RACHEL GREEN IS MORE THAN SHE SEEMS

Oh no molly's back at it again with the Friends analysis blog posts, yep that's right i am so sit tight because i'm about to analyse Rachel Green and tell you why she is so much more than she seems. Why she is deep, caring, loyal and very intelligent. I will also probably inevitably rant about feminism and women being deep, multi faceted beings. It's late and I can't sleep.

Okay so as a child i definetly bought into the idea that Rachel was no more than a self obsessed, dramatic girly girl who can at times be very shallow. The show offered me a very simple narrative and it was easier to consume it, asking no questions than digging deeper into her character. Bearing in mind i was only a kid so wasn't quite into the whole feminist analysis thing yet. On the surface, she is presented as a very simple person, she's your textbook girly girl, spoilt upbringing and disgregard for others. But her character development is one of the most dramatic throughout the ten seasons and i truly believe this needs talking about.

So yeah at first she is all of those stereotypical and bad things, she is selfish and spoilt, she is rude and self obsessed. But why? She's had a very strange upbringing, in a household with parents who have fallen out of love, sisters who she never felt connected to and a rich father who showed her affection in the way of money and gifts. She joins the start of the show as the result of that childhood and those attributes of her personality are used as the butt of jokes. She's thrown into the deep end after having a life where everything was done for her, she has to suddenly be self sufficient. She runs away from a soon to be loveless marriage because she knows she deserves better. She feels suffocated and wants to see what else life has to offer, already this shows us that she has more depth to her than we understand. She has conviction and courage.

Through the help of her friend Monica, she has to start a fresh. She has to cut her family connections off, cut financial stability off for good and start to live independently. She has to find a job with no experience working and she has to start being a proper adult. She starts working as a waitress and very quickly shows no real promise in that field, she is earning less than enough to survive and is hating her job. But still, she continues. She keeps working hard until she eventually quits to pursue something more meaningful, that can lead to a future career. She has the courage to leave a some what stable job and sends off her resume to hundreds of different places. She begins to work her way up the career ladder in low paying jobs, showing little to no signs of relating to her dream career in fashion.

What's courageous about all of this is that it's assumed she's doing this, well in to her twenties. By the time season one starts and all the friends lives are being followed, they've finished college we know that. So they must be at least mid twenties? Not sure on this. BUT, for Rachel to be doing all of this beyond the age where it's normal, takes conviction and integrity. Most people go through this during the college age and come out with some clue as to what they want in a job. But Rachel has taken a lot longer to work her passions out and has taken so much longer to go for them. She must feel embarrassed and confused, compared to others her age. But still she continues.

As well as her obvious career developments, she starts to change character. She becomes more kind and considerate. She starts to show loyalty to the group, helping them out when she can. She's thrown into a new friendship group, of people she doesn't know and still manages to thrive. She learns lessons from each of the friends and develops her character in the process.

There are so many moments on her journey where she could give up, she has no money and doesn't feel like she's getting anywhere. She becomes a very relatable character in that she could very nearly pull the plug and forget everything, she could ring her dad and get money again. But she doesn't, she becomes strong and independent. And even though she hates her crappy job and crappy life, its her crappy job and her crappy life. She keeps going because she appreciates hardwork, and she appreciates that she finally has things of her own for a change. Her conviction knows no bounds in my opinion.

Her hardwork pays off because she finally lands a brilliant job working for a fashion department. She works hard and keeps climbing that career ladder. I mean she gets jobs at Ralph Lauren and Bloomingdales! Not because of name connections or money but because she works hard and earns it. Now the ongoing joke remains that she's girly and cowardly, that she's self obsessed and a drama queen. And whilst i think she has courage, strength and compassion for others in bucket loads. Even if she is all of those things, she proves that she can be overtly stereotypically feminine and successful. She proves that she shouldn't be ashamed of her femininity, she becomes a confident woman in herself and in her abilities. And whilst i will never agree that she made the right choice with Ross, i believe that she is an incredible, inspirational woman with a heart of gold. I honestly believe there is so much more to her character than the narrative of the show suggests and i love her a lot. 

Speak soon,

Molly

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