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Original poster

"Fat" Monica in Friends isn't even fat

412 replies

TallGirl24 · 15/02/2025 22:24

As per title. Rewatching all the old Friends episodes. How in the name of the wee donkey was this a recurring joke? She's basically normal sized but beside some very slim costars. I know it was a different time but it is so jarring to watch now.

OP posts:
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17
NattyTurtle59 · 15/02/2025 22:59

AnneLovesGilbert · 15/02/2025 22:30

She’s overweight. The face doesn’t watch the body but both still show someone with an overweight or obese BMI.

The show has aged horrendously, it’s homophobic, racist, the kid completely disappears and you’re not meant to notice, it’s not good.

Frasier, from the same era, is still perfect. And no fat suits.

Ffs - when did people get so boring? It's a TV show, if you don't like it don't watch it - end of.

Ohwtfnow · 15/02/2025 23:03

The script made her sound like she was absolutely enormous and talked about having to get clothes made specially for her. But in person she was just kind of normally fat - nothing like she is described.

NooNakedJacuzziness · 15/02/2025 23:04

I love Fat Monica

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SnickersAndRipples · 15/02/2025 23:04

NattyTurtle59 · 15/02/2025 22:59

Ffs - when did people get so boring? It's a TV show, if you don't like it don't watch it - end of.

Show quote history

Exactly, it’s a comedy and it’s funny

Purplecatshopaholic · 15/02/2025 23:08

I loved Friends back in the day. And fat Monica was defo fat!

AngelicKaty · 15/02/2025 23:09

CaptainFuture · 15/02/2025 22:27

She's 'normal sized' for now when an 18 is the average size.
Doesn't mean she's a healthy size.

18 isn't the average UK women's size now - 16 is.

NinaNobody · 15/02/2025 23:12

She was fat!

I mean it was a time when Geri Halliwell and Renee Zellweger were labelled fat so she isn't as big as she would have to be NOW to be fat.

But doesn't that just indicate that we've all just gotten so used to seeing obese people that this woman in a fat suit isn't seen as 'properly fat'

WooleyMunky · 15/02/2025 23:13

She was fat.
Friends is about as funny as child leukemia.

TwoRobins · 15/02/2025 23:14

She was fat. We need to stop kidding ourselves for our own sakes.

ExercicenformedeZ · 15/02/2025 23:14

Friends has aged very poorly imo. I don't even think it was all that funny when it aired, let alone by today's standards. One thing that has always bugged me about it as well is that Rachel is supposed to be the 'hot' one when Monica is so much more beautiful. I actually wonder if that isn't why they had Monica have a 'fat' backstory. Also, I kind of see what the OP is saying. While Fat Monica was fat, there is no way someone of that size would have that wobbly face. She is fat but not OMG humungous.

Eldermilleniallyogii · 15/02/2025 23:16

She was overweight and overate.

TwoRobins · 15/02/2025 23:16

OP how fat would a person have to be for you to consider them fat?

MegTheForgetfulCat · 15/02/2025 23:18

Needmorelego · 15/02/2025 22:35

Ben isn't seen in the last couple of seasons.
He is spoken of but not seen.
It's weird because he would have been at his little sister's 1st birthday party. Why wasn't he there?

Show quote history

It's probably to do with logistics of arranging for the child actor to attend filming. Easier when they're babies but gets harder once they reach school age.

daffodilandtulip · 15/02/2025 23:19

DontCallMeKidDontCallMeBaby · 15/02/2025 22:48

But she wouldn't need clothes specially made for her, or any of the other horrible jokes they make about her.

Wasn't it the school band uniform they had ‘specially made’? If you think of the flashback to when she and Rachel visited Ross and Chandler at college, she would have been bigger than the majority of 17/18 year olds in the 80s. I can’t imagine they just stocked school uniforms in that size.
I agree that jokes are awful, and wouldn’t be made now. But I don’t think it’s unbelievable that they wouldn’t make school clothes in that size.

I was at school in the 90s and I had a couple of friends who were just really tall, not even particularly of a significant weight, and they couldn't get the special school items, they had to wear workwear.

MegTheForgetfulCat · 15/02/2025 23:19

And the jokes about fat Monica are unkind, but she's hugely fat.

zzplec · 15/02/2025 23:22

Bear in mind that in the flashbacks she would have still been at high school, so 16 or 17 years old? So she would have gained a lot of excess weight during her childhood/teens, which would have made her fatness more notable.

Butchyrestingface · 15/02/2025 23:22

SwerveCity · 15/02/2025 22:57

Wow a lot of seriously skinny people in here.

I'm a porker and I think she was fat. Especially when compared to her present-day Friends self and that of her female friends.

ShelleyCarpenter · 15/02/2025 23:23

Definitely fat

ThisFluentBiscuit · 15/02/2025 23:24

Needmorelego · 15/02/2025 22:35

Ben isn't seen in the last couple of seasons.
He is spoken of but not seen.
It's weird because he would have been at his little sister's 1st birthday party. Why wasn't he there?

Show quote history

Marta Kaufmann addressed this. She said that they didn't feature kids prominently because they thought the target audience wasn't interested in kid-dominated storylines. For me, she was right.

I think it's a great pity they didn't make a new show, with the same cast, about life bringing up kids in the suburbs. Plenty of humour in that - especially with Janice living next door! 😂 It could have just run and run.

MegTheForgetfulCat · 15/02/2025 23:24

VenusStarr · 15/02/2025 22:45

I'm sure when the actress playing Daphne was pregnant in real life, they had her in a fat suit and there were jokes about how big she was.

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Yes, wasn't there a running storyline about her overeating so that the baby bump could be explained as Daphne gaining weight? I don't know how they resolved it when the actress had the baby though!

ThisFluentBiscuit · 15/02/2025 23:26

Butchyrestingface · 15/02/2025 23:22

I'm a porker and I think she was fat. Especially when compared to her present-day Friends self and that of her female friends.

Show quote history

Porker here too, and when the show was on, it never occurred to me to think Monica wasn't fat. She so obviously was.

Bridget Jones in the first film, though, definitely not fat. She was heavier in the second.

MegTheForgetfulCat · 15/02/2025 23:27

ThisFluentBiscuit · 15/02/2025 23:26

Porker here too, and when the show was on, it never occurred to me to think Monica wasn't fat. She so obviously was.

Bridget Jones in the first film, though, definitely not fat. She was heavier in the second.

Show quote history

Bridget Jones isn't meant to be fat, though. The whole point is that she's not fat but thinks she is.

TheodoraCrumpet · 15/02/2025 23:28

There's nothing remarkable about Fat Monica's size. For the time she'd have been more noticeable as the fat kid, but the fat jokes were way over the top.

2021x · 15/02/2025 23:29

She is fat, very much so. Her BMI would have been well over 30.

Her weight loss however was incredibly unrealistic, with surgery and the “medication” available at the time

Moveoverdarlin · 15/02/2025 23:29

TallGirl24 · 15/02/2025 22:42

OK so maybe I exaggerated. But the way they go on about her weight you'd think she was way bigger than she is. The episode I'm watching shows her in the fat suit standing beside the men and she's about the same size they are. Some of those pictures definitely look worse, I agree on that. But she wouldn't need clothes specially made for her, or any of the other horrible jokes they make about her. It's crazy to think the was acceptable and a recurring theme through all 10 seasons. I agree, it's not aged well although it makes me nostalgic!

You have exaggerated. She is fat. She’s supposed to be a teenager in those scenes, so yeah it’s not normal for a teenage girl to be the same size as a man. She probably WOULD have needed teenage ‘trendy’ clothes made for her. It would have been the late 80s early 90s when Monica was a fat teenager. No one was a size 20/22 back then. Clothes sizes were pretty much 8,10,12,14,16.

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