was around long enough to have some parallels and flip some of the main characters’ most memorable moments, and it did exactly that with one mistake involving Ross (David Schwimmer) and Rachel (Jennifer Aniston). Although focused on a group of six friends trying their best to navigate adulthood in New York City, the series ended up giving more attention to the roller-coaster romance between two of them: Ross and Rachel, who had known each other since high school and got involved in an on-again-off-again relationship throughout the series.
Of course, they weren’t each other’s only partner over the 10 seasons of
, and at the beginning of the series, Ross was going through a divorce and was surprised by the news of his ex-wife, Carol, being pregnant with his child. Years later, Ross and Rachel had a daughter, and on both occasions, they went through a funny mistake, though it was flipped when Rachel was pregnant, adding another parallel to the series.
When Ross learned that Carol was pregnant, she was already in a relationship with Susan, which added more tension to the already complicated relationship between Ross and Carol.
Still, Ross did what he could to be present during Carol’s pregnancy, and when Carol and Susan learned the gender of the baby, Ross didn’t want to know as he wanted it to be a surprise. However, Rachel, who knew the gender of the baby, accidentally revealed to Ross that Carol was having a boy, “ruining” the surprise for Ross. Seven seasons later, Ross decided that they would wait to learn the gender of his and Rachel’s baby, but as he thought Rachel already knew and was just pretending not to, he called the doctor to ask and learned they were having a girl, which he let out during a conversation with Rachel. Ross accidentally got his “revenge” for that one time Rachel revealed Carol was having a boy, but Rachel was more excited about having a girl than the surprise being ruined.
The arrivals of Ben and Emma in Ross and Rachel’s lives were key moments in their stories, and although they appeared a couple of times and were even part of the stories of some episodes, suddenly forgot about them, especially Ben. Ross’ son shared some quality time with the rest of the group in a couple of episodes, such as when Monica accidentally hit him in the head while playing and when Rachel taught him a couple of pranks that got out of control, but
shortly before Emma was born, and there wasn’t much mention of him either. Ben’s disappearance was so abrupt that it made way for a popular theory that claims Ross lost custody of Ben, so he didn’t get to see him as often as before and he didn’t visit aunt Monica and the rest anymore.As for Emma, given that both her parents are part of the main group in , she appeared more often and spent more time with Monica, Chandler, Phoebe, and Joey, but as she was very young, she wasn’t a big presence in the series. When Rachel was going to move to Paris at season 10, she mentioned that Emma would stay with her mom while she settled in Paris, but she ended up staying in New York City and finally formed a family with Ross. Ross and Rachel ruined Ben and Emma’s gender reveal to each other, and weirdly enough, their children’s presence in the series also mirrored each other, as their appearances decreased and they never even meet on screen.
