Emily in Paris is arguably one of the worst shows I’ve seen this year and, yet, I still find myself obsessing over the question: when will we get a season 2?
Starring Lily Collins as vapid protagonist, Emily Cooper, the Netflix original series follows a young, American woman who works at a marketing company in Chicago. Her boss, played by the incredible Kate Walsh (shout out to my fellow Grey’s Anatomy fans), had been planning to go abroad to Paris to work with a French company, Savoir. However, when Emily’s boss finds out she’s pregnant and cannot go to Paris, she offers the opportunity to Emily instead.
And here is where our journey with basic, cringey Emily begins. Beware for some possible spoilers.
The series was created by Darren Star, AKA the creator of iconic shows like Sex and the City and Younger. And Emily in Paris pulls out all of the similar “girl moves to a big city and jumps through hoops and succeeds anyway,” cliches. Yet, I can’t help but imagine an icon like Carrie Bradshaw cringing at Emily, too.
Still, the 10-episode, half-an-hour per episode series is easily bingeable.
It is fun, despite how annoying and privileged Emily is. It is a world viewers can vicariously live through, as we imagine a life where we meet best friends just by sitting on a park bench, Paris bakeries line every corner and love interests appear out of thin air. In a world of coronavirus, less of an ability to travel, less of an ability to live and take risks and meet new people, Emily in Paris feels oddly refreshing, the perfect escape in spite of its drawbacks.
Emily is a 20-something who can still somehow afford a designer wardrobe inspired by Audrey Hepburn moments (again, iconic?). Love interests fall for her the minute they meet her (AGAIN DESPITE HOW CRINGE SHE CAN BE?). She takes selfies and random pictures of Parisian children and somehow becomes a successful social media influencer? She meets one friend through literally zero effort and, boom, they’re immediately best friends? She somehow dazzles her colleagues through extremely basic social media work?
Where is this world, because I want in.
Despite the cringe, the berets and the ease with which Emily literally gets a new life in a foreign country without trying, I still found myself on the edge of my seat, wondering who Emily would meet next or how she would navigate her boss desperately trying to set her up to fail (lowkey Miranda Priestly vibes except Miranda Priestly is a million times more iconic) or by accidentally kissing her best friend’s boyfriend.
Is Emily annoying? Absolutely. Every time she opened her mouth I would find myself covering my eyes because it was too cringey to bear. Should the best friend of the show be the main character? Of course, it would make the show one thousand times more interesting. Does a man like Gabriel exist in real life? Arguably, no, but I still wanted to see what would happen if a man like Gabriel did exist.
This show is problematic, there’s no doubt about it. Emily embodies privilege, and mirrors this through literally everything she does and says. Yet, I still found myself loving every second of this show. And part of this is because it was fun to hate on Emily while still thinking about how extraordinary it would be to live her life: to move to a foreign country on a whim and thrive in every part of your life the way you never have before. Dump the crappy boyfriend, wear the clothes from your Pinterest board and the best part—wake up in Paris everyday: it’s a dream life.
This show allows us to live in a dream—a dream through a lens we hate, but a dream, nonetheless.