Season 8, Episode 17 · 2002-03-07
The One With The Tea Leaves
Ranked #71 out of 236 episodes in Friends
At Central Perk Phoebe does a reading of tea leaves which tell her that she's soon going to meet a man of her dreams. In fact, she does meet a man she keeps constantly bumping into, however, he turns out to be a bit creepy to say the least. Meanwhile, after their conversation, things between Joey and Rachel are still weird and Joey keeps finding excuses to avoid her. As a result Rachel comes up with a rather crazy problem at work to draw him into a conversation. She doesn't realize though, how far he's willing to go to help with her fake problem after their conversation is over. Also, Ross tries to retrieve his favorite shirt from Mona's, interrupted when she returns home with a date.
Absurdist humor drives a middling episode sustained by character-based cringe rather than punchy setups.
Directed by Gary Halvorson · Written by Steven Rosenhaus, R. Lee Fleming Jr.
Humor Index
37.4
2.0
6.8
7.1
7.9
“The One With The Tea Leaves” ranks #71 of 236 Friends episodes on the Humor Index, scoring 76.2 — Great. The episode packs 40 scored jokes at 2.0 per minute, averaging 6.8 on craft and 7.1 on impact, with Monica landing the most laughs. Every joke is ranked below with its individual craft and impact scores.
Get weekly comedy rankings
Join comedy fans getting new analyses, score drops, and the funniest moments each week. Free, no spam.
Top Jokes
All Jokes — 40 analyzed
Show all ↓
The part you fast-forward
Our scorer flagged 15:20-16:00 as the stretch with the fewest or weakest comedic moments. Everything else lands harder.
Top Episodes — Friends