If The Best Man, Then Friends from College

People love to make grand generalized statements about the higher learning experience. College is a conundrum. It is never internalized the same from generation to generation or from one student to the next. The Best Man and Friends from College are hilarious depictions of people who have met lifelong friends in college and those who should probably distance themselves from their college tribe. It would be easier if these groups of friends named themselves like the Flossy Posse in Girls Trip or the Goonies, or Divas like Will’s mother and aunts in the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Alas, they do not, so you will see the word friend a lot.

The friends in The Best Man have not all been together in a while. They are reuniting for the nuptials of Lance (Morris Chestnut) and Mia (Monica Calhoun). We get to see the chaos that spawns from that monumental event. Simultaneously Harper’s (Taye Diggs) novel “loosely based on his college experience” has transitioned from the developmental stage to being a tangible paperback book his friends are desperate to read. You enjoy the tension filled preparation for the wedding day, sexual and otherwise. By the end of The Best Man, you are left wondering how these friendships have faired after what they thought to be true imploded in their faces. Yes, there was a sequel 14 years later, but we are discussing the impact of the classic first film. In Friends from College, the group of 6 pals are also coming together for the first time in awhile but it is a permanent reunion. Every member of the crew is married except for Nick (Nat Faxon) and Marianne (Jae Suh Park). For the squad in The Best Man, Lance and Mia are the first of the 6 friends to get married. I am not including Shelby (Melissa De Sousa) as a friend because most of the group cannot stand her. Even Murch (Harold Perrineau), her boyfriend and her connection to the friend group, has had enough of her by the time we get to the wedding. It is really entertaining to see how the spouses of the Friends from College gang react to and interact with the group. Ethan (Keegan Michael-Key) and Lisa (Cobie Smulders) are the members of the friend group who married one another. Max (Fred Savage) and Sam (Annit Parisse) are married to the outsiders Felix (Billy Eichner) and John (Greg Germann), respectively. They are not even minutely amused by the adolescent behavior of the Harvard grads. It tests their marriages and makes the viewer question if there is a positive effect that they gang has on one another or is it all counterproductive. I personally think that if it is twenty years after college and you can still have fun like you did when you were there, then there is something special about that friendship. Moderation is key though.

I realized in writing this I did not know what college The Best Man friends went to, after a thorough search of my memory and the internet I have decided that it must have never been specified.

There a few characters from The Best Man and Friends from College whose personalities and situations are similar. If you loved Quentin, (Terrence Howard) which everyone with a sense of humor did, you would appreciate Marianne. Quentin and Marianne are free spirits, who do not succumb to the pressures of having a conventional job. They are often mocked and/or judged by their friends for not having a 9-5. Marianne is far more under-estimated than Quentin, though. The moments where she shuts down the slick comments from her friends will make you snap your fingers in agreement. Harper and Jordan’s (Nia Long) attraction and hesitance to act on it, is remarkably like Lisa and Nick’s dynamic with one another. There were several missed opportunities for both pairs of friends. Ethan is an author just like Harper is. The difference is Ethan is trying to formulate a 2nd novel and does not seem to have any direction on how to do so. Max works for a publishing company and the two friends begin working together which is often a recipe for unproductiveness and dissension.

That is one of the many conflicts for the Friends from College crew. Their lives are too entangled. For one, Felix becomes Ethan and Lisa’s fertility doctor. The second entanglement I am unable to fully disclose but it is what connects The Best Man and Friends from College more than anything else. The betrayal and decades long secret that lies under the covers of the Harvard gang is unconscionable.

Friends from College only got 2 seasons and they are both still on Netflix. I probably have never been more surprised that a show did not get picked up for another season. The show will shock you on a consistent basis. You will laugh surprisingly loud, and I mean really loud. There are those heartbreaking moments that you know had to happen, but you are still affected by. Just like how you tear up every time Lance is crying while he says his vows and pictures his best friend having sex with his wife. I say “you”, but I mean that I tear up every time. I will be honest; you will be disappointed by how Friends from College ends but only because you will not want it to end. The best thing I can offer is a suggestion for you to put your imagination to work and make up your own season 3. And maybe 14 years from now we can get a Friends from College movie or reboot, so we do not have to wonder anymore, just as we got The Best Man Holiday in 2013.