Friends Season 8
Overview
This is the pregnancy season, and it changes the show's chemistry in the best way. Rachel is expecting, nobody knows who the father is at first (a certain red sweater gives it away), and all the secret-keeping produces some of the funniest episodes of the later years — Joey's face when he finds that sweater alone is worth it. Monica and Chandler, meanwhile, are doing married life surprisingly well, which leaves the emotional chaos to everyone else. The big shock comes late in the run: Joey, of all people, starts falling for Rachel, and Matt LeBlanc plays it so sincerely that it stops being a gag and becomes genuinely sweet. Season eight also has the best Thanksgiving guest spot the show ever managed — Brad Pitt as Will, Ross's old school friend and co-founder of the "I Hate Rachel Green Club," glaring at Rachel across the table. By the finale, set in a hospital waiting room, a mix-up involving a ring sets up one of the great cliffhangers of the whole series. Eight years in, the show could still surprise you. That's rarer than it looks.
