Emily in Paris: Season 1

Reputedly a comedy drama, the latest from the creator of Sex and the City is little more than an excuse for Lily Collins to espouse the American way.

Even if Emily in Paris is a bit misguided and features familiar narrative beats to the point it is something we've all seen before — and it definitely is; hell, you can even argue it's the same show Star always produces — romance ultimately never goes out of style.

As travelogue and fashion inspiration, Emily In Paris makes for an enjoyable watch—but the familiar plights of its rom-com heroine are easily outshone by the gorgeous, glittering surroundings.

Emily in Paris is almost disarmingly pleasant and frictionless, free of real stakes beyond whether or not Emily will have to quit her burgeoning Instagram account to please her stern and stuck-in-her ways boss.

Emily is written as an irritating go-getter who relentlessly pursues her colleagues’ approval and believes wholeheartedly that she deserves it. If Collins delivered an Emily who was likable — well, that would be a failure.

Despite my mean-girl enmity toward the protagonist, Emily in Paris is strikingly watchable, an escapist confection brimming with easily digestible plots, costumes and characters. Turn off your brain and crank up Candy Crush.

It is a Darren Star show, which means it’s fun and stylish and only partly steeped in reality. It is unabashedly on the side of its plucky heroine, played by Lily Collins, who dresses like Carrie Bradshaw and is self-involved like Carrie Bradshaw and is also charming, so you will root for her regardless of her flaws, like … Carrie Bradshaw.

As created by Darren Star (the mastermind of lush fantasies including “Younger” and, yes, “Sex and the City”), this series is a delight that poses the question of what it really means to grow up, against a truly inviting backdrop.