I know the second season of this hit critically acclaimed show just dropped a few of weeks ago, so I promise I’ll keep this review of The Bear as spoiler free as possible.
If you’ll remember, at the end of the first season, Carmy discovers cash stashed in a ton of cans of tomatoes. Turns out it’s the money Mikey borrowed from their Uncle Jimmy. He had the intention to start that restaurant with Carmy, but his demons got in the way first. Everyone is on board with Carmy’s vision of transforming The Original Beef into an upscale restaurant. In fact, Sydney is so on board that she hopes they eventually make it into a one star establishment. Well, that comes with A LOT of hard work. Thankfully, everyone is all in. Some a little more reluctantly than others, but this season sees all of our main players getting some time alone to really hone their skills as the remodel is going on.
As you can imagine, there are a lot of surprise costs and setbacks as they begin the remodel. Mold, anyone? I like that most of the season steers away from the chaos of the kitchen and delves more into the personal lives of all these characters we’ve come to love from the beginning. Let’s not get confused here, though, there is still plenty of cooking. Fak is around full time now, Sugar is debating whether she should be, also, and Carmy gets a new love in his life, but more on that later. I want to talk about what everyone else involved with The Bear gets up to this season.
Both Tina and Ebra get sent to culinary school, where Tina shines, Ebra kind of falls apart. Everything is too different and shiny from when he first started. He manages to turn it around, just not in the way that was expected. It’s nice to see Tina really hone her skills and bask in the attention she gets from Carmy and Sydney. Almost like she’s probably never gotten that kind of appreciation in the past. My favorite adventures though belong to Marcus and Richie. Marcus is sent to Copenhagen to learn some boss dessert tricks from one of Carmy’s old friends, and Richie learns respect and resourcefulness at a Michelin-star restaurant in Chicago. Richie’s arc this season was probably my favorite.
Speaking of other things that were my favorite this year, the sixth episode of the season, “Fishes.” If you thought the episode, “Review” in the first season was chaos, you need to prepare yourself and watch this episode. Think again of the anxiety of Uncut Gems. That’s what you get here. I have read all over that a lot of people had a hard time finishing the episode in one sitting. It is stress at an eleven. And while there is a kitchen involved, it just Carmy’s mother’s kitchen on Christmas. I don’t want to say much and ruin anything about this golden hour of the season, but you learn a lot about why Carmy is the way he is. There was standout performance after standout performance here, and I cannot wait for awards season to shower this show in trophies. They deserve it.
If you liked the first season of this comedy drama, then you are going to love the newest season. As a warning, there were a lot of surprising and high caliber guest stars this season, but they were used in such a way that I never felt like I was being beaten over the head with their presence. A master class of a show.