Review of “Emily in Paris”, Season 4, Part 2: Netflix’s two-part model doesn’t work

“I don’t know whether to thank you or blame you for everything this year, but it wouldn’t have been the same without you,” Sylvie (Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu) says to Emily (Lily Collins) at the Christmas party for the employees of Agence Grateau.

That's right, Emily in Paris Season 4's second part begins with a vacation-themed episode, and Emily has apparently only been in Paris for less than a year, a fact that's easy to forget given the show's nebulous timeline. (It's also especially easy to forget how little time Emily actually spent in the City of Light, since there's no visible sign of Kate Walsh's heavily pregnant Madeline this season.)

Sylvie's words and the red and green flashing “Emily in Paris” intro threw me so off balance that I was convinced I'd accidentally missed something. So I went back to episode 5 and rewatched the final scene, where Gabriel (Lucas Bravo) celebrates his restaurant, his girlfriend Emily, and the baby he thinks his ex-girlfriend Camille (Camille Razat) is going to have (remember, she's not actually pregnant).

Somehow I didn't miss anything. The show suddenly shifts from fall to winter, which requires the most spectacular and impractical selection of fur and feather outerwear and accessories I've ever seen.

At the same time, there's also a change in the characters driving the series forward. While Part 1 spends more time with Alfie (Lucien Laviscount), Luc (Bruno Gouery), and Laurent (Arnaud Binard), Part 2 introduces three entirely new characters that dramatically change the direction of the series. Between the new dramatic winter wardrobes and the new faces shaking up everything in Emily's world, Part 2 feels like an entirely new season, not the sequel to one. This abrupt jump is also further proof that Netflix releasing new seasons in two parts doesn't work.

For some series, like Bridgerton, the two-part model is annoying and detracts from the viewing experience, but the series still feels coherent. For Emily in Paris, however, it completely changes the viewing experience.

Already, some of the subplots in Part 1, like Mindy (Ashley Park) singing at the Eurovision Song Contest and Sylvie's Me Too moment, don't have enough story space. When you combine story arcs that aren't fully developed with several new characters and squeeze everything into two blocks of episodes, the result is an incongruity that left me with whiplash as Part 2 progressed.

That's partly because Emily in Paris is already saturated with subplots (a quality that makes it fun to watch), but mostly because the series is designed to be binge-watched rather than drawn out. Splitting the season into two parts makes the series feel chaotic in a way that teeters on the fine line between entertaining drama and overwhelming rambling.

This inconsistency is especially evident in episode 6, since so much happens after the Christmas party. Unsurprisingly, Emily's plan to go home to Chicago for the holidays falls through, and she begins part 2 of this season the way she ended part 1 – as the fifth wheel between Gabriel and Camille, even though she's the one actually dating Gabriel.

This is not unexpected. Nor is Emily's realization that she will always be second to Camille as a friend because she is having a baby (which she doesn't really want, but Emily doesn't know that). Instead, she finds herself on the sidelines once again on the slopes of the French Alps, wondering how she will fit into Gabriel's life if he wants to start a family with Camille.

Her literally The mountaintop revelation changes the direction of the season so drastically that it's another reason why Part 2 feels like an entirely new season, and that feeling is only heightened as the other characters' subplots unfold. Sylvie and Laurent's relationship takes a turn when a surprise houseguest comes to visit. I won't give away how this houseguest's presence plays out and affects everyone at Agence Grateau, but it's a new character and a twist I wasn't expecting. The addition makes everything that happens in Paris this season even more dramatic (which is apparently possible).

The drama and work become so overwhelming that Emily eventually decides to take a vacation and fly to Rome. Of course, being Emily, both work and personal drama follow her to the Eternal City, because her work, her friendships and her love life can never exist in isolation from one another.

Wherever Emily goes, Sylvie, Luc, Mindy and Julien (Samuel Arnold) must follow. And I don't want to give away the revelations and plot twists that turn some friends into lovers and some lovers into friends again, so I'll just say that the new setting of Italy was a delightful change of pace.

As expected, the last of the five new episodes ends on a cliffhanger, and it's so much fun that I've been looking forward to Season 5 even more than Season 4. I know it's going to be a mess; I just hope Netflix decides to package it differently so the series remains a delicious treat rather than a hot mess.