forward monica decides she's going to go to the tap class that she's been signed up for by the person who stole her credit card which by the way if you see a someone's credit card why are you signing up for like a recurring class like that's not like insurance people are gonna track you down yeah it's it's not very realistic how this plays out um but also on like a separate note this is and to like reinforce how this is not realistic the majority of times like the way that people will steal credit card information is that they'll actually um essentially only do like 30 to 150 dollar charges every couple a couple times a month and try to like keep it within the range of money that you normally spend so that if you're someone who doesn't check your credit card uh bill very often the basically the charge will just sort of like splendid yeah blend into everything else that you purchase and that is like the most typical way that um credit card fraud happens so just let you know check your credit card bills wow thanks for that no problem you're teaching us so much today quinn i'm just a gifted teacher i learned so much from you um anyways yeah and also if you steal someone's credit card don't buy tap classes yeah like let's flip this together let's put the switch if you're gonna get a hold of jeff bezos's credit card and you want to spend some dollars do it don't do a reoccurring like payment for a class that you're gonna go to on a regular basis they will track you down like preferably choose one-time only uh payments to things uh or buy yourself gift cards to check the security cameras when you go there and buy your things[Laughter] um for the record i have never okay i don't feel like i have to save for the record i've never done any anyway i think it's pretty clear i think anyone who has done credit card fraud would be laughing at me right now um yeah but yeah yeah what's really nice about credit card fraud of all the things to have stolen like if if ever you've had your your credit card stolen like it's actually the least worst thing to get stolen because it's pretty easy to like call a credit card company and be like look i didn't make this purchase like i've lost my wallet like and especially if you call them right away when you notice that your credit card is missing um and then but in this case like it was fraud because she went to go pay for it with her credit card yeah that's so someone got a hold of her number her credit card number yeah which means it was probably like a retailer which in the 90s we had those like stamp like you you stamped the credit card it was less secure so yeah credit card really stealing like that doesn't really happen it's more like online um someone getting a hold of your numbers online and they also don't really explain it very thoroughly because like it sort of it's like they're implying that it's full-on identity theft because this person has taken on monica like as an identity whereas like most of the time when people do credit card theft like you're not taking you're just like using like how often have you used someone else's credit card people usually will go to like a credit well like if they are gonna do a one-time thing they'll go to like a gas station and buy a bunch of gift cards with the credit card um mm-hmm uh which is usually a sign it would be really funny what stealing jeff bezos's credit card and then just oh never mind i was gonna say buy a bunch of amazon gift cards but then you're just gonna make him more money yeah no way well but it's like his money i think it becomes like pretty neutral at that point anyway not that it ever even matters because there's no credit card limit that exists on this planet that could make a dent in his wealth i thought you're gonna say like sign him up for a bunch of like reoccurring subscriptions to a bunch of like super rad gay [ __ ] yes that was my next thought all right anyway any who um okay so yeah so they all decide all the friends decide we're not all the friends monica phoebe and rachel decide they're gonna go perform at this top class um and phoebe is awesome she is tap dancing wonderfully yeah this whole episode even like that whole like theatrical thing that she does when like when rachel's trying to convince her to like not go to this madness madness like just she's great and then she's like an amazing modern dancer i guess not quite tap dancer but but i love what she's like she's like you dance a dance class like she repeats what she says exactly she's so like theatrical in this episode for sure it's so funny um and then um yeah so they're they're they do their dancing and then somehow rachel's like incredible at tap dancing she's like you just click when they click no it doesn't work that way but i bet you 20 bucks that rachel like grow up being you know to all of these after school programs of like different dance stuff and musical things and whatever you know hashtag rich life yeah rich new york life yeah for sure but um more importantly now fake monica shows up fake monica and don't you find that like how she enters it's like she almost like floats into the room like and across the floor and i just find that she's just like like she just takes you the moment she enters it's really cool i like i like fake monica in this do we ever find out her real name or we just call her fake monica the whole time i think yeah we just call her fake monica okay or we call her monica or fake moniker when she's not around right which is not brown behind her back and she recognizes that monica is very tense she says who's the new tense girl um and then monica says my name is monana it's dutch um which we looked it up and it actually is a dutch name super fun fact monica got that right i also want to point out here though that again with like the name theme going on here that like monica said a name that is not as like widely accepted or seen within like our not yeah within like the predominant culture in the area and then immediately felt need to explain the name and i just find that interesting like we have like this theme here around it like having to justify your name because it's not common also i do find it weird that she's like she's like oh it's dutch i spent like this many years in amsterdam and started speaking to her in dutch and then she's like uh pennsylvanian dutch but like you could literally just be like oh i don't speak it like my didn't grow up speaking you know like although to be fair she was in the moment and i don't yeah i don't blame her it's also way funnier um okay so finishing off manana storyline okay so then monica ends up basically going on these fun adventures with uh fake monika that's gonna get confusing it is um so they they go for lunch at first right away with the other two girls as well and then um monica basically starts spending all of her time with fake monica and doing all these like quote-unquote rebellious things that monica would never do and you could tell that she sort of like feels um like invincible with this monika you know yeah like she ends up going for lunch and like or goes out with her during the day and gets like really drunk in the middle of the day um and then you see that like monica's apartment is starting to get really messy like they cut to it very rachel rachel was clean rachel was poorly but rachel was cleaning um and i i do have to say like i really relate to this um this kind of feeling of again like wanting to just lose control and then like it being an all or nothing scenario like either you're tense and uptight following all the rules or everything's falling apart and you're gonna get super drunk you're gonna like um leave everything a mess you're not gonna go to work you're gonna do this you're gonna do that and i did that for a long period of time um i like felt like i had spent all of my teen years up until about like 19 or 20 really following the rules like i didn't do anything wrong i like was like a really intense teen i hated um rebelling as a teenager i didn't like i think i drank underage like very few times well actually a couple of times but like it was more just like as long as the circumstances were very sure that i wouldn't get in trouble for them like i wouldn't drink in public i wouldn't do any of those like rebellious teen things you know i just completely missed that part of my life and so then when i hit 20 i was like rebel time and i fell apart and started drinking heavily and like smoked a bunch and did a bunch of drugs and like let everything fall apart around me dropped out of school and then um you know was doing poorly at work was like doing big mess-ups at work and it was all like this complete collapse after feeling like i need to be in control for so long um and so like obviously we only see a couple days of monica doing this and then you know she's like got a few people who kind of put her on track and really the thing that puts her on track is the fact that like her friend fake monica gets um imprisoned like she gets caught yeah yeah do you want to talk about that sorry i'm just absorbing everything that you're saying that's true um yeah and so then she ends up in prison fake monica fake monica ends up in prison yeah um yeah and i think that that's like an intense moment for monica and i just find this whole story very interesting because i think every single one of these characters get to have different episodes that sort of like show their growth and development and like little pieces into like helping them get there and who and and lead to them actually changing and being very different people come you know season 10. and um i think that's like a very special part of this show that they kind of just end up like building onto themselves every time and i feel like this is like part of monica's like sort of like self-awareness and exploring i also think it's funny because in future we are going to see more drunk monica and she's very similar i love drunk monica she doesn't come out very often but it's like pretty much the same thing every single time you get to see sort of like this more inner turmoil of like wanting to be carefree and just like really is actually uptight um and um i think that she grows though throughout the seasons and that's interesting and this is sort of like one of the pieces of part of it as a part of it including the other episode the one with the butt actually where it's like sort of she recognizes how similar she is with her mom yeah and then you know now she's sort of like exploring this other part of her that doesn't have to be so like straight and narrow and i do like that like so she's talking to fake monica in prison and fake monica is like you're gonna go back to like your old life and monica's like i don't i don't want to like i want to keep this up and um and like monica does go back to her fake her her fake life her like old life her real life but i do like that they include that she does go back to the tap classes and i find it such a powerful little thing at the end like it's actually very meaningful where you know the person's like the teacher is like you in the back you're doing it all wrong yeah and monica's like but at least i'm doing it yeah and i think that that is you know very real and i think that we can actually relate to that in this podcast yeah because you know with this podcast i think that you know especially i would say like the first seven episodes and i think we've said this before it was like literally the most painful process yeah um and having someone else to be accountable to actually like made sure this happened but it was just sort of like having to go through that process of like we're doing it all wrong we have no idea what we're doing everything is horrible but somehow we're pulling something together yeah and like and just having to like get into like just being okay with the fact that like you have this giant looming feeling of like like you're doing it wrong you're doing it all wrong someone could be doing it better but at least we're doing it and but then it's like but at least we're doing it you know and i think that's really beautiful thanks monica yeah i really like i really think that we have to stop thinking that um that art is only art if it's done in a way that can be sold and um and like i really like i think there's like was a post going around facebook the other day but it was this kind of like you know dance even if you're shitty at dancing like sing even if you're off-key like don't stop doing these things that you enjoy doing that are like part of your life and your identity and um like your artistic side just because you feel like you're not good enough at it or you're not um you know not gonna make money off of it or it's not like a valuable way to spend your time like art is so good like there's a reason why art therapy exists like art is a great way to like release emotions to deal with mental health things to like express yourself to um just create and put energy towards something and even if like you know you're drawing stick people like it's still art and it's still important so do it yeah our species as a whole is designed to create yeah and so go go create yeah i hope we i hope you're gonna go create now yeah go go tag us in something that you create you guys yeah yeah oh my god actually do that if you want tag us in or maybe just comment on one of our posts this week or send us a message and on instagram and just be like hey this is my art instagram page check it out and we will follow you and we will support your art yeah totally and actually like if you want to post something that we can like you tag us in and then we'll post it in our story so that everyone else can see it too yeah and we can all support each other as a community because we're adored making community um okay moving on actually okay before we move on i want to talk briefly about uh how fake monica is a very unique character in the entire ten series and that she is a fat character that is not yeah okay she's not in the entire tent series oh yeah but out of everyone like of any of the side characters in all of the ten seasons she's like someone with like the most amount of lines who is in a bigger body and is not made fun of for that body for that body yeah um and it's in actuality like there's no comment at all at any point about her having a larger body and she's like a fun good character who is like you can't help but like fall in love with yeah yeah for sure um yeah glad you pointed that out yeah i don't yeah i don't she's a very unique character in that way yeah yeah i do also also quick snippet i want to point out um that like at one point you know ross is doing this thing where he's like he basically says like she stole from you she's a stealer like he's so mad at this person for like stealing which like i i understand being upset that someone stole your credit card like that's valid but like he's like villainized her to be this like awful human and i really like that she isn't actually villainized as a character in this show like she's like a great character we like her she's like kind she's generous she's awesome and she like stole a credit card and that sucks but like they don't turn it into this like this person is a terrible person because she's still a critic her like they don't make her like evil or snide or anything like that they just like she's a really great human who like did a crime you know and i i think that that we need way more representation on television of like great people committing crimes yeah that sounds weird but like well no seriously right because also crime is a systemic issue it's a result of systemic oppression yeah um and it's it's not an individualist thing it's a systemic issue totally yeah um i also just love how that moment just ends up saying so much more about ross's character than it does about fake monica's yeah for sure it just shows how ross is like yeah um okay so let's talk about um uh ross having to give up marcel yeah sure um like the the whole episode there they have this kind of like funny college zoo comparison that they've got going they're like which friends is like known to be very good for they do like these silly parallels yeah um and i mean like i think the whole time that marcel has been around we've always like questioned like what is marcel to ross you know is it child is he obstacle yeah or is he like sometimes it's like is he a girlfriend like it's very confusing yeah for sure um but um our father's calling me oh i'm just gonna turn it off in a way well i think he just called the house phone too so i i don't care we're in the middle of recording okay um and um okay so yeah so he there's this comparison of like college and zoos and ross is trying to get him into a good college i mean a zoo so that he can like go off to live his life in a great way which is really contradictory and not great um[Music] and yeah so i kind of want to talk about why zoos suck yeah go for it emily um educate educate okay so as someone who's like not really an animal rights activist but like has been vegetarian for like half my life um and was vegan for a period of time and is like super conscious of animal rights um i just think zoos are like a really awful place for animals to be in usually animals are being shipped from like um literally across the world to come into a zoo um the habitat is not nearly large enough for the size of the animal um they're completely in the not proper habitat for example lions in zoos in you know canada when they're like literally african desert animals like not desert african safari um animals you know and um usually like there's many many stats out there that show that um animals often die prematurely in zoos they don't live as long as they would in the wild most zoos are not certified as like actual animal sanctuaries and so they're corporations which means profit is the most important thing not the actual animals themselves um and so if there's any form of band management which happens way more often than not um animals die all the time in zoos like literally all the time yeah it wasn't like marineland which is in ontario was just like a few years ago there's a whistleblower about how like the whales were being treated horribly yeah they're often trying to do like tricks and yeah completely unnatural tricks they're living in cages like animals are not meant to live in cages like um animals are not meant to be domesticated uh they're not here for us like they're just ross they're not yeah ross like ross like i'm not broken up by the fact that like ross is getting rid of his monkey i'm broken up by the fact that like marcel has to go live in a zoo um and like i don't even know how ross got this monkey to begin with like was he shipped did he buy him order online someone at work who had him and then gave him to him oh yeah well where the [ __ ] did this person at work get him i know it was very vague and weird um but yeah no seriously it's just i mean i appreciate how ross is trying to be very considerate as to where he puts his you know his pet um it's also really messed up and weird that we have this i mean it's funny that we have this guy who's like trying to get marcel into basically ring fighting like animal fighting which is like still a very real and alive thing in north america yeah yeah um it's like there's tons of these that exist and it's like pretty messed up but i just i do find it like really funny that they're clearly like doing this comparison of like animal fighting so terrible collectively known in the world that animal fighting is not good for animals whereas like kind of brushing over the fact that zoos actually aren't great places for animals either um obviously it's like different varying degrees because like animals die like pretty quickly in animal fighting rings whereas like most um animal deaths in zoos are like like prolonged and um more just like unhappy life for a long period of time um and so i i think that like but we do this often where we're like this is clearly bad and this is like kind of bad but okay so it's the better option you know oh my god elections flash the lesser of two evils yeah and so and so i just wanted to bring up the fact that like zoos aren't these like wonderful places that we make them out to be um and they're like really unnatural and harmful overall to animal welfare yeah and so if you want to like visit a place that has animals for like educational purposes first and foremost find a place that is not primarily uh using the animals as entertainment and then secondly uh making sure that it is a genuine like sanctuary for the animals like our dad is on the board of directors for lunichua which is like a bird sanctuary on montreal island and they rehabilitate birds there yeah and they rehabilitate birds and try to like um make sure that there's some good ecosystems in place for bird migration because it's actually not on the montreal island it's hudson but yeah hudson sorry yeah um right off the montreal island yes um but uh yeah so and that's a place that people can go to and actually like see the sanctuary and see the birds and like that's a different experience it's a not-for-profit too which makes a huge difference in the way it's run yeah yeah um and also like if you do feel like you really really really really need to go see animals um might i suggest one of the parks that are drive through parks so you stay in your car um and the animals are not in cages but have actually a lot bigger spaces to roam around still not ideal but it is again the lesser of two evils yep all right so moving on um do you want to just finish off the conversation about joey and his name like it's not really much of a plot line to be honest no um it's not he basically finds out that his name is is a russian dictator oops the leader of the soviet union um yeah and he walks in and he he says to phoebe he's like phoebe who's playing with a game boy by the way we've never seen this so that's what i mean yeah she's like it's like they really were experimenting with her character yeah it's true and she's like boy she's like hanging out in a very like removed laid-back way you know yeah anyway i just find it very interesting i kind of like this side i think that's like the only time you see a character like doing something else while they're all hanging out as a group no i think sometimes they're playing like they're doing like the crossword or oh monica will be doing her bills on the kitchen table oh yeah those are like small subtleties of a show that i appreciate yeah totally like these yeah um but anyways phoebe suggests that joey calls himself flame boy which is great what name do you think would be worse it should take oh if you could give joey a name which one like a stage name yeah not holden mcgroin oh my god this is rough i feel like a good stage name could be like it's just joey tribiani to me honestly it's joey triviani right it's a great name i actually put up on our um polls like which stage name do you think is worse for joey joseph stalin or flame boy and we had six percent say flame boy and i put it up for debate because i was sort of like the reality is there probably is currently a joseph stalin out there living in the world living in the world having to make their way through it that's rough and then okay also i just want to like clarify here because like i think that a fair amount of people depending on where you're located in the world might have like not full concept of who joseph stalin is but to put him into context he was a dictator around the same time as adolf hitler and basically um like competed in a sense for territory with adolf hitler and was like a dictator that people parallel to adolf hitler unfortunately he actually started off with like a lot of incredible good intentions um which so did adolf he was part of the socialist party um and he was like basically was a rebel and wanted to change the system because he felt like this that's our rule was not a good way to rule a country um and then yeah then power got to his little his little head i mean it could have always been who knows we don't know who knows um but it's funny when like refreshing my brain on joseph stalin like reading wikipedia um which is my go-to for this podcast sometimes guys um i find that i was just sort of like yeah no wonder the right has such a hard time with the concept of like communism and socialism socialism you know it's sort of like you know you go you go too far in either direction like a dictatorship is a dictatorship right and like it's like you know you see that within the realms of the right with fascism and then you can see it in the realm of like joseph stalin on the left and so is it was he the left though would you consider in the left i don't know i don't know it's hard to say i know that adolf hitler um if you go too far in any direction you end up in the same spot yeah it's like it's a circle guys um but yeah it's i know that adolf hitler did put in like all these really great implement like created some really great change at the beginning uh was like the ideal like you know kind of thing like i would have voted for him on the initial platforms that he ran on right and with the initial things that he was doing he really did a lot of good i didn't know that at all yeah and then and then he basically had this like hidden agenda that also existed that basically went down this road of uh um that was not good well obviously like an understatement of the year but like um yeah so it's just it's just interesting that i guess too much power in any direction right it's just right and that's why anarchism no power for anyone i'm just kidding i'm just i'm just throwing some stuff out there just throwing things i don't expect us to have a conversation about joseph stalin i specifically said we should not talk about joseph stalin yeah i'm sorry it's always already like i feel like i don't know nearly enough about joseph stalin to like have a real conversation about him um so yeah right i took a whole class on um well a large portion of it centered around adolf hitler but it was a science ethics class that really stuck with me um yeah interesting very impactful all right so i think that's kind of it like nothing else really happens um marcel leaves uh monica finishes her tap dance uh finishes her story by going to her tap dance class and joey finishes his story by going to an audition with the name stage name hold him groin and that's how every story ends and so okay two things left to do one is to point out a trivia fact about um why they got rid of marcel so apparently um they had originally wanted marcel to stay on for like the show like they wanted ross to have a pet monkey in the show but it was just too time consuming to film because a monkey is not supposed to be a pet or domesticated and therefore even training it makes it difficult to work with um no kidding please set him free um but then secondly emily we've talked about our best friend yeah who do you vote as best friend for the episode um so i don't think anyone kind of was like excelled at being a good friend i think chandler was like an extra shitty friend yeah i was gonna say can we give chandler the worst friend award yeah i think ross was like a super critical friend when monica was like i'm gonna go you know whatever i think like rachel could be a contender because she like has a tough conversation with monica about like you know you're kind of going out of control here like you need to take responsibility um and then she's also very supportive of ross when he's has to get rid of marcel so but i i also think that phoebe is just a great friend yeah and i don't know why she doesn't do it like she encourages them all to dance the class which is nice but they um she also is just like kind of silly in this episode i don't know yeah i it's hard to not yeah phoebe just plays a very particular subtle supportive role in the whole thing um although part of me wants to give you know fake monika fake monica the award because i just feel like in some ways she deserves it yeah okay yeah i'll do that i'll give fake monica the friend award i mean she is kind of like a monika right so yeah she's one of the six in a sense well we don't need to pick like one of the six for our best friend there's other characters there will be times that i vote janice and or carol and or susan as the best friend you mean anytime janice or janice carol or susan are on the show they'll get the best friend award exactly um okay so that's our show fake monica wins um okay so we'll see you all next week guys i hope you like the show hear us we won't necessarily see you right well tune in next week uh i want to give a big shout out to everyone on patreon who's supporting us and part of our community we're really stoked to have you and it has been a really big help thus far with everything financially even though we're not actually covering all of our costs it's still a really nice uh padding to making sure this project can continue on um and then thank you to everyone who participates in our instagram polls every week because i love them and i hope you do too yeah so as always make sure you um go visit our instagram wtflangie podcast um we post some cool stuff on there as well as our polls every monday if you want to subscribe to our patreon we do our netflix watch parties every monday at 12 15 pm eastern standard time so if ever you want to join one of our fun little netflix watch parties feel free to become a patreon the lowest amount that you can subscribe is two dollars a month and we'd love to have you there um you can find me my name is emily at emilyb yoga on instagram or on my website emilybyoga.com that's emily with an ie not a why and you can find me quinn at quinn kpatrine.com or quinn cave brunette as a handle on instagram twitter and maybe facebook maybe facebook i think it's mindbody with quinn on facebook all right as always keep deconstructing and diversifying the media you consume[Music] okay you