Friends Watch Party Recaps (Season 4): Real-Life Pregnancies & a Wedding | EPISODE 4
The One with the Season Recap
We’re back in Montauk where we left off, and this season, the friendships we’ve watched build over three years really get tested. Joey and Chandler rally around Monica in her time of need, Monica and Rachel prove that even breaking girl-code, and a date with a high school has-been, won’t break them. Meanwhile, Ross and Phoebe end up feuding over a cat who may or may not be Phoebe’s mom. Feelings get hurt when Ross chooses his best man. And let’s be honest, Ross’s “sound” was a real test of everyone’s endurance. On the flipside, Joey makes a huge sacrifice for Phoebe. Oh, and Chandler takes a trip to Yemen.
Ross and Rachel have just managed to find their way back to friendship and even get back together, until… “we were on a break.” This certainly makes things more challenging when they try to move on, especially after Rachel accidentally sets Ross up with her boss’s niece.
Work and personal lives collide, too: Joey learns about museum politics and Chandler dates Rachel’s boss and ends up stuck in the fallout. Later, he tries to play matchmaker for Rachel, but he really shouldn’t quit his day job. Monica and Phoebe go into business together, and things look promising. However, when Monica gets offered a new job, it puts pressure on both the partnership and the friendship. Meanwhile, Joey has to figure out if money matters more than loyalty.
One of the hardest tests comes with Chandler, Kathy, and Joey’s love triangle, although the time the guys get robbed is a close second. Chandler and Kathy may have been the better match, but it was brutal to watch what it did to his friendship with Joey. Honestly, Chandler was lucky the punishment was just sitting in a box.
But you know what truly puts a friendship to the test? Writing a holiday song, sure but also the ultimate showdown: the trivia quiz. “The One with the Embryos” became an iconic moment in “Friends” fan culture for so many reasons, and we’ll be digging into all of them shortly. Not only did we learn more about our favorite friends, but it also marked a big turning point in Phoebe’s story.
Season four also takes the gang (minus Phoebe) out of New York for the first time, with the London episodes delivering some huge surprises. But before we get there, let’s talk about “The One with the Embryos.”
“The One with the Embryos”
If any episode so far shows why this show works, it’s this one. The premise is simple: Monica and Rachel and Joey, and Chandler argue over who knows who better in a winner-takes-all quiz, and the stakes just keep getting higher. Thanks to this episode, we now know what name appears on Chandler and Joey’s TV Guide. How many towel categories Monica has. And even the name and profession of Joey’s childhood imaginary friend. Fun fact: some of these answers were still being written as the episode filmed in front of a live studio audience, with the writers switching lines to get bigger laughs.
But it’s not just about how funny it is. The quiz puts their friendships to the test, showing these characters under pressure while still demonstrating why this dynamic works. This is one of the best ensemble (again, minus Phoebe) performances, with everyone getting their moments to be clever, competitive, and endearingly ridiculous. It really is everything “Friends” does best wrapped into one 20-ish-minute episode. It also feels like a game night we could have with our own friends. In fact, the writers pulled inspiration from a real-life friend group, not to mention the quirky eccentricities of people they know, which makes it feel all the more real. Unlike most sitcoms that like to resolve everything neatly at the end of the episode, the writers weren’t going to let Monica and Rachel off the hook this time.
It’s incredible that what started as a bottle episode to save production costs became one of the series’ most beloved episodes. TV Guide called it “Friends at its peak, a lightning-in-a-bottle gem,” and we’d have to agree. The cast even went for a second round during their reunion, though the stakes weren’t quite as high this time around. And yet, this quiz is technically the secondary plot; after all, the episode is called “The One with the Embryos,” which brings us to our next point.
The One Where Lisa Kudrow’s Pregnancy Gets a Storyline
Last season, Phoebe’s family expanded when she discovered her birth mother and that she had a half-brother. Little did she know her family would keep growing, and she’d play a key role in making that happen. Early in season four’s production, Lisa Kudrow shared some exciting personal news: she was expecting. The creators didn’t want to rely on cliches like oversized props for the coming months, so the only solution was to write the pregnancy in. The big question: how do you make this work for Phoebe?
Thankfully, Phoebe’s unconventional life provided the perfect answer. By now, we knew her well enough to not even bat an eyelid at the plan, and her chemistry with Giovanni Ribisi and Debra Jo Rupp made the setup even more endearing. Adding the triplet angle was just the perfect cherry on top.
This storyline balanced the antics of the trivia game while giving us exactly what made us fall in love with the series: heart, humor, and character. Phoebe’s speech to the embryos remains a genuinely special moment, one that dug its way into fans’ hearts and has stayed there to this day.
Another thing that was interesting about this storyline was how it explored the subjects of fertility and surrogacy in a way that certainly wasn’t common back then. Phoebe is really made to consider the full weight of what she’s about to do, but it’s done totally without judgment, just the plain, hard facts… and a puppy. As the pregnancy progresses, the reality of her choice begins to sink in. If “Friends” taught us one thing, it is that families come in so many forms, and the reality is blood isn’t what matters, it’s who’s there when the rain starts to fall.
Interestingly, Phoebe wasn’t the only actor whose pregnancy shaped the show. Helen Baxendale, who plays Emily, became pregnant between seasons and chose not to travel between the U.S. and the U.K. Her pregnancy was hidden on-screen, but that’s a story for our next episode. Similarly, Kudrow couldn’t make the trip across the pond because of her pregnancy, which meant no London baby for Phoebe, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
“The One with Ross’s Wedding” (& Everything That Leads Up to It)
As we’ve seen before, the production team always looked for ways to cut costs, a hard lesson they learned back in season one. But this was the first time they were properly taking the gang out of New York, and shooting in London came with a hefty price tag. Apparently, it was Channel 4, the British network that aired the show, that suggested bringing it overseas, and then it was up to the team to think up a good reason for everyone to head to London.
Ross unexpectedly finds himself taking Rachel’s place at the opera with Emily when she thinks she has a chance with her crush, Joshua. They hit it off, and before we know it, they’re engaged. This led to the first proper clips episode as Rachel wrestles with how to RSVP to the wedding. No doubt a clever way to pinch the purse before splashing out in London.
For starters, the guest star budget must have been huge to bring in icons like Jennifer Saunders, Olivia Williams, June Whitfield, Hugh Laurie and even Fergie. Richard Branson also makes an appearance, reportedly ad-libbing his lines since he hadn’t memorized them. Tom Conti, who plays Emily’s father, is another big name in British comedy. But believe it or not, the crew had originally hoped for an even bigger international star: Paul McCartney. He wasn’t available, though apparently he told the team he was flattered by the offer. We guess not everything can always “Come Together.”
Of course, these episodes are also best remembered for two of the biggest plot twists in the sitcom’s history. Apparently, when Monica was revealed from under the covers, the actors had to pause almost 30 seconds for the audience’s reaction to settle. And it was the overwhelmingly positive fan response that made the creators realize maybe this could be more than a one-night thing. It even scored in the top three in TV Guide’s greatest twists of all time.
The other twist comes at the end, when Ross says the wrong name at the altar. The writers were still figuring out the conflict when they landed on this idea, reportedly inspired by a slip of the tongue from David Schwimmer earlier in filming. It became arguably the biggest cliffhanger the show ever teased, and fans would have to wait until the season 5 premiere to see what happened next.
Season four certainly upped the stakes for everyone. It pushed the gang to their limits, testing loyalty, love, and what it means to be family. Friendships faced unexpected challenges, yet their bonds remained unbreakable. By now, the series had hit its stride, surprising us at every turn and taking us to places we never could have imagined. You could really feel that the audience mattered to the creators; this was who they were writing the show for. Season four felt like a turning point, and we couldn’t wait to see where they’d take us next.
What’s your definitive “Friends” season 4 moment? Let us know in the comments
