The 40 most popular french drama TV shows, ranked. Click any show for ratings, reviews, trailers, and where to watch.


Wakfu
2008 · FR
Follow Yugo and his friends Amalia, Evangelyne, Tristepin, Ruel and Az as they try to rescue the world of Wakfu from destruction.


Tomorrow Is Ours
2017 · FR
The story revolves around the people of Sète, France. Their lives are punctuated by family rivalries, romance and scenes from daily life, but also by plots involving police investigations, secrets and betrayals.


Ici tout commence
2020 · FR
This television drama series is centered around the prestigious culinary school of renowned chef Auguste Armand. The show follows the lives of students and staff as they navigate the challenges and pressures of the culinary world—delving into their personal and professional lives, revealing secrets, rivalries, and complex relationships.


Lupin
2021 · FR
Inspired by the adventures of Arsène Lupin, gentleman thief Assane Diop sets out to avenge his father for an injustice inflicted by a wealthy family.


Plus belle la vie
2004 · FR
The daily lives of the inhabitants of "le Mistral", an imaginary neighbourhood in the Mediterranean port city of Marseille, where wealthy families cross paths with the less than rich.


Kaamelott
2005 · FR
Kaamelott is a French comedy medieval fantasy television series created, directed, written, scored, and edited by Alexandre Astier, who also starred as the main character. The series, which originally ran for six seasons (referred to as 'books'), ran from January 3, 2005, to October 31, 2009, on M6. In this offbeat account of King Arthur's quest for the Grail, virtually every journey, battle or adventure is stopped dead in its tracks by the knights of the round table's most worldly traits: cowardice, greed, idiocy or misplaced chivalry. As a consequence, instead of epic adventures we are treated with the characters' pragmatic and anachronistic take on each and every event in the Grail legend, true to the purest sitcom tradition.


Plus belle la vie, encore plus belle
2024 · FR
No overview available


Les Mystères de l'amour
2011 · FR
Direct sequel to the cult French TV series “Hélène et les Garçons”.


The Big Valley
1965 · FR
The Big Valley is an American western television series which ran on ABC from September 15, 1965, to May 19, 1969. The show stars Barbara Stanwyck, as the widow of a wealthy nineteenth century California rancher. It was created by A.I. Bezzerides and Louis F. Edelman, and produced by Levy-Gardner-Laven for Four Star Television.


Doc Martin
2004 · UK
Doc Martin is a British television comedy drama series starring Martin Clunes in the title role. It was created by Dominic Minghella after the character of Dr. Martin Bamford in the 2000 comedy film Saving Grace. The show is set in the fictional seaside village of Portwenn and filmed on location in the village of Port Isaac, Cornwall, England, with most interior scenes shot in a converted local barn. Five series aired between 2004 and 2011, together with a feature-length special that aired on Christmas Day 2006. Series 6 began airing on ITV on 2 September 2013.


Murders in...
2013 · FR
Murders in... is a collection of French-Belgian police TV movies taking place each time in a different French city and region.


Find Me in Paris
2018 · FR
When Lena Grisky, a Russian Princess and student at the Paris Opera Ballet School accidentally time travels to present day, she must quickly adapt if she hopes to keep her secret and hide from the dangerous Time Collectors.


The Bureau
2015 · FR
Within the DGSE (General Directorate for External Security), a department called the Office Of Legends (BDL) forms and remote pilot the most important agents of the French intelligence services: Clandestine. Immersion in hostile country, their mission is to identify individuals who may be recruited as sources of information. Operating "under caption", that is to say in a fabricated identity from scratch, they live for many years in a permanent duplicity. Our hero just returned from a clandestine mission six years in Damascus. But contrary to what is required by safety rules, he does not abandon his legend and the identity under which he lived in Syria, thus putting in danger the whole system.


Riviera
1991 · US
No overview available


Tootuff
2001 · FR
The boisterous teenager with the flamboyant blonde forelock is the megastar of the school playground. Surrounded by his loyal gang of friends—led by Manu—he never shies away from a bit of mischief, pulling out all the stops to catch the eye of the lovely Nadia.


A Guy, a Girl
1999 · FR
This series tells the daily life of a couple : Jean and Alexandra. From easy cases: in bed, in the living room, in the kitchen, by phone... to rare ones: lost on an island or in the country, in Hong Kong, during a wedding... Jean and Alexandra's life is not exactly a long, quiet river.


At Theatre Tonight
1966 · FR
At Theater tonight is a TV show broadcasted from 25th August 1966 to 21st September 1985. The show is broadcast plays recorded in two or three days, during public performances at the Théâtre Marigny on the Champs-Élysées, or sometimes Edouard VII theater.


Maigret
1991 · BE
The pragmatic, reserved and refined Maigret investigates murders in his singular unhurried manner and inevitably discovers the truth.


The Little Murders of Agatha Christie
2009 · FR
French adaptations of the stories by Agatha Christie.


Versailles
2015 · FR
The story of a young Louis XIV on his journey to become the most powerful monarch in Europe, from his battles with the fronde through his development into the Sun King. Historical and fictional characters guide us in a world of betrayal and political maneuvering, revealing Versailles in all its glory and brutality.


War of the Worlds
1988 · CA
Humanity must resume its war against the Martians when they revive after decades of hibernation following their defeat in the 1950s. The fate of Earth may very well rest in the hands of a small yet courageous band: astrophysicist Harrison Blackwood, paraplegic computer wizard Norton Drake, microbiologist Suzanne McCullough and military man Paul Ironhorse.


Hélène et les Garçons
1992 · FR
The sitcom follows Hélène Girard and her friends in their life as students.


Spiral
2005 · FR
This gritty crime drama set in the dark underbelly of Paris follows police officers and lawyers as they investigate and prosecute crimes. Throw any romantic notion of Paris out the window. Crime is dark. The legal system is darker. This is Spiral.


Profiling Paris
2009 · FR
Chloé Saint-Laurent is a profiler and works with a police team to solve murders in Paris. She's very sweet, she wears very colored clothes and a huge yellow bag. She looks like a little girl who need a doll, but she's very smart and a very good profiler. Step by step, she fit in the team and her colleagues, very reserved at first, became her best friends.


SKAM France
2018 · FR
Skam France follows five french girls and their friends as they go to high-school.


War of the Worlds
2019 · FR
When astronomers detect a transmission from another galaxy, it is definitive proof of intelligent extra-terrestrial life. The world’s population waits for further contact with bated breath. They do not have to wait long. Within days, mankind is all but wiped out by a devastating attack; pockets of humanity are left in an eerily deserted world. As aliens hunt and kill those left alive, the survivors ask a burning question – who are these attackers and why are they hell-bent on our destruction?


A French Village
2009 · FR
The stories of the people of Villeneuve, a fictional subprefecture, in the Jura, in German–occupied France during the Second World War.


Seconde Chance
2008 · FR
No overview available


Alice Nevers, le juge est une femme
2002 · FR
No overview available


The Traveller
2019 · FR
Hunting down killers to help bereaved families get justice is more than just a job; it’s a duty for Thomas Bareski, a retired, hotshot police detective eager to reopen unsolved murder cases in a mission to find the culprits.


Constellation
2024 · DE
When a fatal accident occurs on board the International Space Station, a lone astronaut makes the heroic journey back to Earth, only to discover key pieces of her life—including her young daughter—have changed.


Largo Winch
2001 · US
Largo Winch is a television program based on the Belgian comic book series of the same name by Philippe Francq and Jean Van Hamme that first aired on January 26, 2001 in France on M6, and May 3, 2001 in Germany on ProSieben. The show lasted two seasons. Guest stars included Kim Poirier, Vernon Dobtcheff, Elisha Cuthbert and David Carradine.


The Cage
2024 · FR
Dreaming of going pro, a young fighter struggles to be seen until an unexpected face-off lands him a shot at the big time — and a ruthless rivalry.


Crossbow
1987 · FR
Crossbow follows the adventures of William Tell and takes place in the 14th-century in Switzerland. William Tell and his son are imprisoned by the tyrannical Gessler. As Governor of Austria, Gessler plans to stop the Swiss uprising. Having split the apple on his son's head with his crossbow, much to Gessler's chagrin, there is no stopping William Tell's legendary strength and skill.


Cassandre
2015 · FR
No overview available


Drops of God
2023 · FR
While the world of wine mourns the death of Alexandre Léger, his estranged daughter, Camille, learns his extraordinary collection is now hers. But before she can claim her inheritance, Camille must best Alexandre's protégé, Issei, in a test of their senses.


The Returned
2012 · FR
In the shadow of an enormous hydraulic dam, the lives of the residents of a small French town are changed to their core when hundreds of previously dead relatives all return home on the same day.


Paolo
2026 · FR
Follow working-class Paolo's unsettling intrusion into the life of Téophane Tolbiac, a young and up-and-coming politician.


The Art of Crime
2017 · FR
Fired for insubordination, PJ Antoine Verlay, good cop but a blood strand and having difficulty working as a team, is attached to the OCBC (Central Office for the fight against Traffic in Cultural Goods) thanks to the intervention of the commander Pardo, his friend who becomes, therefore, his new superior. A clever investigator, but a stranger to everything related to culture, Antoine will have to work with Florence Chassagne, renowned art historian, who lives, speaks and breathes culture, to the point that - fruit of her great imagination - it happens to her in the midst of daydreams, to see and talk to the great artists who have disappeared as if they were familiar to her.


Bref
2011 · FR
A lost thirty-something shares his struggles, from failed relationships to boring jobs and pointless nights out. Stuck in his routine at first, he slowly evolves, searching for meaning in his life. In short, he's just trying to live.
French television has moved from a broadcast-dominated tradition into a strong export position, particularly in crime and spy drama. The results tend to be shorter-run and more cinematic than Anglo-American equivalents.
Television drama is where the medium made its case as film's equal, from the cable era's antihero epics to the current streaming wave. Long-form gives character change room to actually happen.