The Last One
The series finale: twins for Monica and Chandler, the wrong airport, and Rachel gets off the plane.
"The Last One" is the series finale of Friends, aired on NBC on May 6, 2004, as the seventeenth and eighteenth episodes of season 10 and the 235th and 236th overall. Written by David Crane and Marta Kauffman and directed by Kevin S. Bright, it was watched by 52.5 million viewers, the most-watched entertainment telecast in six years and the most-watched episode of the 2000s, and it closes the show's longest stories: Ross and Rachel reunite, and Monica and Chandler adopt twins and leave for the suburbs.
Quick Facts
- Series
- Friends
- Season
- 10
- Episode
- 17 and 18
- Air date
- 6 May 2004
- Production
- 176266; 176267
- Writer
- David Crane; Marta Kauffman
- Director
- Kevin S. Bright
- Length
- Part 1: 22 min; Part 2: 22 min
Facts from the source article.
Background
Erica gives birth to twins, a surprise to Monica and Chandler, who expected one child; they name them Erica and Jack. Ross, who has slept with Rachel the night before, is told by her that it was the perfect way to say goodbye, and Gunther beats him to confessing his love at Central Perk. Rachel leaves for Paris; Phoebe drives Ross to JFK, where they discover her flight leaves from Newark, and she stalls the plane by phoning Rachel about a problem with its "left phalange".
Ross tells Rachel he loves her at the gate, she boards anyway, and at home he finds a message in which she gets off the plane - and then she is standing behind him. Joey and Chandler find the chick and duck trapped in the foosball table and Monica breaks it open. The next morning the six leave their keys on the counter of the empty apartment and go for one last coffee. It was filmed on January 16 and 23, 2004, on Stage 24 in Burbank, renamed the Friends Stage afterwards; the cast cried for real, and only one ending was ever shot. Robert Bianco of USA Today called it as close to living up to the hype as fans could hope.
The closing music over the empty apartment is Jefferson Airplane's "Embryonic Journey"; Pearl Jam's "Yellow Ledbetter" plays after Rachel first boards.
More in Episodes & Story Arcs
Elsewhere in Friends
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