‘The Bear’ Season 4, Episodes 7-9: Breaking Down the Wedding Episode

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Welcome to the Prestige TV podcast.

We are back to discuss the pen ultimate episodes of the Bears season four.

I'm Charles Holmes.

He's Van Lathan.

Together, we're known as the Midnight Boys.

Pee-be-woo!

At Van, it came faster than I would have predicted.

We finally got the wedding episode.

All right, Van.

All right.

You were fucking reading the fucking Midnight Boys Reddit.

Now it got you in the zone.

Okay, I'm fine.

This is not the midnight boys

We have to be adults here.

This is the the house that sales and Joanna and Rob and Rob were built.

We have to and CR and CR Okay, we have to be adults before we get into the episode.

Let's do a little housekeeping and then let's do a little bit of a background and uh plot action.

Okay, so housekeeping guys, you need to stay tuned to the fucking ringer.

Higher learning is on Mondays and Thursdays.

Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Tuesdays and Thursdays, twice a week.

Midnight Boys, Wednesday, but we're dropping some shit.

We're dropping some midnight courts, dropping some drafts, Superman Fantastic Four, Jurassic Park, Iron Heart, fucking tune in.

If you want some squid game season three coverage, don't come here.

Go straight to House of R.

All right, now, background for this episode.

Today, we're covering episodes seven through nine, Bears, Green, and Tonato.

Last three episodes of the season, directed by Christopher Storer.

Joanna Kylo writes episode seven, while Kylo and Storer share writing credits on eight and 9.

So, we finally get our wedding episode.

Richie realizes Frank is just as nervous as he is about fatherhood and life as they both struggle to get young Eva out from under the table.

Carmy reunites with his mother for the first time, and after suffering a mild panic attack, shares a heart-to-heart with his Uncle Lee, played by Bob Odenkirk.

Uncle Lee tells Carmy that Michael was proud of him and that he shouldn't feel guilty for leaving Chicago.

By episode's end, Cindy and Donna bond.

Carmy and Claire rekindle the romance, and Natalie finally forgives Nancy.

Back at the bear, the team is working until the deadline to ensure that the kitchen is safe, but the computer reveals to Natalie that Uncle Jimmy is pulling the plug on funding the operation and questions if Carm and her can afford to keep this place running on such short margins.

Meanwhile, Carmy visits his mother and finally makes peace with her.

We fast forward and we're left with some big surprises.

Albert arrives just in time to pitch Ibra and the beef gang on an idea for expanding that operation across Chicago.

Marcus is named one of the best new chefs by food and wine.

And Pete finally explains to Sid that Carmy is potentially leaving the bear to her and Natalie.

You, You, when we were off bike, you said something that I had the same thought.

Our predictions were fucking wrong.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

If you're tuning into the podcast to listen to Chuck and Van predict the plot of the bear, then you're listening to the wrong podcast.

I think on the last batch, on the last episode with the last batch, I think that I said that Sid would leave and take the job.

She didn't.

I think that I said that Luca would step in for Sid.

That did not happen.

It didn't happen.

I think that I said that the wedding would be the last episode.

It was, in fact, the next episode.

So so many things.

And by the way, this tells you guys we're not watching ahead.

We're watching.

We're watching with you.

But I think what is, what is it also says is that this season has done a good job of subverting my expectations.

I feel like I'm ahead of the show and I know where it's going.

I know where it's going.

And we'll talk about it a little later.

Even the wedding episode, I was a little bit like, oh, this is not how I thought.

This is not how a typical hour-long episode of The Bear with all the Bears Autos happens.

Yeah, let's start right there.

I mean, this is obviously a spiritual successor to Fishes, right?

And you expected to get the same breakneck pacing

intensity,

particularly when Brie Larson pops up that you got in Fishes.

But what you got was

an episode that was excellent, but a really

sweet,

emotional, funny, deep dive into the Brazilo family, even more so than Fish's was a deep dive into their family.

I mean, the reason I enjoyed this episode was because it does that wonderful thing where the characters are experiencing what the audience is feeling, where they're all before the wedding is starting, Richie's like throwing up, he's puking, like Carmy's almost having a panic attack.

They're all like, we know what happens when you get all of us in one room.

And then

the episode opens up like this, this beautiful flower.

And you realize, I think the spine of this entire season

are these various characters breaking patterns.

They even say, I think Uncle Lee, played by Bob Odenkirk, says it.

He's basically just like, the best way to break a pattern.

is to break patterns.

And it was like, I wasn't expecting it, but it was almost beautiful to see these characters in a moment where they're finally like, I can do better.

I could be better.

Absolutely.

Everybody got to play a home game and everybody got to play an away game.

Everybody had the conversation that they needed to have and then they had some that they didn't.

Sugar is my favorite character of this season.

She's so hilarious.

When she sees Franny Fack and she goes, oh, like, like, and then they start their whole thing.

That being the comedic B-plot that was going on, these two bombastic characters.

When Pete, the Pete, look on Pete's face when the facts are just like, yeah, they hooked up.

He's hooked up.

Like, hey, he's like,

it was dying.

By the way, did we ever actually find out what happened with them?

No.

They don't tell us if it had something to do with whatever encounter they had or if it was something else.

But we still kind of don't know exactly what happened between Sugar and Franny Fat, but that's what I loved.

I loved that comedically, where it was just like, oh, it didn't matter.

And even, I'll be honest, we were so critical last season.

A lot of people with just the like,

it was like a fucking DJ Khaled album with the just the people fucking coming in out of the woodworks.

I thought Brie Larson was really,

I thought she fit in perfectly.

She got the humor.

She was, I was just like, oh, this is, this is amazing.

But I also,

it was, I thought everybody did a phenomenal job.

I think Odin Kirk

and

the scene with him and Carmy was really, really fucking good.

Of all of the conversations that we have here, right?

There's so many things here or in this episode that come to a head.

Yeah.

Yeah, Richie and Frank.

Sid and Donna.

Sid and Donna.

Carmy and

Claire to a degree, not really, but it's

not to, but it's the beginning of it.

Which one do you think was the one that the episode centered around?

Which conversation in the episode had to happen?

I think there's two, and I'm cheating.

I think it's Carmy and Uncle Lee, and I think it's Donna and Sid.

Because with Donna and Sid, I was just like, oh,

This is the moment when she chooses the pair.

Yeah.

Like, this was the conversation she needed to have.

right in terms of just like why am i staying here and then the realization that these people are my family that i think

all this season like sid is having like a lot of these logical arguments about why going with shapiro is better and donna weirdly is the because i was like oh

this was the first time i was like oh i didn't realize that the show was kind of telling us that sid and donna

operated similarly in the restaurant where Donna was like when it was the beef I was the person that came in, and they were my family, and did it, did it, and I was just like, oh, the show is always drawing a line between Donna and Carmy.

I didn't like her being the character to like Jamie Lee Curse did an amazing job to be like Sid, like, you love these people, right?

Was incredible.

I think it's Donna and Sid, and I'll tell you why.

Because two things happened there.

Number one,

we tie a bow on Sid's aspirations outside of the bear.

Very important.

Number two,

that scene is an appetizer

for Carmy and his mother reconciling.

Yeah.

That has to happen.

He sort of, you know, avoids her

as much as he possibly can.

She's looming around,

but

really,

As she sits down and talks to Sid,

we get an understanding of how the character has deepened.

Yeah.

Because one great thing that the bear is able to do is to create such

anxiety around two characters meeting.

You know, there's anxiety when a character has a gun on another character.

We went and saw Jurassic a world rebirth.

And there's a scene.

I'm not going to ruin it or spoil anything, but there's a scene where one character is in the foreground and something's happening in the background.

And there's a tremendous amount of anxiety with that, but those are fucking dinosaurs.

To be able to create this much

uncomfortability or anticipation around a conversation that two characters are going to have that's not life and death, but feels like more like death and life than life and death.

The show does such a great job of that.

And in this particular one, I'm like, okay,

Donna's back in now.

It's okay

to

feel something for Donna.

She mothered a little bit.

And I had never seen her do that.

Yeah.

In the show, I had never seen her like be a mom.

And the first time I saw her like be a mom was with when she was talking to Sid.

And Carmen is his mom right now.

I mean, and I think what's beautiful is that this show, even though it is so centered on an Italian family, what I think they locate when you come from a large family is whenever there's a gathering.

I've experienced this every single time I go home, every single Christmas, Thanksgiving, whatever it be, where the beefs that are happening

around the party or the gathering,

everybody like knows the backstory or knows little bits, but like depending upon your relationship to the story, it's just kind of like, oh, they're just fighting.

Like our cousins are fighting, the sisters are fighting, the brothers are fighting.

And

even the trio of our three leads, Richie, Carmy, Sid,

them all kind of realizing at the same time that they're all feeling the same emotion, that they're all nervous, that they're all afraid, that they're all fighting for something in different ways.

Even it was very on the nose, but like by the end, I even thought Ava hiding under the table and all the people coming under, I was like, oh, this is a little cordy.

But by the end, I was like, oh, this is so sweet.

Like, this is so.

Well, yeah, the Ava thing was interesting because

it was a situation that those two guys weren't going to be able to figure out.

Yeah.

And

it kind of underscores everybody gets under the table.

They all talk about what they're afraid of, right?

The only thing that can make all of those people come together and hook together like that is somebody that hasn't been initiated into their trauma yet.

Yeah.

Got to be a little kid.

Everybody going to rally around and protect the little kid, right?

So if it's about getting her out from under that table and maybe helping her find her dancing shoes or her dancing spirit or whatever, everyone would do that.

There's not one other thing that would have happened at that wedding that they all would have got around that could have gotten them all under that table like that.

A little Hokie, yeah, but that took the pressure off Richie, who I really, really,

really identified with in this episode.

Richie was just Richie is just,

he's trying to be a dad.

And normally, being a good dad,

it's about letting go but it's not about letting go so somebody else can fill in so he has to believe that his daughter's heart is big enough to love not only her father but the guy who's gonna be there as her stepdad and he has to trust a kid and that's difficult to do and it's not just that it was like there was this one moment where uncle jibby goes over to

to richie and he's just like he's looking at he's like claire's gorgeous tiff uh he's looking beautiful you too fucked up And the look on Richie, on Emma's Microsoft's face is just like, because I've been in those situations where like you're friends with a dude

and his ex is like happy with someone who's better than like, hey, if you love her, you gotta like, you gotta be happy for her.

You gotta be happy for the daughter.

I've had to have that talk with my friends with kids being like, yo,

you fucked up.

Yeah.

You kind of have to eat your and to for Richie to be graceful in that and to try to help Frank through that was almost I was just like oh we're seeing a side of him that he's been fighting against this entire series

as this functions as

a sequel to Ficious John Mulaney is back yep um and he's been in I think a couple other Paulson's back she doesn't stay for a very long time she does her thing she can kind of gets out of the episode but when you see the extended family of them and you see people who are

just

used to it.

Yeah.

That

they've been through so much.

Like Mulaney's character in this is very important because he likes it.

He's in the family.

And whereas a lot of people go, wow, these jokers are too much for me.

He's, no, he likes it.

He's there for it.

He gets it.

He understands it.

And he helps kind of Sid

get her bearings around what's going to happen because really,

Sid

is him.

Sid is him.

Yeah.

Sid, everybody else is kind of around in the orbit of whatever.

Even Frank, the guy who Richie's ex-wife is marrying, seems to be a part of their extended circle in some way.

Yeah, because he is, he high, because he has this running bit with Marcus's best friend who sold his house, right?

Yeah.

Like he worked and that guy seems like he knows the facts.

Or it's just like, to your point, I think also what this introduced to me is i'm like oh like claire is actually ingrained in these like she knows the bears autos and even tiff is like i thought because i was like wait tiff's not related to them and then she's like yeah only the bears showed up my own family did it and i was like oh the bears autos their family structure mirrors the bear in a way where they're no matter how toxic they are they're very good at adopting people into the larger family and taking care of them and they have so much love And to your point, Mulaney and Claire seem very much like,

this is just the bears.

I mean,

Claire, Claire and Carmy almost seem like an arranged marriage.

Yes.

It almost seems like they are two people that in this entire group were

fell in love, but also are designated partners for everyone.

That's why when you're trying to get at Carmy,

you know, you're fucking up with Claire.

You're fucking up with Claire.

And that's something that they use to kind of pull him or rein him back in, should I say?

Yeah,

but watching Sid

be in that situation with the wedding, with everything on 12, everything turned up as much as it can be turned up, and then still make the decision that now this is kind of her family.

She's talking to Donnie.

He says, hey, like your work family can be

just like your real family.

She says, no, it's like

it's just family.

Yeah.

It's just family.

It's just family.

and then she makes that decision not to stay at the bear but she kind of makes a decision to become a brazato in a way yep i mean and and i will say if we stay on io she's been phenomenal through this entire series i have been blown away with what this season has like asked her to do yeah for sure and how she's risen to the occasion in terms of like having the episode when her dad has a heart attack she's she's crying and she's breaking down and then this episode where she has to be almost soft and initiated into this family and talk to Donna, and she's dancing with Richie.

And even when she's becoming more of a leader in the next couple episodes, I'm like,

it's weird, but the greatest thing about watching TV is seeing young actors who kind of made their big break on a show get to do this and get to like level up.

I was just like, oh, because if we kind of flash forward, I was wondering, I was like,

is there a version of this show

where Io

is more of the lead than Jeremy Allen White, because we end the penultimate ninth episode.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

My understanding with that is that Carmy has essentially said,

I'm no longer in the kitchen.

I'm no longer even a part of the bear.

The only people who are part of the ownership group now are Natalie and Sid.

And then obviously Jimmy.

It seemed like that was Carmy's way of saying, I'm stepping back from cooking.

Like,

did I misinterpret?

I'm not sure yet.

I really don't know.

Carmy's

quest in this season is not professional at all.

No.

Which.

She seems on a parallel path to those stuff happening.

He's rarely in the kitchen.

Yes.

Carmy's deal is not professional.

It is so

subtle how they

have

switched places when last season seemed to be all about everybody's personal growth and, like, personally, what they were going through, you know,

kind of

oriented around what was happening at the bear, you know.

And Carmy was just tunnel vision, tunnel vision, tunnel vision.

One thing, chef, cook, restaurant.

And now, when you think about it,

you don't see him cooking very much in this.

You see him

diversifying his humanity, and you see everybody else kind of locking in on what has to work for the restaurant to work.

Not overly locking in, not getting crazy like he gets crazy, but

it's weird.

Like between Carmy and Sid, it's like he almost became D-Wade in the heat championship years.

Like D-Wade went out, won a finals MVP,

got Shaq a fourth ring, got his first ring.

Hey, I can beat a man at whatever point.

But then it was like, it got to a point where D-Wade, average 30, do the whole nine.

Then LeBron comes and D-Wade goes, I can win a championship averaging 22 points a game, 21 points a game.

I don't have to get 26.

I don't have to get 28.

I don't have to get 30.

Like, I can be a part of an ensemble and rise to new heights.

Now, I'm not saying that Sid is coming in like LeBron, but I'm saying it's like Jeremy Allen White is getting his D-weight on a little bit.

Well, but I think that that, what's interesting is that's made the bear more successful.

The more Carmy has been like, I'm trusting Sid to take over more.

I'm trusting Richie in the front of the house.

I'm trusting like, I'm putting Luke, I put Marcus next to Luca.

They're good.

Like,

I think it's actually, when you think about why Carmy started the bear.

This was a promise that he made, one of the last promises that he made to his brother, that they were going to open up this restaurant, the bear.

And all this season, people are like, What are you chasing?

Why are you chasing?

What are you chasing?

And then Sugar is just like, hey, if you've fallen out of cooking,

you don't have to be like, you don't have to be in love with this thing.

And have we been on this trajectory where I'm like,

is Carmy's ultimate salvation realizing that Sid has it?

Like, Sid, like, passing along this to this woman who like actually doing something better than Shapiro.

Shapiro was pitching her on, you're going to be my partner.

I think think Carmy's pitching on, you don't need me anymore.

This is yours.

We, so we have to talk about Shapiro in a second, too.

But I think that Carmy and the audience through him are supposed to get an idea of what it means, the difference between being obsessed and being invested.

Yeah.

You can be obsessed, and sometimes that feels like you're super invested, but it's blinding.

You're obsessed with something.

You're obsessed with it.

All great people that I look at their greatness all had to learn the lesson of what it means to be obsessed and what it means to be invested.

If you're obsessed, it's like, got to do this, got to do this.

But it's a very singular thing.

Yeah.

It's your relationship with whatever that thing that you're

obsessed with.

And obsession is normally about seeing you grow.

And sometimes what you think is, if I'm as good

as possible at what I'm doing, everything else will be better.

Being invested in something is different because when you're invested into it,

you want to see it grow

and you want to see the people around that grow.

Like if you're

invested into your team, then you want everybody to be better and not just you

so that you guys can do the best that you can.

And I think that

we saw in season three

that Carmy was obsessed.

And that's a part of who he is and what's made him which made him so good at singularly singularly being a chef.

Now we're seeing him try to figure out how he invests, how he invests into Claire, how he invests into his mom, reinvests into his mom, even sometimes with diminishing returns, how he invests into

the restaurant, into Sid.

And some of that has to do with letting letting go a little bit.

And watching him let go in this season has been phenomenal.

I mean, also, because you brought it up, we were talking about the first episode.

I found it so funny where

in that, we saw how Carmy, even when he was making like tomato sauce, has this tendency because he's so obsessed and shit, to almost get frazzled and not actually pay attention and put love into what he's making.

I might be wrong.

Over these past couple seasons, we've seen Marcus make food that is talking about his upbringing and his family and and trying to connect we've seen we've seen um sid make an omelet for sugar and this was one of the first episodes in a while where i remember where we're not seeing carmy try to cook something

that is like highbrow technically perfect

he's making chicken for his mom for his mom who like And it's this, I was like, oh, that's a beautiful scene because I'm like, he traveled the entire world running away from something, learning how to cook, trying to prove himself.

And he ended up at the place where he needed to be, which is infusing love.

He's like, I made this at the French laundry every single day.

Here you go.

Yeah.

And I was just like, oh, that's what he needed more than the rest of the day.

And that's the peace offering right there.

And I was like, that was a beautiful fucking scene.

Right.

And look,

his mom had gone to Italy, had this,

you know, I don't know if you've ever been mad on vacation before.

It's so wild that Kanye

ended up fucking over himself like he did and doing all the shit.

Because there are certain Kanye lyrics that when I would hear him, I would laugh.

Because when he said in Bound 2, he goes, How you going to be mad on vacation?

And I've been there before.

I've been in Anguilla with Khalika.

Like,

can we just like, just, can you just stall me out?

Just give me three days and then you can whoop my ass when we get back because

we wasting beach right now.

Like, we there's no, is no worse feeling than being on vacation.

You had gotten into a fight with your partner.

I'm like, fine, I'm going to go out by myself just like drinking that, like drinking some mixed money.

It's happened.

People, you looking around, everybody else looks like they got it figured out.

You're like, yo, can I get another Bailey's banana and cream?

And then, you know what's funny?

We got a quick sidebar.

So,

so there's a drink that they make in the Caribbean,

and it's called a Bailey's Banana and Cream.

Okay.

has anybody ever had this drink before?

I have not had a Bailey's dream.

I've never had this.

So it's Bailey's Banana and Cream.

It's like a mixed drink, right?

Now, Kai,

the drink is called Bailey's Banana and Cream.

What is that for short?

All right, you're setting me up.

No, I'm asking you because that's what the drink is called.

What is that for short?

BBC.

It's the BBC.

So you're British Broadcasting.

That's crazy.

You brought me in for that.

That's why.

Shout out to Kai.

So, what time is it, man?

Oh, yeah.

Shout out to Jack Sanders.

So we would, shout out Jack Sanders.

So we would, I remember I'm at the bar

and, you know, everybody's hanging out.

And I'm mad.

Me and Khalika and have gotten to it.

I'm mad.

And

there's a white lady.

She wasn't, I don't think she was white.

Well, she was white, but I think she was more like a Latin, Latina or something like that.

And the, you know, I'm by myself now.

And

the guy looks over and she, and she goes, can I get the BBC?

And remember, I just got in a fight with my girl.

I don't know if, what, if she's talking to me or, or to the bartender, and she goes, can I get the BBC?

And I'm like,

no, I'm not that mad.

No, you can't.

I'm on vacation.

So anyway,

did that set Kalika off?

She wasn't even there.

Kalika was over on the

thing.

I had left.

We at the beach shack or whatever,

Blanchard's beach shack in on Meads Bay in Anguilla.

And so

they got, if you have a Blanchard's, it's crazy.

It's really good.

So we, we, you know, she over there, she pissed off, whatever.

I'm, I'm mad.

So I go over there to get the drinks, and a woman walls up and she asks for the BBC.

And I'm like, oh.

Did you look good?

Yeah.

I had to ask.

Sorry, guys.

Because we had had him in Grenada, but but I had forgotten that the BBC was a drink.

Real quick.

So Donna's mad on vacation at their father,

and that memory becomes about a meal.

Yeah.

About an Italian woman who had brought her a meal when she's like crying, furious.

I forget.

Yeah, it's clipping like

tonato.

I looked it up.

It looked disgusting.

Yeah, that, that, and.

Even in

the dish itself, it's something that looks disgusting, but you have to eat it to know how good it tastes.

Bruh, that's what family is.

If you step back and you look at, if I tell people about my relationship with my dad, or if I tell people about

some of the other stuff I've been through with loved ones in my life or some of these people's lives, you would think it would look like all of this stuff was so messy and nasty and disgusting.

But

if you're there, you have to be there to understand how good it really tastes.

I mean, there was even a moment when Carmy was talking to Uncle Lee, where I felt this so much, where Carmy is almost taken aback.

He's like, Yo, my Uncle Lee is a prick.

And he's like, Me and Mikey got really, really close before he died.

And I've had those moments where I've been the person who's left home.

I come back, I'm talking to a brother, a cousin, whatever, and they're talking like they're best friends with someone we had sworn our whole life, an uncle, whoever, I thought you didn't fuck with them, did it, did it,

and then you learn the story of he was the only one around when i up yeah he helped pick me up he helped keep me company he came and got me he bailed me out the whole and it's like and it's funny because i was just like usually it is those uncle figures who have been in that state where they're like oh they're a little older they're like i was young i up i remember when i needed someone and it was interesting seeing Carmy, seeing Uncle Lee in a different light and seeing his brother in a different light.

Yeah.

In that moment, I was like, oh, that is a very honest

conversation.

It was just,

it was, that was a wonderful episode.

And it was something where it was like,

did it almost in a weird way feel like a funeral for the bear a little bit?

Which episode?

The wedding episode, where it was just like, if the season, if the series ends with this season, I could see that being in terms of just like, if Fishes was like teaching us the history of the Bears Autos, does the wedding episode be like, this is how they break the patterns.

this is their future?

It did at the time, but then the next two episodes made me wonder how long they want to do the show.

Because they could do the show for a very long time.

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Talk about the Shapiro thing, though.

You wanted to bring it up.

How Shapiro's reaction is.

I don't fuck with Shapiro.

Shapiro sucks.

There was something.

There was something that I don't know who got this idea for this type of character, but I think we've been very, very hard on Carmy in terms of like, and rightfully, rightfully so, how he's treated not only everybody out in the restaurant, but specifically Sid.

But I think if you watch the series, you can definitely say that like Carmy loves Sid on a personal level, but on a professional level, he actually thinks that she's

he respects her.

Like, this is the chef that he wants to stand next to.

And also, like, get to a point that he can leave her something and be like, even if he's out of this world, like,

yo, you got this.

You don't need this.

Run the team by yourself.

And I think Shapiro in that moment proved

he just wanted

her talent.

Yeah.

There's a difference between like, he didn't want to give her like true, true.

equity in this thing.

Like a true like, no, this is your house.

I am like partnering with you.

So this can be yours one day.

It seemed like Shapiro was building like a nice house, a nice foundation.

She would get health insurance.

She could make a lot of decisions, but she's not the boss at the end of the day.

Well, I mean, honestly, she's just another state-of-the-art thing, meaning that like

he has a state-of-the-art

healthcare system.

He has a state-of-the-art sound system.

He was showing her all of the incredible,

incredible, immaculate stuff that he was going to.

She's just another stuff.

She's another thing.

She's literally a talented black woman that you can feel cool when you're playing Auntie Up.

Yeah, she's a state-of-the-art chef.

She's another thing.

But there's no family.

There's no connection.

I don't know if he even sees her as a person in the same way that Carmy and Richie and Tina do, in terms of like, no, we see your talent as a chef, but we also see your beauty as a person in this world, in our family.

I don't know if Shapiro would ever have given her that.

Yeah, I mean, look, that's a part of

the calculus that we all have to do in our heads in terms of what is meaningful to us you know like if you're a basketball player and

you are a part of the culture of the city that you're in you know think about if like steph left golden state now it might be a time where

steph might want to leave golden state But it's not going to be for no money.

That wouldn't be why that would happen.

So so, like, when you have a player or somebody that's a part of the culture of a place, a part of the thing, like, I am definitively a part of this, for you to leave,

that

we see this all the time.

That has to be a major, major pull.

Either you have to leave so that you could achieve more, you believe more about yourself, or you have to believe that it's worth building culture again somewhere else.

And so, I think the wedding,

plus all of the other questions that she was having about herself, I mean, part of Sid might have gone, well, if my dad is sick, shit, I don't even know if I can be in a new place where I'm not really looked at as a human being.

Yeah.

If I'm going to need to be able to take care of him, you saw some of the dreams that she was having about operating inside all of this chaos and stuff like that.

You know, when she eventually talks to him, he insults her.

Yeah.

So that tells you what working with him would have been like.

If he would have treated her like a person, he might have,

he had no interest into why she made the decision.

So this is very important.

If you're listening out here and you want some advice from an old head,

in that situation where you've made a decision not to do something

and you're on the other end of the phone with somebody who actually cares about you,

they're going to be interested in what made you make that decision.

They're going to care about why you came to this, particularly if they think that you're making the wrong decision.

But if they just, if somebody just looks at you and says, what you're doing is dumb, then they've sent it themselves in a call that was difficult for you to make.

Or even if they're disappointed, doing the like, hey, I'm disappointed, but I'm here whenever you need me.

If, like, if you ever need help, if you ever need to call me up, text me, whatever, like, I'm here for you.

Did it, did it, da.

Are you excited?

You know what I mean?

But even if it's, even if it's a little bit more cynical than that, it's like, you know, I'm really disappointed.

Just what about the bear makes you feel like you can get, you can be the best version of yourself there?

What am I not offering you that you see there?

Yeah.

Right.

Just

a sliver of actual concern

for how difficult it was for you to make the decision.

Just something more than your disappointment.

Because no, and you always learn your disappointment is

paramount.

And it would have been the same way had she disappointed him in some other way, which is going to happen when you're in a working relationship with somebody.

And also, do you think it's she met Carmy and everybody at the beef at their worst?

And Carmy never hid who he was from her.

Like, Carmy's always been an asshole.

Richie's always been an asshole.

It's always been chaotic.

And I tell people all the time, especially when I'm dealing with white folks, I'm like, Sometimes it's way easier for me to deal with someone where I'm like,

hey, yo, they're all their cards on the table versus someone who is just like presenting themselves as an ally.

And I'm like, and then when they fuck up, I'm like, this is kind of who you always were.

You were just hiding it from me.

Versus, I'm like, Carmy has almost worn his heart on his sleeve

too much.

He can't help just but be himself.

And yeah, I thought

if we're talking about our predictions, what I think, I started thinking, like, is this kind of like an anti-sitcom

where

it has the structure of a sitcom?

It has the beats.

We get the wedding episode.

We get, we get the facts.

We get Richie saying little stuff like that, but it's not giving us what fans have wanted, which is the Sid and Carmy relationship or potentially Sid breaking off and competing with Carmy or like all the stuff that we were like predicting.

I was just like, The show almost went in the more, I don't want to say realistic, but the more we're not.

It's about people making weird decisions.

And

that's what life is.

Life is about people making weird decisions.

Think about how many times you didn't talk to somebody, and you're like, Yo, why you do that?

And they go, shit, man.

How many times have you been in a situation?

It's like, why do you do that?

Or

our inability

as people

to

see past the thing that's right in front of us.

And

like

every year, every moment you spend not talking to somebody that you're into it with

has to really matter because,

particularly if that person is in your family, like it's your mom, it's your dad, it's your brother, it's something like that.

And your feelings are so important

and you've centered them to such a degree that you're like, I can't fuck with them or I can't talk to them right now.

And then you have no clue

when the last time you're going to talk to that person is,

or what's going to happen during the time that you're not fucking with them.

Yeah.

But we make these decisions every day.

We make, and we, it's up, it's in our nature as human beings to not look at the big picture.

If we were thinking,

it's, it's odd.

I'm rambling, but I want to land this.

If we were thinking of the big picture the entire time we were on this planet,

we would not be able to exist.

We'd

be in existential dread every single second, every single decision.

We think and move based upon the input that's right in front of us.

And so, when I'm watching the show, I'm watching people that are trying to think about the big picture, but they just love, they love,

they're mad, they're jealous,

they're scared, they're

confused.

And that is a bigger thing.

Like Uncle is losing his shirt on the restaurant, but he just wants to be able to take care of these kids.

Like, you know what I mean?

He's, it's, he's the decision making, it doesn't make any sense.

But, but it's, and it's funny because, like, even it does a very sitcom thing where it's just like, you have the Ibra plot line where you're just like, is this going to be the saving grace?

The saving grace.

And to your point, the person that's actually looking at the bigger picture is the one person that was almost pushed to the side.

And you're just like, oh, you're like, we're watching it to the entire.

And you're like,

almost these also rans of the bear, the people that aren't doing the fine dining thing are now the ones that I was going to ask you, is

for the bear to survive, do you think that they're also saying something about the restaurant industry?

How many places do we order from DoorDash or fucking whatever you use that don't have a physical location anymore?

I think that that's an interesting question.

And it makes me think of two different things.

Number one, you

have to have the place that you're comfortable going in order to have the place

that

you're is daring.

Yeah.

Like I like a restaurant here

in

Beverly Hills.

It's called Steak 48.

Okay.

It's a chain.

It's got a couple of them, maybe five, six of them around town.

But Steak 48 never misses.

I go there.

I get the shells and the cheese.

They got lobster.

They got chicken-fried lobster.

Oh, my daddy.

So I go there, right?

And I go there when I know, when I know.

And this is not like a mom and pops.

It's like a fancier steak restaurant, but it's good.

So if I have, if it's my birthday, I'm going there.

If it's like, I'm going there because I don't want to go to a place with all different different types of shit if

I want to be certain.

But life isn't about certainty.

So the question is, how do you juggle comfort with being daring?

This season, really, we've seen a lot of people,

even in the conversation that Luca has with Tina, where he's talking about how much pressure do you want?

Yeah.

Like, how much like

of your life do you want to be uncomfortable so that you can achieve something?

Are you supposed to be comfortable?

Is there a time in your life where comfortability is supposed to, comfortability is even something that you should be trying to attain?

And there is.

Just not all the time.

We're watching Carmy become more comfortable with situations that were uncomfortable.

And we're watching everybody else adapt to pressure, which last season was more about Carmy putting pressure on everyone and breaking them into little bitty pieces.

Yeah.

And so

he's becoming whole because he's becoming more comfortable.

And some of these other people are becoming whole because they're adapting to pressure.

Marcus is the best chef, one of the top upcoming chefs.

So this is, did you see that coming?

Because what I and we haven't even talked about my man who's trying to guess the wines.

Oh, fucking our sweeps.

Yeah, sweeps.

Once again, putting a shit ton of pressure on himself.

And every single i love taking the little breathers with him as he's trying to guess the wines and do all of that stuff i thought but once again a character who started off is almost just this like a very small part of like season one and to your point i'm just like

him with the facts and they're like it's about it's not skittles

it's it also shows you how carmy has now built a place where

these other people can feel ownership of the restaurant and their role in the restaurant.

And I think the show is saying a couple of things about

just because I watch a lot of like food shows, read a lot of food shit where it's like, for some place like the bear to exist just financially in 2025, I don't know how many restaurants I've wanted to go to in LA where I'm like, my friend's like, you need to try this restaurant.

I check temporarily closed, closed, closed.

We couldn't stay open.

Did it, did it, da.

Or they'll say, we're going straight just delivery.

There's no place you can eat here.

Did it, did it, da.

I think even with Marcus's role in the bear, I might be totally wrong.

We might have to ask Dave Chang about this, but I have you ever heard that like pastry chefs in the in the uh culinary world sometimes are looked down on pastry chefs desserts

just in terms of just like you have to think about it.

There's one of Marcus

in this restaurant.

There's a whole bunch of other chefs, sous chefs doing everything.

Usually it's just Marcus in the corner away, just like grinding away, kind of just like, but he's making beautiful stuff.

We've seen this entire season, people be like, this is delicious, chef.

This is perfect, chef.

And it was interesting when Sugar announced who the best new chef is, Carmy didn't look at Marcus.

Yeah.

Carmy looked at Sid.

Yeah.

And that was even like a telling where it was just like, even Carmy hadn't located, like, had it located like

you have a best new chef in your restaurant.

you were so you and sin were so focused on like dinner and making that you didn't realize that you had this kind of like gem yeah and even luca i think in that moment was just like that i think luca with that entire time was like oh he's got good

you know what i'll is speaking of marcus

he was only in a couple of scenes in the wedding episode but

but Marcus, what's homie's name that Marcus is that sold his house for him?

I forget.

Look that up for me.

You guys know I'm not great with names on television shows.

But he's like,

when he's talking about the fact that they weren't invited, he goes,

we're about to get kids out of this fucking wedding.

I love Marcus.

Also, I've been in that exact situation with something where I'm like,

you didn't have, we're not supposed to be.

I hate that feeling.

Bro, let me tell you something real quick.

I got to hit y'all.

Chester.

Chester.

I got to hit y'all with another one real quick.

The years 2006,

maybe 2007.

Nah, it had to be 2006.

I'm living in the apartment with Dan and Brett.

Okay.

Brett Bulatek,

Dan, okay.

Our friend Nick Sheptek.

Shout out to Nick.

All these guys are Chicago guys, right?

They all went to...

Columbia College of Chicago.

We had a friend named Will.

Will was a little bit more plugged into Hollywood stuff than we were.

Cool, Will, black guy.

The rest of these dudes are white.

We go to this party.

We go to this party and we hanging out in the party and we chilling.

Me,

Nick's friend Joe, me, Joe, Dan, Brett, all of them.

These are my

still in college mode.

First got out to LA, made a bunch of friends, white boyfriends.

And I started looking around and I started looking at people.

I'm like,

yo, these people don't want us in this

like we're at somebody's house

and it was will

was either invited will gellen is his name shout out to will wherever you at brother hit me up will

was invited

or

he came with somebody will told us to pull up We pulled up.

So we inside the house, we chilling, we having fun.

We're meeting people.

people, we're doing the whole thing, like everybody's hanging out.

And then people start asking us, like, who are you here with?

Like, why are you, why are you here?

And I'm like, and you know, I'm like, yo, cool, I'm good, whatever.

We about to, we'll get the fuck up.

I'm out of here.

It's cool.

We'll, we'll leave.

So we get up.

And

I'm,

I always had it in my mind that I wasn't going to get caught up in no shit with these dudes because the, the shit would be different, you know?

This would be different.

so

we're getting ready to leave and nick sheptak

my homie nice guy tall dude white sox fan cool guy i start to see a little static there's some static

nick brett dan there's some static i'm like okay i'm about to get out

so i walk out the door right

And I'm walking out the door and there's a hill where we have to walk.

The person's house was up on the hill.

Decent, nice little house.

So I'm walking down and I see Nick

at the door pointing at people, like pointing at people, Dan and Nick, everybody.

And all of a sudden, I see people coming down the hill.

Stop.

Gigantic brawl.

Like, bruh, huge fucking brawl.

Everybody's getting bitty.

Fuck no.

Crazy.

You think I'm about to go up there?

So the cops could pull up one dead.

Like,

the cops killed one guy.

I'm sitting down there.

I'm looking.

Everybody is getting busy.

Dan is a fucking wild man.

Dan had took on like three or four people.

I got to actually go get Dan.

I'm like, Dan, you're about to kill this guy.

I got to grab Dan off of the fucking guy.

Nick.

Joe, Joe gets a gigantic gash over.

This is crazy white boy shit.

And when we was on our way to the party, Joe had on flip-flops and or one of them had on flip-flops.

No, Brett had on flip-flops, and Joe was telling Brett, don't wear flip-flops.

What if we get in a fight?

And I was letting, I was telling them straight up.

I was like, if y'all get in a fight, I'm letting y'all know I'm not about to fight for y'all on this bitch.

It ain't that type of friendship.

Showing up to another person's house you don't know of flip-flops.

And by the way,

this shows you.

We showed up.

Think how many people, none of us invited.

Me,

Dan, Brett, Nick, Joe.

It's five people.

Was it that type of five people where you can just blend in because there's so many motherfuckers?

Obviously not, Charles.

So it's like,

obviously not.

I remember looking, because at first we having fun, we playing a little card game.

We talking to girls and all of that stuff like that.

We're a hit at the party.

People are enjoying us at the party.

And then people just start to like, get the fuck out of my house.

Like, who are you?

Like, and so.

I'm like, all right, cool.

I'm gone.

Boom, I'm talking about, when I say a huge brawl, I'm talking about like eight or nine people fighting.

Hell yeah.

The dudes and eight or nine people fighting.

Dan and bust somebody up, blood everywhere.

Like, it was really fun.

And that's what.

That's why Marcus, Marcus, like, I'm around these white folks.

Around these white folks.

And we didn't see Marcus again.

Maybe we did once or twice in the episode.

Because, look, got to get out of here.

I can't.

Can't do it.

Boy, then what's the days?

Busbees.

We would go to Busbee's on Wiltshire.

We went there right after the Tony Soprano.

final episode.

Anyway, whatever.

Final episode of Sopranos.

Played Dulce.

What do you?

Because we haven't, we have not seen the season finale.

I haven't seen it.

Or the series finale.

I'm very excited.

I am just like, it is

so much of this feels like the death of one version of the bear, where I'm just like,

I might have, that might have been a total misread, but it's like, it seems like Carmy is putting his affairs in order.

He is like, I'm no longer a chef.

Y'all got this.

I'm riding off to the sunset with my girl.

I'm a because he was, he was at Frank Lloyd Wright's house in the other episode.

Like, he's appreciating art and architecture and the finer things.

He might be like.

And the conversation between him and Claire Bear, we have to talk about in episode nine, where it seems as if they have,

he is vulnerable enough with her to where she forgives him and they are back on.

Did you think that, are we supposed to believe?

Because basically, it's a very romantic scene where he's like, he calls her to talk about the mom, has to hang up.

He wants to tell her something again.

They call back.

She reveals that at one of the parties, Don almost burned down the house.

She lost a green sweatshirt.

And Carmy finds it.

And I was just like,

did Carmy keep that after that?

Has he been in love with this woman for years?

And it's been in his closet.

And he's like, I can finally give it back to her.

And him giving it back to her is like him giving himself to her.

It's closing the loop.

It seems like even him cooking his mom that chicken felt like, is this show trying to say

Carmy's journey or what he was chasing, what Tina was like, you don't have to chase the shit anymore.

You're the shit.

Is this him being like, I don't have to chase being the best chef ever?

I can move on and do something else.

Here's the question.

It's a good question.

Is Carmy's journey to become Mikey?

Mikey, who didn't have any excellence professionally, but was the rock of his family.

Right?

Whenever you see Mikey

on the show, he's surrounded by family.

They're doing something together.

He was present.

Obviously, there was a lot that was weighing on him, obviously, but he was present.

Is

Carmy's real goal, or not his real goal, the real salvation of the character in marrying that part of his brother with still being able to achieve something in his professional life?

Because remember, he asked him, first episode, first scene, when he's talking, he's like, the car rental thing, did you love it?

Did you love the car rental thing?

And he's like, no, I didn't give a shit about it.

So, I mean, there's enough love to go around, but I think this season has really been about Carmy trying to figure out how he divides himself.

I mean, that is interesting because it is funny how many people

are so surprised when Carmy shows up at the wedding or are so surprised that he's seeing his mom.

And I was just like, oh, I had not really thought of like.

Are they surprised?

Because Carmy does have that thing in him that Mikey had, which is just like

you make people better.

You make people better.

Yeah.

People want to be around you.

even if like let's say he doesn't leave cooking is there a version of his life that's okay helping being the rock that is like all right we're gonna set up little locations so we can get these sandwiches across chicago but i don't need to be in the back of the fucking kitchen doing like

like fucking high cuisine shit is it okay if the bear is never french laundry

Which, by the way, I can't get anyone who can get me in the French laundry.

Listen, I'll be honest.

You can't get anybody?

I've been trying to go eat there i bet bill been there before

bill can't get us into the french laundry it's a question i don't be wanting to ask him for stuff like that

i don't want a him to do stuff like that i don't want to have to go through bill bill you know i i is it's like if i it to me you should never you know he's kind of he's he started this whole thing you don't want to ask him to go to the french laundry you want to go you know who you want i'll give you an example

you want the shapiro in your life to get you into the french laundry oh that's tommy tommy could get you another french um tommy whatever you want the shapiro

you want the shapiro somebody that is trying to wine and dine you that's the person that you want to get into want to get you into the french laundry because then you can get them to do the favor and you can dub them after like oh hollywood hotsman but but but if

If it's the guy who is kind of the dude around here, then he, then you're going to be in a situation with him and he's going to be like, hey, remember that time I got you in the French laundry

all right i'll do the podcast man you know what i'm saying you don't want to be beholden you know

fuck good advice

all right so rather

we are so bad at predicting what's going to happen next

but

season or series finale

How are you feeling going into the last episode of the Bear?

Are you kind of like rejuvenated?

Because like I've seen, I haven't read any of the reviews.

I've kind of been trying to keep myself very pure, but I see people are like a little mixed or whatever.

How are you feeling about this season and just The Bear as a project?

I'm really enjoying it.

To me,

this season is,

I think it's incredible in terms of the growth of the show.

I'm laughing.

I'm getting really weighty, important scenes.

The artistic vision of the show, the music, all of that.

Chicago is still a major character in the show.

It's beautiful shots of Chicago.

I'm really enjoying it.

I think

sometimes I think what we do with shows like this, shows that because we don't get as many of these anymore, shows that feel like appointment viewing.

I remember that first, second season of The Bear, it felt like finally, we all have a show we could talk about again.

I think sometimes we have a rocky relationship with them in terms of just like our love and hate relationship and pushing back on the thing.

But watching the season,

what I remembered is: I'm like, oh, this show, what it's trying to say

about grief, about dealing with people in your family who have substance abuse issues, and like, how do you grow?

How do you break cycles of abuse and break cycles of toxicity?

The talk that Carmy has with Uncle Lee, and then the talk he has with Donna, as someone who has had to have similar talks with many people in my life who either alcoholism or substance abuse, seeing people take their lives and seeing like what it does to a family.

I know it's not always the most fun thing to watch.

And I know this is going to sound very corny.

I feel lucky being able to watch a show that's kind of like, we want to tackle this shit.

Yeah, we want to talk about it.

Even if it's not pretty, even if it always doesn't work, even if one season might not be as good as another.

Seeing those actors, seeing the writing, seeing what they're trying to achieve and the emotion of that,

I'm not like, I got misty out.

I'm just like, they're fucking locating something about all of that that is fucking true.

And I'm just like, I'm fucking excited to see how they land the plane, what they do.

I don't fucking know, but I thought, I think so far this has been a fucking phenomenal season.

This thing's been great.

This has been great.

Can't wait for the finale.

All right, yo, that has been your Penn Ultimate episode of our cover of the Bear.

We will be back on Monday to talk about the

talk about the season or the series finale.

We honestly don't know.

I haven't read anything about it.

Thank you so much to everyone behind the boards: CT, Kai, Justin.

You all have done such amazing work, and we'll see you soon.