Friends - The Complete Series Collection (2006)

Friends - The Complete Collection

We are very pleased with this collection. We just started watching the show on TV.The station kept skipping from season to season about every five days.It is great to see the whole show without commercials and without missing any. Your price was very good, and they arrived before the suggested delivery date. August 30, 2008

Great Show, BAD QC!

I love the show so much. But this DVD set disappointed me! The package looks very new but once I opened it, finger prints and scratches on the discs were already there. The major problem is - only 18 discs out of the 40 discs in the box are 100% playable. I have returned the 1st set and now testing the 2nd set, seems the very same problem are still there. For all the Friends Fans: Don't buy it! August 27, 2008

Can't miss--must buy--need to own

Wow! I love this set. The bulk of my comments are on the show itself. I watch it for hours at a time and love seeing the forgotten bits that stations have cut out to squeeze in more commercials. How in the world did these wonderful producers create such a heart-felt, funny, HYSTERICAL show with 10 great years of viewing with so many story lines which caused such a great following? All other comedies pale in comparison. (I don't watch any others now. Friends has ruined it for me. All current ones are cardboardlike, mean-spirited, snide and poorly acted and written.)

Friends will be in reruns forever.

The most amazing thing to me is that through marriages, divorces, giving birth and a whole host of important life events going on with the actors, EACH actor was in EVERY episode always bright and in character. No one was the "star" or the "extraneous one." Though Ross and Rachel's relationship was the most prominent story of the show, each character had indepth story lines with significance and lasting effects that were not overshadowed by other story lines. Every actor had funny stuff to say in every episode.

And we know these people, don't we? Phoebe has goofiness but great insight, Chandler's the class clown but so intelligent, Joey's got both sex appeal and innocence, Rachel is vulnerable but probably grows the most, Monica is so obsessive/compulsive but has great common sense, Ross epitomizes professionalism and integrity. They're all charming and all have their amusing idiosyncrasies. The only "flaws" I saw in the entire series were Chandler's faky tears during his proposal to Monica and Courteney Cox-Arquette was too clearly pregnant at the end when it had been firmly established that she and Chandler couldn't make a baby. (Why couldn't they "write in" her pregnancy like they did Lisa Kudrow's?) I have my favorite and least favorite characters but the difference between the 2 is negligible. (OK, Chandler is my favorite.)

The characters never got boring or pigeon-holed. Didn't they mature and get more interesting and complicated season by season?

Of course, the racial exclusiveness poses a problem. The whole group is too white and too affluent (despite Phoebe's crummy early life and everyone's periods of unemployment). And they are impossibly beautiful.

But overall, this is one of my top 5 TV series of all time.

A great reason to get this set is the special features which are really fun. Hearing the creators and writers talk through entire episodes is cool: you hear their angst over portrayals that might come off as too negative or out of character or about settings that are just very difficult to film. These include the Thanksgiving football game and when Ross yells at Rachel for being late. (And you find the meaning behind every element in Monica and Rachel's apartment set. Who knew the LR table holds a picture of "fat" Monica and thin Monica?)

Regarding the packaging--I even love the DVD's without the little booklet. (Maybe I don't know what I'm missing.) I've read all the previous comments (have you noticed that any whining is about discs missing or not playing, except for one or two. People are always more apt to comment if it's about something negative than positive.) I say to those who complain about not being able to find a specific episode: MAKE YOUR OWN LIST! You're gonna watch every disc and episode anyway. So just sit down and watch them.

Quite an enjoyable, loveable and engaging show. It gets 2 thumbs up, hands down! August 25, 2008

greatly disappointed

I never received the DVD as promised despite several attempts to contact this seller. He promised the item by the end of the week twice and never delivered. I even paid for expedited shipping and no item six weeks later. I ended up asking for a refund. August 21, 2008

Make sure all your disks work asap

This is a hard once since we are talking about 40 something disks and hours and hours of viewing. Several of the disks had problems skipping etc and the finally would not play at all. So we paid big bucks to have all the disks together and we still have to hang on too all the old VHS tapes and other DVD's to actually have the whole show. Of course the seller ignored all of our attempts to perhaps fix the problem. August 17, 2008

More reviews at Amazon.com ...