French Titles (Translated) of American TV Shows
January 11, 2008 · Print This Article
If you are anything like us, you are always curious to see how people outside the U.S experience American TV shows. One of the things that have always fascinated us is how they translate some of the TV show titles we take for granted. So in the spirit of enhancing our minds, we have embarked on a journey of discovery of the quirky titles from our French Speaking Friends:
ABC
Desperate Housewives is “Beautés Désespérées” in French which means….
Desperate Beauties ( Well, I am not sure if they are all beauties but I like this better. Plus a litteral translation “Femme de
Maison désespérées” would sound unappealing in French)
Boston Legal is “Boston Justice” in French which means….
Boston Justice (Literally. Not very sexy but it does the trick)
Grey’s Anatomy is “Dr. Grey, leçons d’anatomie” in French which means…..
Dr Grey, Lessons in Anatomy ( Close Enough I guess)
CBS
Cold Case is “Cold Case : affaires classes” in French which means….
Cold Case: Closed Cases (My theory behind this name choice is that Cold Case “Dossier Froid” doesn’t mean anything in French)
Criminal Minds is “Esprits Criminels” in French which means….
Criminal Minds ( Well that was easy to Translate)
Without a Trace is “FBI - portés disparus” in French which means….
FBI - Missing in Action ( This is kind of weird because the litteral French translation” Sans Aucune Traces” would have been a cool title but oh well!)
CSI is “Les Experts” in French which means….
The Experts (Ok, well this one is easy to explain. It turns out there is no real equivalent of a CSI unit in France. So it was just easy to call them what they really are: Experts)
And so for similar reasons, CSI: Miami is called “Les Experts: Miami” and CSI: NY is called “Les Experts: NY” in French .
Numb3rs is “La Loi des nombres” in French which means….
The Law of Numbers (Pretty Decent Title in my opinion)
Two and a Half Men is “Mon oncle Charlie” in French which means….
My Uncle Charlie (Now that is kind of a creepy title, don’t you think? I guess the literal translation “Deux Hommes et Demi” would have been even more unappealing to French speakers)
NCIS is “NCIS: Enquetes Speciales” in French which means….
NCIS: Special Investigations (Again there is no french equivalent for NCIS so they had to find a way to explain it away)
The Unit is “The Unit - Commando d’élite” in French which means….
The Unit - Elite Squad (The litteral translation “L’unité” has so many meanings in French that it would have confused folks so they explained the title instead)
CW
One Tree Hill is “Les Frères Scott” in French which means….
The Brother Scotts (Ok, I am not quite sure about this. I guess it’s hard to translate locations but still…)
Everybody Hates Chris is “Tout le Monde Deteste Chris” in French which means….
Everybody Hates Chris (Simple and elegant)
FOX
House, M.D is “Dr House” in French which means….
House, M.D (I know, Duh!)
Family Guy is Les Griffin in French which means….
The Griffins (The litteral translation “Pere De Famille” doesn’t really get the essence of the title so I guess this is as close as it gets.)
The Simpsons is “Les Simpson” in French which means….
The Simpsons (Once again, Duh)
NBC
My Name Is Earl is “Earl” in French which means….
Earl (Ok, Ok , I’ll stop with the obvious translations)
Law and Order is “New York District” in French which means….
New York District (Well this is a case where the French title actually means less than the US Title)
Law and Order CI is “New York - Section Criminelle” in French which means….
New York - Criminal Department (Well that makes more sense I guess)
Law and Order: Special Victims Unit is “New York - Unité Spéciale” in French which means….
New York - Special Unit (Okay, I give up. This is not the Law and Order Franchise anymore)
Scrubs is “Toubib or not toubib” in French which means….
Doc Or Not Doc (That is not a cool title at all. I guess the literal translation “Vetements Medicals” was not any better. The worst part is that they are trying to be smart by making a play on words so it sounds like “To Be or Not To Be.” Wow, how desperate are you for a good title?)
ER is “Urgences” in French which means….
ER (I lied. I can’t help myself.)
So as you can see, sometimes French Titles are straightforward (Like Everybody Hates Chris) and other times, it throws you for a curve (Like CSI). So let me know what you think. Are some of these names surprising to you? Is there a different title you would have liked to see? Come and share your wacky thoughts with us.
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I’m french. Desperate Housewives keeps its original title. Grey’s Anatomy, Numb3rs and Scrubs too. Ok for the others
You can notice Six Feet Under was translated by “Six pieds sous terre”, which means… Six Feet Under. Sometimes, our channels aren’t too donk they seems to. If you need other translation, you’ve got my email 
Thanks for the input, Manuuu. I agree with you that these titles can be cooky. Also i grabbed some french canadian and belgian french titles in addition to just regular french titles. You would be surprised what our friends from French Canada come up with.
In France, Desperate Housewives, Grey’s Anatomy and Numb3rs don’t have a different title from the original. Maybe you’re refering to the French Canadian title for these three shows.
@ Nick : Yep, that’s it !
ABC : “Men in trees” –> “Une fille en Alaska” wich means “a girl in Alaska”
Oh, there is a french CSI, RIS : Police Scientifique :
http://www.serieslive.com/fiche_serie-667-ris-police-scientifique.html
(On this website, you find all the shows with the french titles)
The German title for “Two and a half men” was “Mein cooler Onkel Charlie” (which means my cool uncle Charlie) for the first two seasons, but they changed it to the original one - luckily.
Hello, I’m Frenc too
“Scrubs”, indeed, has been called “Toubib or not toubib”, but this title has been quickly renounced.
Good article
Hi, I’m french and in fact we have an equivalent to CSI Unit : la police scientifique
too many frenchies here ^^
Nowadays, french networks try not to change the original title ’cause it’s so numb… or because after that all the french fans go mad!
For example, How I Met Your Mother nearly changed but the french fans wrote to the network and ask them not to put it into a french translation…
I’m French too… “French” titles for Grey’s Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, Scrubs and Numb3rs are used by french-speaking canadian who are more attached not to use english words…
Hi! I have a little question there… Actually, I’m french too, and I noticed this : If CSI and CSI : Miami kept their original location in the french title (les experts, les experts Miami), CSI : NY became Les Experts : Manhattan…
Any idea why?
Because when I asked french people, some of them couldn’t replace Manhattan in NY… So I suppose we can’t talk about cultural point there… :/
I’m french and I leave in France and I found this article very interestig. But I have to say that some of the french titles are not used in France but only in Canada or Belgium. For exemple, Desperate Housewives, Grey’s Anatomy, Scubs, Numb3rs had the same title in France than in the US.
After, why CSI:NY became Les Experts : Manhattan and not Les Experts : New York ? This is because CSI franchise and Law & Order franchise are broadcasted on the same netwotk in France (TF1) and like it said in the article, the L&O franchise has benn translated by New York District, Section Criminelle, Unité Spéciale. So, with Les Les Experts : New York, there will be many titles with New York and people could be lost. That’s why the chose Manhattan instead of New York.
Oh yeah, that could be as dumb as that… Why do they always think people are stupid?…
Boby, im from belgium they use the same title than france for most of the shows so it’s not from here (i guess it’s from canada) sometimes we dont event add or translate anything here
You forgot Lost : Les disparus (wich i think translate in Lost : The missing)
If you want a laugh you can check the titlesong from Prison Break or Heroes that TF1 and M6 change for the french broadcast, it’s so bad it’s insane
[...] I also talked about the theme song for “Mein cooler Oncle Charlie,” aka “Two and a Half Men.” (The first title means “My cool Uncle Charlie” in German.) You can watch the show intro here – or look how some other American TV show titles are translated into other languages here. [...]