Stress in the Kitchen: The Bear
We ripped through the 18 episodes of S1/S2 of FX’s series The Bear in the past week.
The episodes are short and the drama is high.
Why is this show so good?
Like Mikey Berzatto’s recipe for Family Meal Spaghetti, I think The Bear is good because it has all of the right ingredients.
If you haven’t watched it, stop and go watch it now.
Why I love it:
A look into the high stakes and high stress environment of working in a commercial kitchen.
The Telegraph describes S1 as an “exercise in tension.” From the chaos of operations at Original Beef, flashbacks to CDCs screaming in Carmy’s ear that he isn’t good enough, to the meticulous clockwork operations of running “the greatest restaurant in the world” at Chicago’s Ever - we see a full range of emotion.
This show spiked my heart rate like glucose spikes your blood sugar.
The complexities and fluidity of the “Family” concept
The Bear is to the culinary world as Star Wars is to space — the background for a story about family.
Within the Berzatto family itself we have:
The strained relationship between Carmy and Mikey, which Carmy can only begin to start to heal through his attempt to turn around Mikey’s restaurant that is bequeathed to him, though he never permitted him to work at Original Beef with him.
Carmy and Nat’s tensions when he first returns to Chicago and their reparations once they are able to
The Berzatto kid’s complicated relationship with their mother Donna, which is shown in full swing S2E4 at a Christmas Dinner
The disdain for which almost all characters have for Nat’s husband Pete
The Adjacent Family:
The historical and current financial ties both Mikey and Carmy Berzatto to their “Uncle Jimmy” a close friend of their father’s
The affectionate term of cousin which both Carmy and Richie use to refer to each other though no blood relation exists and the relationship itself cannot be outwardly called affectionate
Richie’s challenges with his ex-wife and connection with his young daughter
Sydney, who has lost her mother and finds a new family at The Bear
The Characters
There are a ton of characters in this show especially considering the majority of the scenes take place in a relatively small restaurant. Most have a fairly developed backstory, we have context into what drives them, and a general understanding of their family challenges.
Every single one has some type of struggle they are working through that we see. The marginal characters have deeper story lines than most shows.
Syd is a young, ambitious and impatient chef. She is full of ideas that she wants to implement now. I love her honesty, her energy, her vulnerability. She started her own business which failed and then sought out the world’s top CDC to learn from, even if that was in a beef sandwich shop. She is someone that you just want to be really proud of for both her efforts and outcomes.
Apparently the professional culinary scene is also very male - dominated, and her presence in the show goes further than representation, it’s assertion!
Ayo Edebiri is so good in this role. She is also a comedian and co-host of the Iconography podcast.
Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto is our main character - The Bear himself. Despite being on the very top of his culinary game, he returns home to Chicago to run his late brother’s failing sandwich shop.
We learn over two seasons that his culinary excellence is likely a result of his lack of both family and social inclusion over the years. The kitchen was a place that he could both belong and excel. His extreme dedication got him early notoriety and we’re met with a brutal scene in season 2 when he comes to terms with effects of diminished focus resulting from his first real romantic relationship.
His hair is always a bit wild and his character is considered one of the best fictional menswear icons in a decade.
I’ve never seen Jeremy Allen White in anything else, but you instantly feel like you’ve known him as Carmy forever.
Richie has one of the best 2-season character arcs that I can recall. On par with Jamie Tartt’s on Ted Lasso, which I also really enjoyed.
Richie is played by Ebon Moss-Bachrach, which if you watched HBO Girls back in the day, you may remember as Desi, Marnie’s post-Charlie love interest.
He is just as frustrating in The Beat as he was in Girls, but we do see his redemption in The Bear. After being faced with some tough personal news regarding his family and an opportunity to stage in the top restaurant in Chicago which he first views as punishment from Carmy, he pulls the biggest and quickest 180 i’ve ever seen, but it’s convincing.
“I wear suits now,” becomes his catch phrase which embodies this change of his entire view on life.
I’ve probably never rooted so hard against someone and then for them within such a short span of episodes.
Season 3 of The Bear has not yet been announced but we cannot be left hungry. We need another serving, please!
