Friends spinoff Joey never stood a chance — Here's why

Friends premiered in 1994, and it continues to be a phenomenon even after all these years despite the show having ended over 20 years ago. Considered one of the greatest sit-coms of all time, what made Friends special was the chemistry that its lead cast shared. Together, Courteney Cox (Monica), Jennifer Aniston (Rachel), Matt LeBlanc (Joey), David Schwimmer (Ross), Lisa Kudrow (Phoebe), and Matthew Perry (Chandler) were a sitcom dream team.

This group of six friends is what made the show magical. While the characters definitely had potential as individuals, they worked best as a team. They balanced each other out and so none of the characters stood out as too overbearing or too stupid.

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Given how popular Friends was, it was natural for the makers to consider a spin-off. With the way the show ended, Joey remained the only character who could not find a happy ending, and therefore it seemed logical to create a spin-off based on him. In theory, the idea also seemed sound because Joey was a popular character in Friends whose unique quirks made his stupidity look adorable.

However, in reality, the spin-off titled Joey did not work at all, and the show was cancelled after two seasons due to poor ratings.

Joey could not pull off the magic of Friends

The primary reason Joey failed to make a mark was that Matt LeBlanc’s character had to do the whole thing on his own. In a lot of cases, sitcoms work because of a group of characters as seen not only in Friends, but also in other popular shows like How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory.

When there is a bunch of characters running a show, the responsibility of being funny does not fall on a single person. Therefore, if a show is focused on only one character, as was the case with Joey, the character needs to be really well written, which, unfortunately, wasn't the case with Joey’s character on his solo show.

In Friends, Joey was enjoyable because he was surrounded by his five friends who allowed him to be his own stupid self. A lot of jokes were made at his expense but he did not mind and neither did the audience, as that was what made his character special.

However, in Joey, his character seemed even more stupid, which became unbearable after a point and with no other lead character to balance out his ditzy energy, the spin-off was destined to be doomed.

Moreover, it is important to remember that Friends never focused excessively on one character, and it was always about the group. None of the characters, regardless of their popularity with the audience, had to carry an episode alone.

However, in Joey, the entire spotlight was on this single character and his shenanigans somehow did not strike a chord with the audience, leading to poor ratings and eventual cancellation of the show.

When a popular character from one of the most popular sitcoms is picked for a spin-off, it might become difficult to keep up with the audience expectation as they have been seeing the character in top form for long enough, and hope that the same would continue. The same thing happened with Joey and right from the beginning, it didn't stand a chance to achieve the level of success that Friends did.

Friends can be streamed on Netflix.

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