'The Bear' is back, baby: Season 4 review
There is a moment in Season 4 of FX's "The Bear," which has taken over every summer on TV since it premiered in 2022, when you acutely remember why you got so sucked into this show in the first place. Especially after last year's third season made us forget.
Much has been written and said about the acclaimed series – which launched its cast into superstardom and took home a treasure chest full of Emmy awards – and its ability to engross and bewitch its viewers. There's the frenetic energy of its setting in a restaurant kitchen. There's the aptitude of its talented actors, who spit profanities as sharp as their chef's knives as they chop and stir and and season and argue. There's the sense of place in a perpetually overcast Chicago and the triumphs and tragedies that populate every episode. There are the Oscar-winning guest stars and family gatherings that make the Roman Colosseum look tame.
But the heart and soul of "The Bear" and its return-to-form fourth season (now streaming on Hulu, ★★★½ out of four) – the meat and potatoes, if you will – are the people. The characters keep you coming back for more. Chef Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) with his raw anxiety and trauma; "cousin" Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) with his anger that can be tamped down by joy; and chef Sydney (Ayo Edebiri), a voice of sense, reason and professionalism but also vulnerability and imposter syndrome. And "The Bear" Season 4 gets them right, to its end.
Without them, the frenzy that is this show's signature mode is just noise, not story. And that's the thread that got lost in last year's lackluster third season, where vibes and an overly artsy structure got in the way of just seeing this trio in a room together, preferably a kitchen.
In Season 4, "The Bear" is serving what we might call humble pie: a reset from the sins of Season 3. It's, if not peaceful − because there is no peace in the pandemonium that is nightly service at a restaurant − then it has a rhythm to the mad music in 10 new episodes. Creator Christopher Storer and the cast deliver more of what we love about "The Bear," sometimes sweetly and quietly and sometimes with deafening fury. But this year, the chaos is focused and controlled. Every second counts.
The new episodes pick up right after the Season 3 finale, in which Carmy and Sydney's restaurant received a rough review from the Chicago Tribune. Coupled with Carmy's mismanagement of its budget and the general ill use of the staff and resources, The Bear is just weeks away from going under. That point is underlined by a large countdown clock that investor/patron Uncle Jimmy (Oliver Platt) has placed in the kitchen. Everyone has to get better, calmer and faster. Carmy has to make sacrifices. And Sydney has to decide if she's staying or jumping ship to a job with another buzzy chef.
Whereas in Season 3 episodes would often slip and slide around a plot and a point and blur into each other lazily, the new installments are sharp and addictive, begging you to just let the next episode play on. There is the trademark radical realism and awkwardness to the dialogue, particularly in an episode set during a wedding that sees many returns from fan-favorite guest stars, and raw emotion on every sleeve. Parenting remains the show's prevailing theme, whether it's of an older generation, a new one or even caretaking a business. Everybody could use a little therapy, particularly Carmy. But it's tantalizing to watch them work out their issues instead in front of us.
If there's one major flaw in the new season (which at times feels like it might be the final one, too), it's that the laser focus on Carmy means some members of the great ensemble are left behind. The wild-haired protagonist finally confronts the trauma of losing his brother Mikey to suicide (Jon Bernthal, back for a cameo early on), and the emotional abuse and alcoholism of his mother (Jamie Lee Curtis, also back). It is cathartic and electrifying, but his lengthy screen time means there's less for the show's other standouts, like Marcus (Lionel Boyce) and Tina (Liza Colón-Zayas).
But "The Bear" happily leaves time for some. You'll find yourself heavily invested in half a dozen subplots that seem to perfectly illustrate the old aphorism that there are no small roles, only small actors. There is so much more heart to the new season, and if you were disillusioned last year, you might be won back just as easily as I was.
As the Season 4 plot unfolds, the path forward for the series becomes uncertain. The writers could easily swing open a door to a fifth season, or perhaps close up "The Bear" for good, like so many restaurants and TV shows before it. It's a mark of the craftsmanship that you'll find yourself satisfied with either answer. This could be the end, or it could just be a beginning.
Either way, I'm so glad to have dined here.
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Time Magazine
44 minutes ago
- Time Magazine
Let's Talk About 'The Bear' Season 4 Finale's Shocking Twist
This article discusses, in depth, the events of The Bear's Season 4 finale. You've got to feel for Sydney Adamu. Played by Ayo Edebiri, whose understated performance is a highlight of The Bear's fourth season, Syd has spent months agonizing over whether to leave The Bear—the restaurant of her dreams and also a chaotic nightmare—for a more stable, less stressful job in another chef's kitchen. Amid this deliberation, her father is hospitalized for a heart attack. And just when she's finally decided to sign her partnership agreement and stay at The Bear, Syd is hit with another bombshell: Carmy has updated the contract to list only Uncle Jimmy, Sugar, and Syd as co-owners. In other words, he's making plans to leave the restaurant. The details of this choice, which is certainly shocking but perhaps not so surprising given the many hints we've gotten that Carmy has lost his passion for work that was once his whole life, are hashed out in a finale that is among the best episodes of an otherwise mostly stagnant season. Set entirely in the alley outside The Bear, it consists of a long-awaited confrontation between Carmy and Syd, with Richie joining the fray midway through. Though he promises to stay until the restaurant is out of financial trouble, it seems that Carmy does indeed intend to leave. If The Bear creator Christopher Storer actually goes through with this shake-up, it could be exactly what the show needs to get out of the rut it's been in for two seasons. The finale opens on a close-up of Syd, her head pressed to the fence outside the kitchen door in a gesture of utter exhaustion. Carmy appears in the doorway: 'You didn't talk to me all service.' The reason for her coldness is, of course, that she had to find out about his plan to extricate himself from The Bear through a lawyer (who also happens to be Sugar's husband and Carmy's brother-in-law). 'It's the best thing for the restaurant,' he says, after denying that 'quitting' is what he's doing. 'We have to put the restaurant first.' Syd sees this for the non-explanation it is. From her perspective, he's abandoning a fragile business whose money problems he caused (sourcing ingredients for a new menu every day is expensive); he believes that he's chosen the right moment to exit, now that a proper team is in place. Then Carmy explains why he feels he must leave: 'I did this so I didn't have to do other things.' Which is to say, he threw himself into cooking because he couldn't deal with the burden of being a person with a life and relationships outside work. Syd, who doesn't smoke, needs a cigarette. She has a betrayal of her own to confess. We've known since Adam Shapiro's name lit up Carmy's phone that he knows she almost jumped ship. Now he calls her on it, and she apologizes—sort of: 'I'm sorry that I didn't tell you, but you were being a f-cking maniac.' Extremely fair! In the season's most cathartic moment, she finally unloads on Carmy after quietly absorbing so much of his destructive behavior: 'I'm sorry it even f-cking got to this. And I'm sorry for everything that you've been through… I'm so sorry that your family has had to go through this sh-t, and the fact that you and Nat and Richie have to come to work every day and f-cking work your way through this sh-t… But when you take it out on the restaurant and the people who work here and the f-cking business and on me, it's beyond the f-cking…' It's a glorious monologue, in part because the things that frustrate Syd about Carmy—his self-absorption, his misery, his tendency to suck up all the oxygen in the kitchen—are also things that have made the show's fixation on his character frustrating for viewers. To follow Carmen Berzatto through the stages of grief over his brother Mikey's suicide, as we have now been doing for four seasons, is to feel stuck in a morass, repeating the same limited motions in a futile attempt to generate forward momentum. A far more dynamic protagonist would be Syd. Carmy says as much. 'You're everything I'm never gonna be,' he tells her. 'You are considerate. You allow yourself to feel things, right? You allow yourself to care. You are a natural leader and teacher. And you're doing all this stuff for every right f-cking reason… Any chance of any good in this building—it started when you walked in, and any possibility of it surviving, it's with you… You're The Bear.' She doesn't seem ready to hear this yet. To my ears, though, it sounds exactly right. Carmy may be brilliant, but she's the hero, the chef capable of greatness. This is when Richie makes his entrance and Syd gives him the news of Carmy's departure. ('I'm retiring,' insists a man who won't be eligible to collect social security for at least three decades.) 'I'm putting the restaurant first,' Carmy explains. Richie isn't hearing it, either. 'Just like you put your family first,' is his cutting reply. When Richie curses him out, Carmy finally confesses that he did show up to Mikey's funeral and left without speaking to anyone. It's then that Syd tries to remove herself from this personal conversation, and they urge her to stay; the implication is that she's now as much a part of the extended Berzatto clan as 'Cousin' Richie. She's around to hear Carmy give Richie a very overdue apology: 'I didn't realize how you lost somebody, too.' Carmy's moment of self-awareness takes Richie off the offensive. They share their regrets about Mikey. And the two men admit to resenting one another. Carmy envies the connection Richie has with his family; Richie hates that he'll never be a real blood relative and recalls fantasizing about having a calling like Carmy's. ('I bought a f-cking cookbook.') Which is why he can't wrap his mind around Carmy's premature retirement. Carmy tries to explain: 'I don't know what I'm like… outside of the kitchen.' He is, after all, a man so emotionally stunted, he ignores his would-be girlfriend, Claire, for months, then shows up at her door on a late-night whim. Syd has silently observed most of this tentative reconciliation, but now she speaks up with an idea for how The Bear might proceed in Carmy's absence. She wants to make Richie a partner, too. This feels right. He's put as much sweat equity into the restaurant as anyone—and, watching him charm diners and obsessively hunt for the right quote to inspire his front-of-house team, it's safe to say he's found his own calling in hospitality. Richie tries to demur at first but soon heartily embraces the idea: 'F-ck yes, Chef Sydney, it is a f-cking honor.' I love this for Richie, who has worked hard to dig himself out of the depths of divorce, grief, and self-loathing, and to become the kind of guy who can sincerely wish his ex and her new husband well. Sugar's arrival in the episode's final minutes seals the deal, just before the season ends on the image of Uncle Jimmy's two-month timer counting down to zero. There are still plenty of challenges ahead for The Bear, which has averted disaster but has yet to achieve sustainability—and for The Bear, which struggled to build a plot around this season's scramble to stop hemorrhaging money. What's promising, though, is Storer's apparent realization that with Carmy at its center, the show is doomed to keep spinning its wheels. That doesn't necessarily mean wholly robbing the 'Yes, chef!' contingent of their brooding short king, Jeremy Allen White, who has done a laudable job with an increasingly irritating character. But it's hard to imagine the show thriving again without a massive vibe shift. As Carmy phases out his presence at the restaurant, I hope we'll see Syd claim not just the menu, but also the spotlight. Along with Richie's ownership stake—and, fingers crossed, a recommitment in Season 5 to the stories of kitchen personnel like Marcus and Tina—her ascendance would prove something The Bear has been trying to say, with varying degrees of success, all along: A great restaurant is not the achievement of one superstar chef who terrorizes his employees into submission. It can only be the result of a talented team working in harmony.
Geek Tyrant
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- Geek Tyrant
Kim Kardashian in Talks to Star in BRATZ Movie for Amazon MGM — GeekTyrant
Kim Kardashian is in talks with Amazon MGM to star in their upcoming Bratz movie. After a competitive bidding battle, the studio has landed the package for a live-action movie revolving around the Bratz doll line. Charlie Polinger and Lucy McKendrick are writing the script, and while a deal is not closed, sources say Kardashian is being eyed to play the villain in the project. Erik Feig and Julia Hammer will produce for Picturestart with Kardashian, and Jason and Jasmin Larian producing for MGA. MGA's Isaac Larian will executive produce. Following the success of the Barbie movie in 2023, studios have been on the lookout for iconic toys that could have a similar pop on the big screen, and Bratz falls right in line as something that could play well at a global level, though I don't think another film in this genre could have the affect the Barbie movie did. The Bratz toy line has sold more than 200 million dolls to date globally and has the highest social media engagement across all platforms of any toy brand in the world. Kardashian has landed several Hollywood projects lately, both on the producing and acting fronts. She is currently producing and starring the Netflix comedy The Fifth Wheel, which has Eva Longoria directing and Paula Pell penning the script. On the TV front, she is set to star in Hulu's Ryan Murphy drama series All Is Fair and is also producing and appearing in the Hulu series Group Chat. That series stars La La Anthony and shoots this fall. via: Deadline
CNN
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Is this the most political fashion item ever?
Overlooked, familiar, homely… These are the words traditionally associated with the apron, a detachable, workaday garment that has historically functioned 'almost like an invisibility cloak.' So said Carol Tulloch, a professor of dress, diaspora and transnationalism at Chelsea College of Arts, in a telephone interview with CNN. Just don't tell that to Jeremy Allen White's character Carmy Berzatto in hit TV drama 'The Bear' whose tightly-tied blue Bragard apron (a replica of those worn in chic Napa Valley eatery The French Laundry) only enhances his main character energy as the show's fourth season premieres this week. Tulloch, alongside fellow London-based academic Judith Clark, a professor of fashion and museology at London College of Fashion, have recently come together for a three-month-long residency at the Chelsea Space gallery to reflect upon the apron's cultural and social values — its design and use, as well as role regarding issues of race, class, and gender identity. It's timely as the apron is enjoying something of a renaissance in popular culture — featuring, for example, in recent collections from Hermès, The Row, Dior, Phoebe Philo and Ganni and on Kaia Gerber who wore a chic pinafore-style dress while out in New York in April — and it's ability to encompass unheard stories and experiences is starting to be critically appraised. 'They've been an unconscious part of many of our lives and childhoods,' said Tulloch. 'While they only really have one function — to protect clothes — they come in many forms.' When Tulloch started critically examining aprons, they proved to be a fascinating insight into people across all strata of society, she said. 'Those I wouldn't expect to have a close relationship with aprons — academics, for example — become quite pensive when they start thinking about them.' Tulloch recalled a small show from some years ago, called 'Pinnies from Heaven' at the Makers Guild museum in Wales, exhibiting works created by artists based on their recollections of the apron. One artist talked about how, for them, the apron absorbed the detritus of all the things that happened in the home, not just the mess from cooking or cleaning, but emotional fallout too. 'That really stuck with me,' Tulloch said. For Clark, the apron is 'talismanic.' Speaking to CNN via a phone call, she observed that the residency created an immediate sense of nostalgia for some people. 'Within two minutes of coming in, people recount something of their family history,' she said. Tulloch has also looked at aprons as a tool of protection and activism for women through the lens of African Jamaican market women called 'Higglers'. 'The Higgler is still very much a part of Jamaican identity,' says Tulloch. 'She was visually defined by the apron, whether tied around the waist or as a full bib. Likewise they were worn by women who were pineapple or banana pickers, or domestic workers.' Tulloch references contemporary South African artist Mary Sibande who explores the intersection of race, gender and labor in the country with her sculptural depictions of the apron-wearing 'Sophie,' the artist's self-proclaimed 'alter ego who plays out the fantasies of the maternal women in her family.' 'Sibande's great grandmother all the way up to her mother were all maids,' said Tulloch. 'The apron has served as a visual code in movies too: African American women were often defined as maids by the wearing of aprons in films and cartoons. Separately, the suffragettes reclaimed aprons, using pinafores emblazoned with slogans as activist tools, often when they had come out of prison for their campaigning work…' But aprons weren't always a sign of domesticity, servitude or homeliness, or of being working class. Nor were they always worn predominantly by women. Research suggests that triangular apron-like garments were first worn by noblemen in Ancient Egypt, as evidenced in paintings from the time. In the Middle Ages, aprons made from leather and heavy canvas were worn by farriers, cobblers, butchers, blacksmiths and other tradesmen desiring heavy duty protection from the perils of their work. Then, during the Renaissance, European 'women of means' wore elaborate yet washable aprons adorned with lace and embroidery to keep their luxurious gowns clean. Aprons were a fixture of many employments during the industrial revolution, with strict codes delineating the styles to be worn by staff (plain, workaday) and the styles worn by the women holding the purse strings (elaborate, embroidered and made from more costly cloths). In the 1950s, the apron came to be a symbol of homemaking particularly in the United States — think Lucille Ball's Lucy Ricardo character in the 1950s sitcom 'I Love Lucy' or more recently January Jones' portrayal of Betty Draper in 'Mad Men.' Despite the garment being such a part of our collective consciousness, aprons have rarely been studied, said Clark.' Collections, such as the one held by the Fashion Museum (in Bath, England), are huge and of great cultural value and significance, but there hasn't really been sustained research done on them,' she explained. While displaying aprons comes with its own set of challenges — the style is tricky to mount due to its flat construction — Clark also suspects aprons have 'not been considered of cultural importance because of their relationship to traditionally women's domestic work.' But perhaps that's changing as the apron continues to be modernized, further cementing itself into popular culture. Thanks to Gen-Z's increasing interest in food and cooking, apron-wearing is finding a new genderless and more diverse audience. While alpha male chefs of old wouldn't often be seen in a pinafore (Gordon Ramsay aside, aprons were the preserve of a 'cook') Carmy's proud pinny-wearing is a case in point. Even Vogue magazine decreed the return of the garment (alongside the rise of what they termed 'gardening-core') in their June 2025 issue. 'There's some beautiful imagery of the late (fashion journalist and muse) Anna Piaggi with Karl Lagerfeld, using a Chanel cape as an apron,' said Clark. 'I love their shape, their mobility, that they're not fitted and so therefore are a truly inclusive garment… I love how easily the item can be subverted. It just refuses to be defined.'
