Emily In Paris was originally meant to land on Paramount Network, which would have made it an outlier at the home of Yellowstone, but as TV junkies are aware, the show works immensely well with the Netflix bingewatching format. Emily Cooper’s breezy European adventures are a welcome escape, and the fourth season finale did the unthinkable by daring to suggest that Emily would really leave Paris for Rome. Officially, this would be for an Agence Grateau assignment, but we know exactly how work usually goes on this show.
Sylvie even teased Emily being adept at “mixing business with pleasure,” and the suggestion was that Emily was growing more serious about her budding relationship, which presents questions about her French on-and-off boyfriend. How much more will (in the words of Mindy) Emily keep “stamping her passport”? Let’s talk about what to expect from the fifth season.
Cast
Let the love triangles flow. Quadrangles? Perhaps even larger. As the fourth season revealed, Emily (Lily Collins) had moved on from Gabriel (Lucas Bravo) to Marcello (Eugenio Franceschini) but had also seemingly held out brief hope of reuniting with Alfie (Lucien Laviscount). Now, Alfie did reveal that he was getting serious with a new girlfriend, but the fourth season finale included Gabriel’s dismay over Emily moving to Rome, and one overlooked moment of that scene was how Alfie called Emily the “greatest girl in the world.” Oh?
Deadline has confirmed that Lucien Laviscount will return as Alfie while noting that he “will have a larger presence in the upcoming fifth season as the actor who portrays him, Lucien Laviscount, has made a deal to rejoin the cast as a series regular.” Not too long before that update arrived, Laviscount revealed that he had dinner with series creator Darren Star in Milan, and “I think [the show is] gonna flip things on its head, which is cool.”
Then there is the flip-flopping going on with Gabriel. Last fall, actor Lucas Bravo revealed that his contract ended with the fourth season, and he seemed on the brink of departing the series. He told The Times, “Life is short. It takes five months to shoot this series. Do I want to sacrifice them by telling something that does not stimulate me? … I do not want to be a part of a cog that does not tend to take the intelligence of viewers into consideration.”
Bravo admitted to Indiewire that he was “frustrated with the direction” of Gabriel, but something has changed because Variety recently reported that Bravo “is definitely on track to star in Season 5 as of now and his Michelin-rated restaurant will be one of the backdrops of the upcoming season.”
Additionally, Marcello (Eugenio Franceschini) will be present, so the action should bounce back and forth between Paris and Rome. As a result, we can count on seeing Sylvie (Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu), Mindy (Ashley Park), Julien (Samuel Arnold), Luc (Bruno Gouery), and Antoine (William Abadie) again.
Plot
Emily In Paris is such a frivolous show that the plot (aside from the cast that predicts love triangles) actually matters very little, and since that is perfectly alright (not every show has to be complicated, you know?), we shouldn’t expect the show to suddenly change routes in the fifth season.
With that said, location is everything. The fourth season finale set up the possibility of this becoming Emily In Rome, which feels like a temporary diversion, although the show has amazingly sparked discussions from international leaders. That includes French President Emmanuel Macron musing aloud that Emily should stay in France because “‘Emily in Paris’ in Rome doesn’t make sense.” Whereas Rome Mayor Roberto Gualtieri did some good-natured goading over Emily seemingly enjoying Rome too much.
The location will drive the relationship drama of the series and therefore the plot. Remember, Gabriel visibly lost his sh*t and pressed Mindy to tell him where Emily went in Rome, so he’ll show up and cause friction with Marcello, and ideally, Emily will tell Gabriel to stuff it. We do know that Emily will be in Rome for at least six months to help Marcello’s family business after Sylvie decided to launch a temp office in the city. Whether or not the fifth season picks up at the beginning or end of that period remains a mystery.
Release Date
Emily In Paris is throwing out vibes for a 2026 return.
Trailer
In lieu of a current trailer, this blast from the semi-recent past highlights Gabriel’s pretty awful fourth season. He was tied to Camille (via a fake baby) and still attempting to string Emily along while treating her like garbage, and it’s easy to understand why Lucas Bravo wasn’t thrilled by that being his entire arc with occasional mentions of a Michelin star quest.
