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One of the most stressful shows to ever grace our televisions is back, with The Bear returning for Season 3. Created by Christopher Storer (Ramy), The Bear follows a talented chef who returns to Chicago to run his late brother Michael’s (Jon Bernthal) sandwich shop, turning it into a high-class restaurant. The main character Carmy, is played by Jeremy Allen White (Shameless). Michael’s best friend and front-of-house manager for The Bear, Richie, is played by Ebon Moss-Bachrach (Andor), while the sous-chef Sydney, is played by Ayo Edebiri (Bottoms).
The season also stars Abby Elliott (Saturday Night Live), Liza Colón-Zayas (IF), Lionel Boyce (Loiter Squad), Matty Matheson (It’s Suppertime!), Edwin Lee Gibson (Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty), Corey Hendrix (Fargo) and Oliver Platt (Chicago Med). Picking up where we left off from the show’s second season, The Bear is now open for business. The staff tries to adapt to Carmy’s grueling new rules, including one that requires a different menu every day. Carmy attempts not to crack under the pressure while refusing to patch things up with his girlfriend Claire (Molly Gordon) after last season’s outburst.
The Bear’s Open, Now What?
Most of the main characters have their motivations and side stories that tie into them. There’s a rift between Richie and Carmy for pretty much the entire season because of Carmy’s outburst, but Richie is dealing with his ex-wife (Gillian Jacobs) marrying somebody new while being worried about how his daughter and ex-wife perceive him. Sydney has gotten an offer to co-own the restaurant with Carmy, and Sugar (Elliot), and at the same time, Adam (Adam Shapiro) from the restaurant Ever offers her another position to open a restaurant with him.
The story and substance of the third season is its biggest issue. The first season saw Carmy reinvent the restaurant while keeping it afloat, while the second saw the team prepare for its reopening while it was being renovated. Season 3 is about the day-to-day of the restaurant now that it has opened. The big emotional payoff of the season is set up to be their first review, but we aren’t shown the review’s fallout by the time the season ends.
Leaving the season on a cliffhanger would be fine if any other story arcs came to fruition, but the story ends leaving a bunch of balls in the air. There are many self-indulgent moments in the season too, like filling the last episode with cameos of culinary professionals. In the moment the self-indulgent sections seem artful, but when you’ve spent five hours and the plot barely moves, those sections make this season feel bloated with trivial tangents. There are funny sections that add to the show’s humor that feel that way too, but at least they might make you laugh.
Stress, Tension, and Misery
Even though the story’s pacing is The Bear Season 3’s biggest problem, the episodes that don’t move the plot forward are the best of the season. Season 3’s best episode is Napkins, directed by Edebiri. It’s a flashback, showing how Tina comes to work at The Beef with Michael and Richie. Napkins works in conjunction with the other episodes because it has the same tension the other episodes have. Instead of being about generational trauma, the restaurant, or grief, Napkins is about Tina struggling to find work after losing a long-held job.
It’s about the difficulty of unemployment, especially when you have a family. Tina’s journey is stressful, with her life falling apart in a day, followed by rejection after rejection after more than a decade’s worth of experience. Colón-Zayas’ performance is great as is Bernthal’s when the two sit down to talk about their lives and how they’re feeling. It’s a character moment that informs decisions the two make later on, but it’s also a nice touch of catharsis at the end of an extremely stressful episode, in the midst of an incredibly stressful season.
Another episode, Ice Chips, is stressful, cathartic, and sad all at the same time. Directed by Storer, the episode takes place mostly in one room, as Sugar is in labor and about to give birth. The main theme of The Bear is trauma, and here Sugar is actively trying not to pass on generational trauma to her child while being guided by her mother Dee Dee (Jamie Lee Curtis). Both actresses perform immaculately as Dee Dee attempts to connect with her daughter, as Sugar reckons with the new life she’ll need to take care of.
Step Out of the Kitchen
You obviously can’t make a show that is constantly stressful, or people just wouldn’t watch it. There are moments of levity – The Bear is technically part-comedy – and some sweet moments as well. Those moments are well-executed for the most part, with Richie’s interactions with his daughter, and the comedic yet stressful audit. Any scene containing one of the Faks (Matheson, Ricky Staffieri) is hit-or-miss, but I found myself laughing more than I didn’t. There’s a particular early gag with Matheson’s character that had me howling with laughter.
We haven’t touched on it so far because at times Carmy does feel like a side character in Season 3, but Jeremy Allen White is playing Carmy as an exposed wire as usual. It’s a fantastic performance, I just wish more was done with it this time around. Ebebiri is great too, but personally, I’ve never liked her character. Although, that’s a testament to her performance. It’s a truly great ensemble cast with only a couple of actors dropping the ball.
The guest and recurring stars are fantastic as well, with Olivia Colman (The Crown), Will Poulter (Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3) and a couple of smaller scene-stealers we won’t mention to ruin the surprise, standing out. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (The Social Network) were behind the phenomenal music in the first episode of The Bear Season 3, entitled Tomorrow. They nailed the mind-numbing nature of the tension and the quiet calm of Carmy’s memories. The regular score by J.A.Q and Johnny Iguana captured the high bustle of the kitchen, but the score was used sparingly in most episodes.
Can I Get the Check?
It’s worth shouting out that as much as the music and the performances help bring you a plate full of tension, they wouldn’t work as well without fantastic editing. Most of the show is edited in a way that forces you not to look away and in some cases befuddle you. It’s straightforward sequence editing for the most part, but it’s done quite sharply aiding that tension and catharsis like an expensive LEGO set. Even though for most of the show the visuals are muted and clinical, the visuals of the series are always gorgeous to look at, especially the food.
As much as I liked the individual pieces, I left The Bear wanting more and annoyed that most of the characters are more or less the same as we left them in Season 2. Season 3 is a great season of television. You can sit down and be thoroughly entertained, deeply empathize with the characters, and relate to the stressful situations they are going through. You can laugh with them, cry with them, and get angry with them. But after a season of renovations, The Bear Season 3 could have been more concise and it could’ve completed at least one major storyline.
You can watch Season 3 of FX’s The Bear on Hulu now, and keep an eye out for the fourth season coming soon.
The Bear Season 3
Even though this season is more self-indulgent and meandering than previous seasons, The Bear Season 3 is a great season of extremely tense thoughtful television.
Pros
- Brilliant performances from a spectacular ensemble cast.
- Phenomenal editing that supports performances while also scaling up the tension of every situation.
- Keeps an incredibly tense and stressful tone, breaking for catharsis and humor.
Cons
- The story doesn't go anywhere and ends on an obnoxious cliffhanger.
- The overall pacing is meandering, and some of the show is too self-indulgent.
