Charles fails his medical exams, but his mother arranges a rural doctor position and a first marriage for him.

Charles is called late one night to treat farmer Monsieur Rouault's broken leg and is captivated by his daughter Emma.

Charles's first wife Héloise dies suddenly after coughing up blood, freeing Charles to pursue his feelings for Emma.

Charles and Emma hold a large, festive countryside wedding attended by guests from across the region.

Emma moves into Charles's home in Tostes and quickly realizes she is not in love with her new husband.

Emma becomes chronically ill from disillusionment; Charles uproots his career and moves the family to Yonville-l'Abbaye.

Emma gives birth to a daughter named Berthe in Yonville-l'Abbaye.

Rodolphe Boulanger sits beside Emma throughout the Agricultural Fair, whispering seductively about passion overriding social morality.

Emma begins a secret affair with Rodolphe, sneaking to his estate whenever Charles leaves early for work.

Rodolphe writes Emma a letter ending their romance and leaves town on the eve of their planned elopement.

Charles takes Emma to the Rouen theater, where they run into Léon; Charles leaves Emma alone, and she and Léon begin an affair.

Emma uses the pretense of piano lessons in Rouen to meet Léon regularly and sustain their secret affair.

A bailiff arrives at the Bovary home to inventory all their possessions due to Emma's long-hidden unpaid debts.

Emma convinces the pharmacist's assistant Justin to give her arsenic and consumes it, dying slowly and in great pain.

Charles discovers Emma's love letters proving both affairs, then dies of heartbreak while Berthe is left destitute.

Pool 1 follows the central arc of Emma and Charles Bovary, from Charles's arranged early career through his marriage to Emma and their move to Yonville-l'Abbaye. It traces Emma's two major love affairs — with the manipulative Rodolphe and the romantic Léon — and how each reflects her desperate search for the passionate life she fantasized about through novels. Running parallel to her romantic life is the accumulation of debt Emma hides from Charles, buying luxury goods on credit from the predatory Monsieur Lheureux. When the debts become impossible to manage and no one will help her, Emma consumes arsenic and dies slowly and painfully. After her death, Charles discovers the truth of her affairs through her love letters and, destroyed by grief, dies himself, leaving their daughter Berthe orphaned and destitute.

Emma's marriage, affairs, debts, and tragic death.

The assets of Charles's first wife Héloise are revealed to be far less than she claimed, triggering a family financial crisis.

Héloise repeatedly confronts Charles about his attraction to Emma Rouault until he stops visiting the Rouault farm entirely.

Emma and Charles receive a coveted invitation to attend a lavish ball at the Marquis d'Andervilliers's estate, La Vaubyessard.

At the La Vaubyessard ball, Emma dances with aristocrats and refuses Charles as her dance partner.

Emma returns from La Vaubyessard filled with agitation and fires Charles's longtime housekeeper Nastasie on the spot.

Emma subscribes to Parisian women's magazines and studies a map of Paris, immersing herself in fantasies of city life.

Before leaving Tostes, Emma pricks her fingers on her old wedding bouquet and throws the flowers into the fire.

During the journey to Yonville, Emma's greyhound Djali runs off into the countryside and cannot be found.

On Emma's first night in Yonville, she and Léon discover a deep shared passion for literature and escapism at dinner.

Monsieur Homais persuades Charles to attempt an experimental club foot surgery on the stable hand Hippolyte.

Hippolyte's leg becomes infected with gangrene after Charles's surgery, and Doctor Canivet arrives to perform an amputation.

Emma begs Rodolphe to run away with her and Berthe; he verbally agrees but privately decides he will never follow through.

Monsieur Lheureux spots Emma arm-in-arm with Léon in Rouen and begins using the knowledge to pressure her for repayment.

Emma approaches the town notary to beg for money, but he makes a sexual advance and she leaves in disgust.

Monsieur Homais ascends to public prominence as a celebrated intellectual and is awarded the Legion of Honour.

Pool 2 covers the key supporting events that frame Emma's journey, from the collapse of Charles's first marriage to Emma's fateful arrival in Yonville and her growing connection with Léon. It captures the aristocratic ball that plants the seed of Emma's deepest discontent, her immersion in Parisian fashion fantasies, and her symbolic burning of her wedding bouquet before leaving Tostes. In Yonville, the pool tracks the disastrous club foot surgery that publicly humiliates Charles, Emma's escalating recklessness as she pressures Rodolphe to elope, and the moment Lheureux discovers her affair and weaponizes it. The pool ends with the darkly ironic triumph of Monsieur Homais, who rises to public acclaim and wins the Legion of Honour while the Bovarys are destroyed around him.

The social world and circumstances surrounding Emma's unraveling.

While being educated in a convent, Emma discovers literature and romance novels that give her unrealistic expectations of love.

Monsieur Rouault, facing financial pressures on his farm, accepts Charles's marriage proposal as a secure arrangement for Emma.

A patient gives Emma a greyhound named Djali, and she begins taking long solitary walks to escape her suffocating domestic routine.

Emma realizes that Léon is in love with her and begins secretly reciprocating while performing the role of devoted wife to Charles.

Léon says a private goodbye to Emma alone in her home, then flees her house hoping she is watching from the window.

Emma spirals into deep despair after Léon's departure; Charles's mother arrives and cancels Emma's subscription to the lending library.

Rodolphe deliberately delays his return to Emma after the fair, successfully manipulating her into longing and missing him.

Rodolphe takes Emma horseback riding deep into the countryside and attempts to kiss and touch her for the first time.

Emma receives a letter from her ailing father about the struggling farm and feels unexpected nostalgia for her former simple life.

Emma makes secret plans to elope with Rodolphe, hiding new luggage purchases from Charles by exchanging a watch for them.

Emma sees Rodolphe's carriage pass her window after reading his abandonment letter, faints, and falls bedridden for weeks.

After recovering, Emma recommits herself to religion and remodels the garden to erase all reminders of her affair with Rodolphe.

Emma receives a legal summons warning that the Bovary home and all their possessions could be seized to settle her debts.

Emma goes to Rodolphe's mansion to beg for 3,000 francs; he rejects both her romantic advances and her request for money.

Charles runs into Rodolphe after Emma's death and, still devastated, forgives him and says fate had a hand in everything.

Pool 3 focuses on the internal turning points and decisive moments that drive the story's emotional core. It begins with Emma's formative convent education, which shaped her romantic fantasies, and traces the key emotional shifts: her silent, mutual love for Léon, her seduction by Rodolphe, and her complete collapse when he abandons her. These events reveal Emma's recurring pattern of projecting impossible fantasies onto real relationships and her inability to confront reality when it disappoints her. The pool follows Emma's desperate measures to escape her financial ruin — hiding luggage, begging Rodolphe, evading the law — each failure pushing her closer to destruction. It ends with Charles's heartbroken forgiveness of Rodolphe after Emma's death, a moment that encapsulates both his tragic devotion and his lifelong refusal to see Emma as she truly was.