The Bear has to be absolutely one of the best shows I’ve ever watched so far. And no, contrary to the title, it is not populated by wildlife of various forms, unless one considers the human kind populating the cloistered kitchens of the restaurants it sets its story around. It is intense, it can claustrophobic, it is depressingly real sometimes, and it is riotously funny at other times. But it all feels so real.
The basic plot is a retread of several such stories before; a high-flying career man returns home to his roots to take over his legacy and set it right. But oh, how they play around with that concept. In this case, Michelin-starred chef Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White), who decides to put aside his career at one of the best restaurants in the country to come back home to Chicago and the restaurant called ‘The Great Beef of Chicago’, bequeathed to him in tragic circumstances after the suicide of its previous owner and Carmy’s elder brother, Michael (Jon Bernthal makes brief but powerful flashback appearances). But the restaurant is close to going under and its motley crew of cooks and servers all stuck in the old ways. There is also Richie (Eben Moss-Bachrach), the volatile family friend who is like family and calls Carmy ‘cousin’, who was helping his brother run the restaurant and is now stuck in a cocktail of grief and stubbornness when Carmy tries to change things around with his newfangled ideas. Carmy’s sister, Sugar (Abby Elliott), doesn’t want anything to do with the place or him initially, but as with everyone here, the characterization has a lot of scope for exploration in the second season. Carmy is joined at his venture by the ambitious sous chef, Sydney (Ayo Edebiri), who needs something to bounce back from the challenges which got to her and who also is perhaps the only one there who knows something about how good Carmy really is in the restaurant world. Sydney later blossoms into a major player in their venture and gives back as good as she gets from Carmy. Among the chefs, there is Marcus, a soft-natured pastry chef, and Tina (Liza Colón-Zayas), an initially resistant line chef who later turns sous chef. In fact, Tina’s character is one which made me realize how lovingly detailed each supporting character has been shaped. There is a sequence in the second season where she is called upon to sing karaoke on a night out. The pleasure which deepens her expressive eyes as she is lauded is the kind which hides a lifetime of drudgery and pain, and the actress is brilliant. Watch out for a cute omelet making sequence too, as well as some lovingly detailed everyday conversations that Marcus has when in Copenhagen with the chef he has been partnered with to learn from.
Those were some of the small moments which were realized beautifully, but the big themes hit the mark too. Carmy is a complicated concoction of knowledge, talent, grit but also deep lying sadness and nerves, forever haunted by his brother’s legacy and a constant desire to prove, especially to himself, that he knows what he is doing. An episode in the second season deep dives into a certain extended family Christmas dinner which lays bare a lot of the problems Carmy was running from and has to now deal with. Perhaps the same description, at least on the culinary ambitions front, can be said about Sydney, Ayo Edebiri pitch-perfectly playing the character with a seemingly soft exterior but a steely resolve within. I also loved Eben Moss-Bachrach as Richie, a veritable fuse about to go off for most of the show, but who hides deep insecurities and grief within. His character’s learning arc in the second season was one of the more rewarding ones in a show filled with plenty of them. While the first season deals mostly with the sh*t storm that Carmy and Sydney need to navigate through to keep the restaurant a going concern, a certain twist towards the end (perhaps a tad unbelievable but by then you’re totally invested in this thing) meant that the second season took a whole new turn into the conversion of the Original Beef into The Bear. This takes a bit of the action out of the kitchen and into the streets and homes of the people involved and there is a lot of insight into the struggles and challenges faced by the hotel and hospitality industry, especially in the wake of the COVID pandemic, ranging from staffing issues to keeping spiraling costs under control. There is also a real attempt to understand the fine dining experience. It would have been very easy to poke some fun at the exactness that some of these kitchens demand, as in the case of Richie being made to polish forks to perfection during his weeklong stint at another hotel, but instead this theme is taken to reflect the care that the chefs and servers are supposed to feel for the diners who throng their tables. Ultimately, the show tells us, serving food is about caring for the person you’re serving it to.
I don’t have intimate experience with the insides of restaurant kitchens, but it sure feels like what is shown in the show is probably very close to reality. The constant bustle and movement in cramped spaces, the salutations and lingo which Carmy tries to bring them around to, and the on the feet thinking needed to continuously serve their patrons, day after day, with all the momentary rages and issues that can bring up is just so potently manifested on screen that uninitiated viewers can perhaps take a couple of episodes to actually get to grips with proceedings (I should know, I was one of them). But, oh, is it worth it. The second season has only left me wanting more from The Bear and co. and I have a funny feeling they will deliver again.
DipsicDude 