The Bear Season 4: Binge, Fringe, or Singe?
Written by Andreas Babiolakis
Binge, Fringe, or Singe? is our television series that will cover the latest seasons, miniseries, and more. Binge is our recommendation to marathon the reviewed season. Fringe means it won’t be everyone’s favourite show, but is worth a try (maybe there are issues with it). Singe means to avoid the reviewed series at all costs.
Warning: This review contains blatant spoilers for the fourth season of The Bear. Reader discretion is advised.
The Bear was originally slept on and slowly worked its way towards becoming the must-watch show of the early twenties. It was suddenly everywhere: everyone’s favourite series that they had to suggest to their friends, a platform for stars of old and new to become untouchables, and the awards season juggernaut that wouldn’t let up (there will forever be controversy surrounding The Bear winning trophies for being a “comedy” series, but that is beside the point). By the time the third season dropped last year, The Bear had become The Bar: an extremely high precedent that even the very show that set it could no longer reach. Season 3 was flimsier than the two that came before it, but it had enough highs to pick up the pace and electricity of the episodes that wanted to slow things down. I wouldn’t call the season a disappointment because I still enjoyed it, but it was clearly the weakest season of the series at that point, even if it was slightly so.
By the current fourth season, there weren’t many great expectations anymore. The Bear could be flawed and still worth watching. The series was winning fewer trophies. The glow was gone. And yet it still feels subpar as to what it could have been. Both seasons 3 and 4 were ordered at the same time, and it initially felt like the third season was meant to build up to what was to come. Instead, it is clear that what we are seeing is the prolonging of a series that should have had a cut off point far earlier. Had The Bear been three seasons at most (with the third season acting as either a downward spiral of the central restaurant or the triumph that sets everything in motion for our characters for life), it would have remained punchy, direct, and impactful. That isn’t to say that The Bear had to remain an anxious ball of chaos, but I’m not sure if creator Christopher Storer and company are handling the tenderness of the series nearly as well as they imagine they are.
What was once the most fired-up series on television at this point has been reduced to a slow-cooking crawl. The main theme of this season is a damning review by The Chicago Tribune: one that makes investor — and family friend — Cicero (Oliver Platt) skittish of The Bear’s future. Seeing the loss of revenue and the high amounts of turnover that the restaurant is accruing, Cicero gives Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) and the rest of the staff two months to turn things around. Otherwise, The Bear is to close for good. I can’t help but wonder — even if by sheer coincidence — if the review in The Chicago Tribune within the show was meant to represent the lukewarm response that the third season of The Bear received, with a promise that Storer and friends are making: this season will spruce things up a bit. To be fair, the goals of this season are more set in stone: The Bear has to be saved from failure; Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) needs to decide if she wants to sign Carmy’s proposal to make her a partner of The Bear, or if she wants to work for the rival restaurant, Ever; characters throughout the show are to be more fleshed out as human beings than ever; Carmy must finally reconnect with his former partner, Claire (Molly Gordon).
I would argue that the show does focus on these goals, but this doesn’t save the season from feeling like the clear slowest and over-long of the series thus far; it is so over stuffed that it makes a turducken seem like a low-effort dish. All of this is because of one last quest that Storer and the rest of The Bear made for themselves this season: make The Bear more sentimental. I can see why empathy was a priority. We live in hard times, and a messy, angry show may seem like the wrong angle (however, I’d argue that The Bear once worked as a great outlet for our own frustrations, like a televised rage room; we see our own struggles within the characters of the show). The series may be showing how to embrace insecurity and fear with warmth after many episodes of panic, but The Bear is over compensating to the point that feels as sugary as Ted Lasso at times (to be clear, The Bear is still far more human). I also wonder if the writing team behind The Bear took the non-comedy accusations to heart since season 3 appeared to have more actual jokes tossed in and this fourth season continues this objective; as a result, the comedy feels forced now, whereas the discomfort from before would make us laugh whenever we broke while watching (a far more authentic form of comedy, I’d argue).
The on-camera components of The Bear are better than ever. It is what comes before and after the shoots that lets this season down.
It’s frustrating because The Bear’s fourth season boasts some of the finest performances of the series thus far, particularly from its leads Allen White and Edebiri: both of whom open up more than ever before. Allen White faces some major conflicts head-on, including an attempt by Carmy to bond with his unstable and remorseful mother, Donna (Jamie Lee Curtis) in the episode “Tonnato” (Lee Curtis is also phenomenal here, continuing to be as vulnerable as she has ever been in the series). Sydney faces a tragedy in her family — the sudden heart attack of her father — that she feels guilty about (as if she prioritized her own needs above those of her dad); Edebiri is brilliantly candid during these episodes, including a one-shot monologue with her leaving it all out there (and a fountain of tears to boot). Both actors boil over in the season finale, “Goodbye”: one of the only episodes that feels like The Bear of old, and their fierce performances help bring the show back to what it once was. I also feel like the season trying too hard to get everyone on board gets in the way of the roles of characters and actors we have come to love. Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), Marcus (Lionel Boyce), and Tina (Liza Colón-Zayas) all feel dialed down to varying degrees. It may be no coincidence that each of these characters have had their own special episodes in the past (“Forks” for Richie, “Honeydew” for Marcus, and “Napkins” for Tina), but that doesn’t mean that they must now be utilized less overall. Richie does show up midway through the season finale “Goodbye,” at least, but it still doesn’t feel like enough.
I believe that everything in front of the camera of season 4 works, from the acting to the cinematography and set design. It’s everything else that gets in the way. The writing is clunkier than ever before, with many lines of dialogue that do not feel natural in the slightest (outside of “Goodbye,” which feels like an exposition of what the show at its very best can be, or the seventy-minute special “Bears” which is when the series is handling tenderness correctly, albeit for too long). The editing — which once felt precise and crisp — now feels half baked, with shots that linger for too many beats or cringe-comedy moments that feel lopped off awkwardly (which only enhances the embarrassment of these scenes, and not in the intended way, I’m sure). While I love the majority of the songs being used (from numerous cuts by The Ronettes — one of my favourite girl groups — to singles by Talk Talk, Eddie Vedder, and many others), The Bear has become a jukebox to showcase these songs whilst overcooking the scenes they are meant to compliment; what once felt like a surprise song here and there — acting like a garnish — is now the norm. I’m not sure if these are the decisions made by a season that is rushed or over produced, but this isn’t the raw, organic series that once was. The Bear was once conceived by what came from the heart and gut; it is now derived from expectation.
Things aren’t all bad here. Despite how repetitive and glacial season 4 can be, there is a soul within every episode and scene (even with all of the blemishes). There will forever be a passion for cuisine, with the food photography and love behind cooking being as emphasized as they ever were. I also think that the reserved, tactical approach to season 4 does evoke the sensation of going numb when one is under too much pressure, like that lingering shadow that creeps up on us as the timer winds down; I just wish that season 4 wasn’t so slow and methodical when the majority of the series is far more intense (these feel like different series at times, and the intended unification is absent). The season appears to be building up towards “Goodbye” as if we are seeing all of the beauty within the culinary arts, family dynamics, and the nightmares of running both a kitchen and a business. It is unclear if “Goodbye” is meant to be a season or series finale (I’m leaning towards the former), but it is a major shakeup that the series needed. Carmy emphatically decides to retire, amending the partnership agreement he once sent to Sydney so that she and his sister Nat “Sugar” (Abby Elliott) are in tandem with their percentages versus the investors. This results in an episode-long argument between Carmy and Sydney, with Richie eventually being involved (Sydney’s one condition is that Richie becomes a co-partner alongside her and Nat); while Sydney initially feels betrayed and Richie feels like Carmy is being cowardly at first, Nat instantly hugs Carmy and understands his trauma right away; she gets why Carmy needs to save himself and, thus, leave the restaurant life for good.
”Goodbye” makes the rest of the season work a little better. The wedding at the epicentre of “Bears” now hits harder. Sydney’s decisions throughout the season now feel not as thought through as they once were. The uncertainty of what is to come proves to be an earthquake that dismantles all that came before it; I’d argue that this is a good thing, like life hitting you when you least expect it. It’s a long road to get to this point, however, and I have this nagging thought that this should have happened sooner. Let’s say that we combined seasons 3 and 4, with the first few months of The Bear being the first half of the season, the midway point being the revelation that The Bear is destined to close, and the final episodes leading us to where we are now: Carmy’s realization that he can no longer do this and must change as a person. In my mind, this would have been a phenomenal season without any pauses or dawdling. It could have been optimistic and heartfelt without feeling too kitschy. Considering that the series is about whether or not a restaurant can stay open within a very limited time frame, The Bear seems to be going on forever. With the ambiguous ending of the season — with the two-month timer having fully counted down, the lights within The Bear off, and the new partnership deal sealed for good — it’s tough to say how much is left in the series; maybe a season; maybe nothing. Had this potential series finale happened with the season I had in mind, The Bear would have gone out in a blaze of glory with one of the gutsiest conclusions in recent memory. Instead, it feels like a major pivot point when we’re wondering how much longer is left in this trip.
The Bear rides on heart and soul enough to keep going, despite having run out of steam enough to be noticeable.
A reoccuring theme in the season is the use of Sonny & Cher’s “I Got You Babe,” famously used in the fantasy comedy Groundhog Day. The song wakes up Sydney (sort of; it’s used in the opening credits after her alarm goes off) after a crazy nightmare — one where she is a television chef who somehow gets caught in the rain indoors while ravenous patrons create a calamity behind her, only for her to “wake up” outside in the snow and find herself stuck running in place (all in the episode “Green”). This leads up to Sydney making a decision on whether or not she wants to be a partner for The Bear or work for Ever (a clever metaphor I see now that it is in written form: to work at The Bear is to live, while to go to the opposition is to work “for Ever”). A shot from Groundhog Day is featured earlier in the season, leading to Carmy asking multiple peers if they, too, feel like they are stuck in the same rut every day. While this is an allusion to Carmy’s eventual decision, it may also explain why season 4 is so cyclical and — at times — monotonous: we are meant to feel the droning nature of working at The Bear and, thus, the impending dread. While understandable, a series should still captivate the audience and maybe give this sensation of doom in small enough doses that we don’t become bored or disillusioned like the characters at hand. It’s like when a character is meant to be annoying: as soon as they irritate us and not just other people within the story, they are no longer welcomed by us.
The fourth season still tosses as much our way as possible to keep us around. These include some interesting guest appearances, including Rob Reiner who is sensational as business manager Albert Schnur, and Brie Larson winds up being the eccentric Fak sister, Francie, who creates quite a splash during the wedding episode, “Bears;” but Danielle Deadwyler steals the show as Sydney’s cousin, Chantel, who is borderline unrecognizable and a breath of fresh air in the episode “Worms”. In fact, “Worms” is one of the bright spots of the season: an episode where Sydney is getting her hair done (probably for Tiff’s wedding in “Bears”) and bonding with Chantel’s daughter, TJ; TJ and Sydney are talking about different things at one point, but both are understanding one another and are on the same page (it’s quite a beautiful sequence). Outside of the guest appearances, we get some other snippets of splendour, including Carmy leaving an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and facing a world that is so colourfully shot — as if to say that he is finding meaning in his life. The re-introduction of Carmy’s extended family in “Bears” — albeit in a far more positive and down-to-earth light — is a pleasant surprise after one of the best episodes of the series back in season 2 (“Fishes”); “Bears” doesn’t quite compare, but it’s a welcome gesture of humanizing this dysfunctional family.
Season 4 isn’t all bad, but it is definitely lukewarm. The blemishes aren’t enough to ruin the show for me, but the strengths are also not strong to the point of rescuing this season entirely. Season 4 is average: something I never thought I’d say when it comes to The Bear. The series once felt like a scrumptious dish made out of a pan that’s on fire. It now feels like a decent meal that was cooked on low heat (you’d expect it to have more flavour, and yet it doesn’t). If “Goodbye” is truly the end of the series, it’s a risk made far too late. If the series continues with Carmy out of The Bear, it can either resolve nicely in one more season or proceed to overstay its welcome. The future is uncertain for The Bear, but I think Storer and company need to figure out the through-line here and fast. The chefs in the writers’ room need to keep their heads down and focus on what the themes and plot threads of the next season are — should there be one. The front-of-house staff — the actors — are killing it and needn’t change. The end-of-shift crew — editors — need to be back on their A game and as sharp as they once were, as to not miss any spots to tidy up. In order for The Bear to return to form, there must be a clear directive that everyone is following.
The first season was made with the expectation that the series may not have been picked up at all. It threw everything out into the void and hoped that it would land. While season 1 was certainly great, it was made in case that’s all that there ever was. Audiences craved more. Season 2 knew how to add more right off the bat. By season 3, the spark was dissipating because it was no longer a question of how to flesh out this series but, rather, keep it going for as long as possible. By season 4, it now appears to be too drawn out. That once juicy piece of steak has been chewed for so long that it is an indecipherable mush of what once was. There’s still hints of that prime cut in the gnarled paste, but it’s time to swallow and move on to the next bite. The Bear has yet to be renewed by the time of this review’s unveiling (the embargo for season 4 being lifted at midnight after the season dropped is also a sign of a lack of confidence, I’d argue). If the series ended at season 1, it would have been a short lived what-if that still was sensational as is. If “Goodbye” is all that’s left, part of me will wonder what could have been — both overall with The Bear, and after this season if there were more episodes to come that never did. The other part will recognize that food can spoil. We may want to eat more, but if the mold is showing, it’s sadly time to let go. Even a speck of mold will do. As it stands, The Bear is still good to eat but is quickly growing stale. Do we toss it yet?
Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Ryerson University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.