‘Emily In Paris’ season 4 part 1 looks better but feels emptier

Emily in Paris season 4 part 1 est arrivé! The new season of the Lily Collins series from Darren Starr takes us to even more fabulous French locales and glamorous parties, and the costumes are definitely getting better with each season. But can we say the same about the season as a whole? Mais, non!

There’s a scene this season where Luc (Bruno Gouery) is handling a luncheon for the luxury watch and jewelry client Boucheron, and the clients tell him that “Something is missing” from the whole experience. And Luc spins it into the theme of the event to save face. Well, let’s just say that’s the theme of the entire season 4 of Emily in Paris. Something is missing, indeed. The usually effervescent, escapist haven feels lacking this time around.

With 5 of the 10 episodes out, it is difficult to definitively tell you if this season is going to go anywhere good. Yet with a start that’s fizzled out like flat champagne, my expectations are low and my disappointment is high for now. 

You’ll remember that at the end of season 3, Camille (Camille Razat) breaks her engagement with Gabriel (Lucas Bravo) and blames his feelings for Emily instead of confessing about her affair with the Greek artist Sofia (Melia Kreiling). Camille walks out, Alfie (Lucien Laviscount) gets mad and breaks up with Emily, and she’s left behind, only to be told by Gabriel that Camille is pregnant with his child. A mess! 

The other supporting characters are also teetering on the brink of messes of their own. Mindy (Ashley Park) finds out that she and her ex-boyfriend Benoit’s (Kevin Dias) band have been selected for Eurovision, while she’s still figuring out her precarious relationship with her new boyfriend Nicholas (Paul Forman), the son of luxury fashion conglomerate JVMA’s owner Louis de León (Pierre Deny). Louis’ complicated associations with Emily’s boss Sylvie Grateau (Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu) are hinted at, as he decides to finance her husband Laurent G’s (Arnaud Binard) new club in Paris, in exchange for Sylvie’s silence. And while Luc is dating Marianne (Laurence Gormezano), the Michelin inspector who could get Gabriel’s restaurant L’espirit de Gigi a star, Julien (Samuel Arnold) is considering leaving Agence Grateau for a place that values him.

Season 4 Part 1 picks up all of these threads but doesn’t spin anything new out of it. The characters are making the same silly choices, everything’s predictable, and the professional world just magically falls in place for Emily Cooper, without a word of French spoken by her. Usually, this predictability is the comfort factor of this show. But the zest, the zing, the effervescence that existed in the previous seasons can’t be found in this one. 

It almost feels like the actors are just cruising through it because their characters aren’t challenged enough to deserve a “performance.” Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu’s Sylvie Grateau, a favorite, almost gets a strong arc with a #MeToo exposé storyline, but it’s so quickly wrapped up, that it doesn’t have much impact. Ashley Park’s Mindy has an interesting start this season with the whole Eurovision contest angle, but not much happens there because her love life once again takes precedence. As for Camille, I want to steal all her outfits, and give her a piece of my mind, because, girl, all that drama with the baby, the baby daddy, and his girlfriend is just not a good look. She used to be so badass!

All the improvements that earlier seasons made on the first—a meatier arc for supporting characters like Mindy and Sylvie, the focus on Emily learning French instead of bending the locals to her American will, and a scandalous love life—seem to have relapsed. And character arcs have grown stagnant. But there’s another major problem this season.

By breaking the season into two parts, Netflix snatched away the best thing Emily in Paris has going for it. This show is made to binge-watch, to enjoy in its entirety before you have much of a chance to think too hard about what it is you’re watching. That frothy pink bubble of escapism that Emily In Paris provides is its appeal, and when Netflix temporarily bursts that bubble for us mid-season by splitting everyone’s favorite binge into two parts, yanking us back to reality. And the reality is that the show really has been going around in circles. 

It used to be easier to defend Emily In Paris because, for one, it was entertaining, and two, I could see the growth, even if slow and barely discernible, in Emily as a character. But now, especially after the previous season, it feels like the show doesn’t know whether to break the mold of its genre and do something truly bold with what they’ve got or to stick to the clichés that have always worked so well. For now, it seems like they’re choosing the latter. That would’ve been fine, except they’re unable to sustain that engagement.

I used to be one of the defenders of Emily and Gabriel because that chemistry in season 1 was palpable. But this season, it falls flat. Maybe because we have seen all the ways that this relationship can go. That spark has fizzled out because there’s no passion in the yearning they feel for each other. Gabriel continues to not have any character development and he and Emily seem so chilled out about their feelings that when they come together now, it’s a hollow echo of what they meant to each other and to us in the past. There’s a cheeky shower scene and a gorgeous carriage scene between them. But it made me feel nothing!

So far in the season, the characters (especially Camille, Alfie, and Julien) have taken one step forward and two steps back, relapsing into their old relationships, old feelings and insecurities, and old jobs. And no amount of incredible fashion, hair and makeup, or gorgeous production design—which BTW only keep getting better with every season!—can cover up that feeling of emptiness that this season is giving off. It’s no longer serving even the comfort watch entertainment and joy that the earlier seasons did.

I’ve always thought Emily In Paris was cleverer than we gave it credit for, because despite all the criticism aimed at it, the show knew what its true target audience wanted, and was giving it to them. I’ve rewatched the first season of the show more times than I can count, whenever I need a pick-me-up that I could binge over a few hours. But I cannot say the same for the later seasons, which are running out of ways to keep the escapist bubble seeming sustainable. Especially when it’s split into two parts.

Still, I’m going to wait and watch for the second half of Emily In Paris season 4 because, like Emily Cooper, we’re nothing if not persistent. Hang around for a review of p art 2, s’il vous plaît?