Candice Renoir (2013– ) User Reviews

An absolutely delight

[ljroberts-551-552933 · 9/10 · 3 July 2021]

I love this series. I managed to binge-watch both seasons in 3 days. The cast is wonderful, every single one of them. I was afraid when the first pathologist left, I wouldn't like the replacement. Wrong! The humor isn't forced, but makes you laugh aloud. No, the police work isn't the best, but who really cares. This is much more about the people than anything else.

I know that 8 seasons of Candice Renior were made. Acorn is only showing two of them now. Step it up, Acorn. I really want to see the other six.

Love it to pieces

[MsDJH · 8/10 · 18 October 2022]

To everyone outside of Europe: this is not your average police show, it's, as the title suggests, a show about a woman called Candice Renoir who happens to be a police detective and a mother of four. She's quirky, colorful, chaotic and very skilled at her job. She's also trying to live her life after the divorce from her charming cheat of a husband. She succeeds, trips and falls. She learns and moves on. That's the secret of this show for me: you see her grow, scars included, warts and all. It's not always pleasant for her, but a treat to watch for the excellent cast and a scenery that's to commit a crime for.

Clever and witty, good cast, unusual stories

[Trellismay · 8/10 · 31 March 2022]

Really engaging show with interesting plots; lovely setting in the south of France. Candice is charming and smart; her character is warm and likable and you care about her. She's more than able to take care of herself in crime situations or at work with a bitchy boss. And her work and home lives are complicated, messy, and believable. The supporting cast are very good, and the often snarky, funny dialogue (captions) support their diverse team relationships. The team wasn't sure about Candice at first, but then...

So this isn't as stylish as Call My Agent - after all it's not Paris - but the topics are current and the stories are stand-alone good. Someone mentioned that it's nice to get away from the grey, foreboding, gloom of Brit crime shows; that's true. Candice Renoir can take you to an area of France quite different from Paris or Cannes.

It would be great to have more than the 3 series offered now, maybe that will happen, supposedly there are 8 seasons.

Very enjoyable ....

[PeterHerrmann · 10/10 · 12 June 2021]

I was in the mood for a series that was somewhat light, but which would keep my interest. This police procedural - too often they are heavy and dark - but with some humor, fit the bill perfectly. I love that this police captain's subordinates keep playing her for a blonde bimbo idiot, but she's always 2 or 3 steps ahead of them. I also find Cecile Bois (who plays Candice) to have a mesmerizing face (somewhat chameleon in the sense of constantly changing appearance -just my opinion- and a very likeable - and intelligent - personality). Finally persuaded my wife to watch and she also loves it. So this is my 2nd time through all 5 seasons. We'd like to see Acorn air additional Cecile Bois movies and series in their lineup. Just a superb actress (as is the whole cast in this series).

Can't wait for the new series

[dberulyte-98580 · 10/10 · 29 August 2018]

Finally detective series with some humor and overall optimistic. And NO super science power, NO magic autopsy labs or experts, NOTHING gross. It's such a refreshing sip of water compared to all the dark grey depressive detective series currently released. And yes, there are some other detective series which "should be funny", but none of those have made me laugh out loud, cover my eyes and smile or watch 2 seasons in a row, nearly skipping night sleep. In other words - I'm a fan!

Cecile Bois

[Kirpianuscus · 22 August 2019]

In many senses, it is her serie. From the performances to the exploration of nuances of role. And , sure, for the clothes. A smart serie. For the courage to give something real new in real provocative terms, for be more than reflection of cases but wise reflection of motherhood, condition of woman and something as next level of classic policier \ crime.

A Good Series Until It Wasn't

[TheRGV · 6/10 · 18 September 2023]

I got hooked by the first season of Candace Renoir. The character was different, bubbly and out of date due to her seven or so year absence from police work. A cute hook.

The next few seasons were okay with good story lines solved in an often quirky way by our heroine.

A continuing thread is her love life, or lack thereof. The first guy was believable but soon gone. The second guy, played by the same actor who portrays the detective ex-husband of a detective in a different French show, Tandem, got hokey quickly.

The third love interest is a just plain stupid story line dragged on ad nauseum. I'm nearing the end of Season five and getting ready to give up.

Entertainment is why I watch TV

[javabluz · 10/10 · 5 June 2021]

Here in the states I actually look for foreign detective shows with English CC. The reason the characters are more fleshed out which becomes a greater understanding for how things develop. We see Candice at work, at home and dealing with her kids. Real life is messy and in particular her career. Just because she likes to look good, has sense of humor and displays a quick wit isn't a reason to dismiss her.

I watch TV mystery and detective shows to be enteretained and this moment it time I like to watch a detective series where a Mom with 4 kids, thrust back into work with a goup that doesn't want nor support her can still smile.

Jumped the shark

[slvalenti · 6/10 · 19 April 2023]

I thoroughly enjoyed the first 5 seasons and gave the series an 8 score. The characters of Candice and the other policemen and women, her children and her love interests were well fleshed out and quirky enough to hold interest. Now having watched half of Season 6 available on Acorn I have downgraded my rating to 6. Candice's new love interest has made her character ridiculous. I also have scanned some of the brief descriptions of seasons 7-10, and it appears the stories become even more silly, especially about the interactions between Candice and Antoine. I'm sorry to say I have quit watching the series.

Funny French detective series

[alleypat · 10/10 · 29 June 2021]

It's funny in subtle ways. It's serious about the crime. I like that It's not full of blood and guts. The cast is perfect. As a mom, I can totally relate to Renoir's domestic delimmas interfering with work, and work interfering with her home life. I watch on Amazon Prime with subtitles. I highly recommend this show.

Excellent

[emdhome1 · 10/10 · 6 January 2015]

I am a keen student of the French language so I keep an eye out on the French channel TV5 MONDE for programmes with subtitles as a fun way of building up my French vocabulary.

I happened upon this series and I am hooked! Even though I cannot understand half (or more) of what is going on! It is a great series and the actors are good. It has a light comedic element so it does not rely on the more ponderous gloom prevalent in The Killing or The Bridge for example but it does tackle tough crime stories and it does it well.

Captain Renoir is a single mother of four who has had to return to work after ten years and she is doing it with aplomb despite the withering and undisguised hauteur of her senior officer who is approximately 10 years her junior. Renoir is admirably impervious and her attitude is juxtaposed humorously well, including frequent interruptions from the range of farm animal ringtones her children have assigned to her phone to identify their calls. I am hoping an English channel commissions the series and provides me with the luxury of English subtitles.

Downhill after Candace moves to seaside house

[dklecan · 5/10 · 3 May 2022]

Candace was quirky, funny, unusual. But once she and the kids move to the new seaside, Candace became extremely tiresome. After she says hi to her kids, she sneaks over to the boyfriend's boat (a stupid high school maneuver), she also manages to flirt/sleep with most males in the police dept., jealousy arises with every superior assigned, she can't keep track of her 4 kids and dog (see first and second reasons listed), and changes her hair color and gets rid of all her pink stuff to pass off as "masculine" and not as a dumb/smart blond (the premise of the show). There was never any time for solving murders.

Wonderful Show!

[palmanita · 10/10 · 1 August 2021]

I'm watching Candace Renoir season 2 on Acorn in the United States. Acorn only offers two season but this show has 8 seasons. Where can I watch Seasons 3 to 8? I like the Actors and the way the shows are written! Great show!

Highly addictive!

[claudiaeast · 10/10 · 11 June 2022]

I really like this series, Acorn has 4 seasons with subtitles... and there are 10 complete seasons with an 11th in the works as far as I have read. Candice is a unique and bright character who not only has to deal with her children, her job and some of its frustrations, but her personal life and all the changes that divorce brings. Her relationships with her co workers are well put together. Especially her relationship with Antoine Dumas. They both do an exceptional job of letting the viewer understand their emotions even without knowing the language! I have been frustrated I couldn't find any more seasons with English subtitles especially when they are available with French, German, and Portuguese dubbing. Please Acorn add them all!

Funny police serie.

[denisvachon · 8/10 · 6 September 2018]

Attaching characters, this police series is light and comic. Candice is a modern mom with an active love life. Yet, she is a police investigator with great talent...a sort of Columbo in high heels.

Great series

[psychopro1 · 9/10 · 28 April 2022]

Characters are wonderful. Candace is superb and projects warmth. I was sort series four ended with an unresolved relationship. I cannot find series five although listed on IMDB.

I've just discovered this series....

[vikingtales · 8/10 · 6 July 2023]

So I'm starting from Season1, and so far I'm up to Season 2 and it is a an enjoyable series, Candice Renoir smiles so very much, perhaps at some perhaps slightly wrong moments, but I think that is part of her character, and really nicely portrayed by Cécile Bois, and her smiles is kind of a smile you want to fall into...

Having read some of the other reviews I have to say I'm not there yet, but if this series falls off a cliff after season 4 as some other reviews have stated, I will be quite annoyed, but as we stand at Season 2 so far, I'm liking this a lot, I do hope I won't be disappointed.

The female sitcom-detective cliché

[Doctor_Dexter · 1/10 · 5 June 2016]

Over the last decades, in Europe, we've been swamped with the older female detective character with a family in tow. Some have a weak excuse for a husband to emphasise their strength, many others are independent single mothers who struggle with a demanding job and raising their kids. To be honest, I'm not a fan of the genre. Nothing against strong and independent women, au contraire. I just prefer decent detective work above being sucked into the personal life of a fictional character. If I wanted to see family drama I'd go watch a sitcom. It's beyond me why the detective genre has to be muddled with sitcom-esque fluff like this. (I wouldn't buy it, but it's programmed on TV *instead* of a proper detective). I can accept a modest degree of family life. After all, Beck and Wallander have families too. However, they are primarily detectives, and every episode is about solving the case.

"Candice Renoir" is more sitcom than detectives. And it's just as tacky and kitschy as the name already suggests. A fifty-something big mama, who seems to think she's Brigitte Bardot in the seventies, miraculously becomes the team leader of a small town detective team. She blunders through everything, but 'magically' finds clues in fashion magazines and the likes. She's supposed to portray the strong and independent older woman who can do it all, kids and playing the boss- detective, but it's way to contrived to be the least bit believable. Her character, the rainbow team, the younger cutesy neighbour - who has stamped "love interest" in all caps across his handsome forehead - it's all a stylised light version of a concept we've seen many, many times before. And now it's here again, only worse. Yay.

To be fair, the acting of the team and other characters varies from passable to decent, but the lead actress is really milking the diva character, and as such, overacting horribly in just about every scene.

It might just about do as daytime TV, on a rainy afternoon, but that's probably me being generous.

How do we see seasons 7+

[glen-248 · 8/10 · 22 August 2023]

Charming and funny and interesting. Hoping some service picks up the seasons starting with 7 since Acorn stops at 6. She is like a French Columbo and she is fun to watch. The plots are interesting and playful but they are also varied which allows you to watch a few episodes without getting bored. Her family stays the same but her crew changes from time to time with different personalities and issues for Candice to deal with and that adds to the depth of the series as well. The cases are topical and there is a lot of divorce and love and children mixed in. There is even a story about a dog. I would love to meet her.

Les cheveux de Candice Renoir

[koleary-24152 · 14 January 2023]

The show keeps my interest and has a great supporting cast. However, two things bother me, and they both involve Cécile Bois.

I just want to get my hands on her hair! It looks uncombed, overly processed, and poorly cut. It should be a woman's glory, but hers is a mop, made even worst by the hideous headbands she wears. It detracts from the story line.

Secondly, she smiles inappropriately, as if sharing a secret with herself, at least in the first three season that I have watched so far. Her smile is disconcerting at times when no one else would smile. Are we supposed to take from it that she knows something we don't? If so, it's rather contrived to make her look superior.

LOVED IT UNTIL SEASON 6

[canabera · 10/10 · 7 May 2023]

Agree with Jumped the Shark - great series until Season 6 when everyone become gay, fluid, whatever. Too much of that. Candice also seems to lose her mind - she has become nutty, self centered and unlikeable. The episode where they see themselves as each other was beyond the pale. Were it not for Antoine I would be gone. Acorn is running a lot of shows with "gay/trans" stuff right now and while I have no objection to that, it is being overdone and a turnoff. Good shows like Brokenwood Mysteries, Midsomer, are losing their appeal fast due to this. Since I pay for Acron I just may be finished with Candice after Season 6. Well I hung in there and it's now Season 8 on Acorn which I just finished watching. Same old, same old but I'm still here. I'm tired of all the deep, dirty, dark polic shows and this is a nice break.

Witty, sexy, warm wonderful cop show

[gscroggs · 10/10 · 17 January 2024]

Intelligent, playful... Amazing sexy, gorgeous cast and intriguing plotlines. I love the way the stories blend the personal with the professional.... Makes it easier to identify and believe in Candice and others. Her team take calls her Barbie, but they come to appreciate her insights and intuitions that come from living a full life and not just reading the manual. The director and camera people have an unusually refined sense of aesthetics.... Beautiful lighting and angles. Totally enjoyable.... I don't even mind that I have to read subtitles! With luck and over 80 episodes, I am bound to pick up some French!

Addictive and so French

[lisbethinsydney · 8/10 · 17 December 2023]

Everything sounds better in French and this series has it all: interesting cast and characters, good scripts, intriguing stories, beautiful setting. And they just keep coming. It's addictive.

Cecile Bois is a very likeable lead, easy to identify with as she tries to balance returning to full-time work, and the difficulties she experiences there, with her family and private lives.

Her team was at first openly hostile towards her - her boss still is - but their characters develop and get used to her unusual methods of investigation. Candice is not sophisticated, she can talk to and connect with practically any suspect. She unashamedly uses her woman's intuition a lot of the time to crack a case. Her deputy, Antoine, does a complete about face and later, is most convincing as cop with PTSD in denial. The characters face real conundrums and have to make difficult choices in their lives and we're with them all the way. Being gay is handled with genuine understanding and frankness.

There's also plenty of humour and even an episode when the French do a Life on Mars and head back to 1975.

I could have done without the crude, hackneyed feminist anthem 'Respect' being the title music, but otherwise, I love it.

The secret ingredient is that Candice Renoir, both the character and the series, has heart.

Soooo boring

[susansundaisy · 3/10 · 15 March 2022]

I thought it was ok at first but it really doesn't hold your attention. The actors deserve better writing than this. They mostly just roll their eyes and say exactly what you know they will say. It's a wasted opportunity.

Typical female fluff "detective" series

[qui_j · 5/10 · 9 August 2022]

This is your typical light fluff piece about a female detective who solves all manner of crimes while juggling her home and love life. It has the propensity to become repetitive as the characters never change and all behave predictably. Not great for "binge watching" but more as a series where one uses the episodes as fillers when there is little else to watch. It has the usual hallmarks of French cinema to it with the "older woman, younger lover", older man, younger woman, and lesbian sex, all constant features in any French series! There is also the usual shouting coupled with histrionic behavior, again, a common feature in French cinema. As the series progresses, the story telling becomes worse and it's impossible to relate the conclusion of each episode to the events that lead up to it. Enjoy it for what it is, not as a serious murder mystery.