Netflix’s ‘Emily In Paris’ Is Riddled With Clichés, But So Easily Binged

Created by Sex and The City Darren Star, Emily In Paris sees a young American woman landing her dream job in Paris. With just 10 half-hour episodes, you’ll be left wanting more, no matter how cliché the show is about the French capital city.

Emily (played by Lily Collins) is an ambitious marketing executive, who unexpectedly gets the job in Paris her boss was meant to take. She leaves Chicago and her boyfriend, hoping that a long-distance relationship will work with the spreadsheet she made detailing their availabilities.

Upon arrival at the French luxury marketing company named “Savoir,” Emily’s new colleague, Julien (played by Samuel Arnold), and new boss, Sylvie (played by Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu) are surprised to find that she does not understand nor speaks French. Fortunately for Emily, everyone seems to be fluent in English. She finds though her new colleagues and boss to be less than welcoming. Emily is determined to win over her French colleagues, and especially her Devil Wears Prada-esque boss Sylvie.

Her task in this new job is to bring an American point-of-view as regards to their social media strategy. Emily is quick in imposing her way of doing things, even sending a list of “Thou shall not” to her new colleagues, and is somehow baffled as to why no one likes her at the office. Emily is also quick to make stereotypical judgements, but she too is judged for being the pushy and overly ambitious American. While at first she feels very lonely, she soon meets friendly faces: Mindy, a nanny from Shanghai, her neighbor Gabriel and his girlfriend Camille, who just so happens to also be the heiress to a Champagne dynasty.

Emily In Paris is riddled with clichés and stereotypes about Paris and Parisians. Anyone who has lived in Paris will tell you that a “chambre de bonne” is not a one bedroom apartment, but rather the tiniest one-room studio you’ve ever seen, that includes also your kitchen and bathroom (if you’re lucky, most often the toilet will be shared and outside your apartment). And if you mistake your door with your neighbor’s, that person will most likely not be a handsome young man named Gabriel (Lucas Bravo) who just happens to speak fluent English, but most likely a rather angry person who’ll shout at you for destroying their door lock, and for being an idiot.

The series has managed to enumerate every possible cliché about the French capital and its inhabitants, from the chain-smoking, the perception of Parisians as mean and arrogant, overly flirtatious men, the extra-marital love affairs, dog poo (well, that is actually a real problem), the delicious pain au chocolat, red berets, to the mention of films such as Ratatouille and Moulin Rouge.

But, of course, the series is not meant to be realistic. It is a fantasy about moving to Paris, arguably one of the most beautiful cities on the planet. This series reminded me in that respect of the film Midnight in Paris. Both the film and Emily In Paris show a postcard view of the city, a picture-perfect representation of the city during the summer months, in which all the characters seem to be super rich, and the metro with its unique aromas does not exist.

Amongst all the clichés and overused storylines, there is one character that definitely stands out of this series. That’s Mindy’s character, played by Ashley Park. Emily meets Mindy in a park during her lunch hour by chance. Mindy first came to Paris to study and is now working as a nanny. The two girls soon become close friends. Mindy’s story is so intriguing that I wished this series was actually about her and not Emily’s predictable encounter with the city of lights and its male inhabitants.

Emily In Paris is an overall entertaining and extremely watchable rom-com, and the perfect show to dream of Paris. The series has already jumped to fourth place on Netflix’s Top 10 shows in the U.K.