Emily out of Paris? France's love-hate relationship with the hit series

The cliché-laden series about marketing manager Emily (Lily Collins) from Chicago, who is looking for love, success and adventure in Paris, has not only made friends in France. The second half (episodes 6 to 10) of the fourth season has been available on Netflix since Thursday.

"Problems at all levels"

Parisians have been rolling their eyes at the fact that the series shows a fairytale version of Paris rather than real life since the Netflix romance began in 2020. Even though the series by "Sex and the City" producer Darren Star is far from the first tale of Paris as a postcard idyll and romanticized place of longing.

The magazine "Harper's Bazaar France" believes that the series is more like a comic strip than a realistic depiction of the fashion world or even Paris. "Problems - they exist on all levels," writes the magazine and judges that the strange constellation of characters full of outdated clichés annoys French and Americans alike.

But the fact that in the fourth season the French women are portrayed as being so in love with wine that they even drink during pregnancy is likely to be seen as an unnecessary and pointless affront, especially in France. And the countless product placements, which led "GQ" magazine to describe the series as "one giant billboard", are also likely to be more easily digested in the hugely commercialized USA than in culture-conscious France.

Welcome greetings look different

Before the start of filming for the new season, anti-Emily graffiti appeared in the middle of Paris. "Emily is not welcome" was written on the wall of the apartment building where Emily lives in the series. "South Paris doesn't belong to you" and "Fuck off, Emily" were also reportedly written.

The frustration is probably less about the countless stereotypes or the naive main character in the series, but more about the many tourists who visit the show's filming locations. Several providers now offer tours to follow in Emily's footsteps through Paris.

And although the show has been criticized by Paris City Hall - watch out! Poorly insulated buildings are idealized here! -, the city itself lists on its website where fans can find the most important addresses from the series.

Paris is a magnet for tourists and Emily fans

The cinema website Allociné says that Paris did not necessarily need the additional advertising. After all, the city on the Seine is one of the most visited cities in the world. In 2022, 24.5 million tourists were drawn to Paris. Leaving French people out of the equation, Americans made up the largest group at 7.9 percent.

It should be clear that not everyone in Paris is interested in hordes of holidaymakers driving up housing prices in the city center and clogging up sidewalks. And anyone who has watched even a few episodes of "Emily in Paris" can guess that travelers from the USA with their way of life, which is very different from French savoir vivre, are perhaps not everyone's favourite guests.

But perhaps Paris can now breathe a sigh of relief. Because Emily is moving to Bella Italia in the second part of the fourth season. It is possible that Paris and Rome, which is also already groaning under masses of tourists, will soon be able to share the attention of series fans.

Show also a success in France

Trouble with tourists and clichés or not - the French can't quite do without Emily. After all, the current season, which was watched almost 20 million times worldwide in its first week, not only reached number one in the Netflix charts in the USA, but also in France. What a thing!

Whether this is hatewatching, i.e. people watching a show that they actually find totally stupid, for example to get angry about the lack of French subtitles or French words like "cauchemarque" that were probably accidentally made up during translation, or whether the light fare and escapism behind the curtains are also catching on in France or even Paris, remains to be seen.