Pop Culture Happy Hour - The Bear

Episode Date: July 1, 2025

The Bear is back for a new season. The FX on Hulu series sees Carmy and Sydney (Jeremy Allen White and Ayo Edebiri) trying to get the restaurant they opened together on its feet before they run out of money. Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) is thrown by his ex-wife's approaching wedding and what it's going to mean for him. Plus there's scallop drama, secret negotiations, and guest stars both new and old. To access bonus episodes and sponsor-free listening for Pop Culture Happy Hour, subscribe to Pop Culture Happy Hour+ at plus.npr.org/happy.See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

The Bear is back. Carmi and Sydney are trying to get the restaurant they opened together on its feet before they weren't out of money. Richie is thrown by his ex-wife's approaching wedding and what it's going to mean for him. Scallop drama, secret negotiations, and guest stars both returning and newly introduced are all on hand for the fourth season. I'm Linda Holmes, and today we're talking about the new season of The Bear on Pop Culture Happy Hour from NPR. are. Joining me today is NPR TV critic Eric Deggans. Hello, Eric. Yes, chef.

Are you ready, chef? I am ready, chef. Heard. Okay. So when we last saw Carmi, played by Emmy winner, Jeremy Allen White, he was swearing at a review of the restaurant, the bear. In the fourth season, we learned that the review was not so positive. The trib ate here three times at three different restaurants. The food sounded good.

Sometimes. They didn't like the vibe. They didn't like the chaos. And, yeah, frankly, I don't know if I do either. This has put pressure on everyone, especially after Uncle Jimmy, lets them know that the money he's been providing is going to run out in a couple of months. They need to turn things around in a hurry. Sid needs to figure out what to do about the fact that Chef Adam Shapiro

offered her a job at a new place he's opening. And given the chaos that is the bear, she's tempted to take it. She's played by Iowa Debris. Karmie is still pining for Claire, played by Molly Gordon, who he accidentally broke up with at the end of the second season. Whoops. As for Richie, that's Evan Moss Backrack's character. He's sweating the fact that his ex-wife is about to get remarried to a man so nice, Richie can't even dislike him, which is awkward. The new season is streaming now on Hulu.

Eric, before we get started, catch me up on sort of your release, where we're, where we're, were you with the bear when we left off in the third season? I liked it more, I think, than a lot of critics. I did too. I did, too. You know, no matter how middling you may think the actual season is, there are always at least one or two episodes that just kind of shake you up and prove what this show could be if it could fire on all cylinders in every episode. But I do think that this season was more consistent and more entertaining overall. I'm with you. I liked the third season more than a lot of people did. And I do think that this season goes back to the core relationships between Karmie, Sydney, and Richie, and to some degree, Natalie. And I think it is plugging back into those relationships in a way that I ultimately really liked. And we are, by the way, going to talk

about the whole season. So just be aware that we're talking about the whole season. It's been out for a little bit as you hear this. But, you know, in that final episode, in that finale, you really get mostly a single scene with Karmie and Sid and Richie. And it really reminded me how good those performances are and how deeply developed those characters are and their relationships are. And my feeling about this show sometimes is that I have to stop myself from taking for granted. The things I already know are great about it. Now that I've seen them a bunch of times, I think if you went back and watched that scene with those performances as a fresh show and you hadn't seen, intensity of the Jeremy Allen White performance or the comedy and deep feeling of the

Evan Moss Backrack performance or the way that Iwo Debris is so believably ambivalent about her relationships with these guys. I think if you came in fresh to those, they'd be so impressive. But now that you know those things, they get maybe a little bit taken for granted. I want to talk a little bit about that wedding episode where Richie's ex-wife, Tiff, played by Gillian Jacobs, so I think it's really good in this, is marrying Frank, played by Josh Hartnett, who I have to say, if you've seen Josh Hartnett in this, in Trap, the M. Night Shyamalan movie, and in the bonkers action movie, Fight or Flight, you have seen that Josh Hartnett is having

the time of his life right now, which I love. Talk to me a little bit about that wedding episode, because it's a little bit of a mirror to fishes, the episode that had the whole extended family in season two, but it was all kind of chaotic and terrible and everybody was miserable and yelling at each other. And this is a more joyful family gathering. And one thing I do want to say about the overall season before we get into that is that it also feels a little bit like a reaction to how people reacted to the previous season. There's less sort of obvious comedy. You know, maybe they were reacting to people refusing to believe it was a comedy. And they had more slapsticky, kind of obvious comedy.

With the facts. With John Cena. And that felt ham-handed and obvious and like a reaction. And so this season, we don't have that. But to me, there are more funny moments. I agree. And it's much easier to see why they might make the case that it's a comedy. I still don't think it's a comedy.

No, I don't either. It makes more sense this season than last, I think. Exactly. And also, you know, you mentioned there's much more conventional storytelling going on here. Because I think they, you know, they got the note from people. that, you know, we understand why you tried that. You're maybe disappearing up your own nose a little bit. It didn't quite work, and let's just get back to, you know, what we really like about these

characters. The wedding episode, I think, is an example of what we really like about these characters. It's their family in one place, bouncing off each other, and when they get together, it's, like, shaking up nitroglycerin. We kind of knew that. But to see it in a family gathering like this, I think was even better than the dinner episode. Because that dinner episode from previous seasons was fueled by the mental illness of Carmi's mother. Here we get to see Carmi's mother is struggling and has kind of gotten her arms around her dysfunction.

Yeah, she's trying. But you also see, I think also you see more of a mix of the dysfunction and the function. Oh, absolutely. That you also realize how loving these people are towards each other in many, many ways and how this family, as weird as it is, they have also kind of embraced all these other people who are not blood relatives, but who have gravitated toward them because of this energy that they have and the devotion that they have to each other. There is a scene between Gillian Jacobs and Oliver Platt where one thing you kind of wonder,

this wedding is like, why is Richie's whole family at his ex-wife's wedding? And they try to kind of bring some insight to that. Why are they all there? And why is she so close to them? And there's a scene between her and Uncle Jimmy that I just thought was small and relatively short, but really, really lovely. My family's such a mess, you know, and they're all over the place and I'm, look, they're not even here. I don't have anybody here. And the Barizano's are like a family to me. You know, you mentioned Carmi's mother, played by Jamie Lee Curtis. There's an episode between that's mostly Carmi and Dee Dee, his mom, and I thought it was beautiful and really moving. So it's like, yeah, the show's uneven. There are things that don't work. I have

never been convinced by the relationship with Claire. I don't think that's ever been persuasively interesting to me. I think that character's always been underwritten. I don't particularly like how they ended it. I don't particularly like the, note they chose to end on. But those episodes, like the wedding episode, the episode with Karmie and his mom, the episode where Sidney gets her hair done by her cousin, played by Daniel Deadweiler, of all people. That's another one of those standout episodes where they focus on a character who's not Karmie. In fact, what's interesting to me about this season is that Karmie is the least interesting character in it. And I don't really notice it. I think it helps.

the show to not hang so much of its narrative juice on his art. Right. But the thing I wanted to say about the wedding and the family, and ultimately, this wedding episode brings home the idea that the bear is a family. All these characters are a family. Well, what I was saying, like, sometimes your work family is closer to you than your family family. Oh, well, um, I mean, sometimes I feel like your work family is. like part of your family, family, though, you know?

Like, it's one big, I don't know, family, family. And what the characters are trying to do in different ways is master their dysfunction enough so that they can live. These characters talk about their feelings in a way that does feel a little unrealistic. These characters are trying, and they understand that communicating with each other is important, but the level to which they achieve that in this season,

it does feel a little unrealistic, and it does feel a little wish fulfillment. But that's what we've always wanted for these characters. We have wanted them to speak to each other and understand each other. You know, however much you like or don't like the ending, and I'm really intrigued by it, these characters understand each other at the end of it. I think that's true.

And I see your point about the fact they open up a lot about how they're feeling. But what I like about the way that they do that is, first of all, they tend to do it, particularly with characters who you can kind of see how they got themselves there. When D.D. is finally sort of talking and apologizing to Karmie for her kind of treatment of him and his siblings, she's got it all written down on note paper. And you can see that she's put a lot of time into trying to process those feelings. She's gotten sober, so you know she's done work.

I didn't know how to help him, Carmen, I didn't know what to do. I probably made it worse. I know I did. I know I made it worse. And I know that by saying that I know these things doesn't make it better, it's just, Carmen, my heart's broken. My heart's just broken. Jeremy Allen White in that long scene doesn't say a whole lot, but the performance is to me

extraordinary. You can see how he is tolerating this conversation with his mother, even though everything in him wants to run away from it. It's very important for both of them to have this conversation and his mother really needs it and he really needs it. But his instinct is bolt, run. I hate this. I want to tear my hair out. But he sits and kind of he tolerates and also loves and appreciates this conversation with her. And I thought that that episode, like, he eventually makes her lunch. Yeah, do you want, you know what? I'll make you something.

No, no, no, no, no. You just sit there. I'll make something nice. What? I'm going to make you something to eat. Okay. They could have gone a lot heavier with the experience of her eating the food that he made and everything. They play that relatively light, and I appreciated that.

The whole point of that was that he made the food instead of her. That was part of her dysfunction. She would always spin out when she started making food for the family. And it was important for him to make the food. And once we saw that was happening, that was all we needed to see. What was interesting to me about that whole moment was that Karmie has talked a lot about breaking patterns. And so even though he wants to leave, he knows that for him to get better in his own life, he's got to break the pattern of running away from his mother when she does something that, Looks like it might lead to her spinning out.

Everything in this season is about these characters breaking old patterns and learning to connect with each other because they know that's crucial to them surviving. So when Iyo's character sees this, this is what makes her choose the bear over the other restaurant. Finally, we get the ending in which Karmie decides to step back from the restaurant. And he's facing the ultimate question, which is, what if the. thing that you are best at is also the thing that is killing you. Yeah. And we've seen other shows ask that question, but I don't think we ever saw the bear consider the possibility that Karmie would accept that and act on it to save himself

and his family, which I just think is kind of amazing. Yeah, I think that's right. I also think, you know, I mentioned the episode with Sidney and her cousin, how happy I was to see Danielle Deadweiler show up in that role. because she's wonderful. Oh, yeah. You know their beefs be different. Stop, stop.

I just am an employee, okay? Put some cheese on it. I can't speak to the beef. I won't speak to the beef. Dip it, keep it wet. Listen, I can't have these. These people will come up here and they'll be rioting. And I think what you see in that is partly that Sydney is so fortunate to have people

that she genuinely is very at ease with. She's very at ease with the cousin's daughter. she feels embraced by them. There have always been tensions in her relationship with her dad, but it's not like Karmie and his mom. And so you really see that Sydney is fortunate enough to come from, I think, an emotional place where even though there's been a lot of hardship, the relationships that she's built are basically healthy, even if there's work that you always have to do with them.

I think you get an interesting look at Sydney. You get a bunch of interesting looks at Karmie. I also really loved the arc of Ritchie. working through the feelings about Frank, about the Josh Hartnett character, because that felt very realistic to me, like that he feels very threatened by this guy who's going to be his daughter, stepfather. You know, Frank is insecure too, and there's a, that felt very generous to me that neither one of those guys had to be bad. She and I were supposed to do this cute dance like a father-daughter day. Stepfather daughter day. Yes, you are acting goofy. I knew it.

You're not going to defeat. Your face, it's like, you know, you got to put your game face on, G. All right? You can't be showing fear like this. Okay. I think Richie, in some ways, is the character to me who has changed the most in the most interesting ways over the course of the show. I think when he went off and worked at Olivia Coleman's restaurant and learned so much in what seemed like such a short period of time, I think people felt like, well, that's a little abrupt, whatever. I think they've paid that off over the time.

since it happened, you've really come to see that Richie really loves the service that he does, even when it's hard and even when he's frustrated. He really loves doing it in a way that Karmie doesn't feel like he does love the restaurant work. It was so interesting to me about those two characters is that when the bear started, you had the sense that Karmie was the one who was saved by fine dining and devoting himself to perfecting his craft. and having to deal with his cousin who comes out of nowhere and will not be disciplined is his biggest bang. And then we get to the end of the fourth season,

and those roles have switched. We have one character where doing what their best at is saving them, and we have another character we're doing what their best at is killing them. And we finally realize that, and they both fess up about why they were at each other's throats when they first got together in the very first season. Very rarely in real life, do we get to have a conversation with somebody that we have that kind of familial connection to and deep-seated conflict with to resolve it?

I mean, I'm enjoying it. I loved it. But there was also a part of me sort of going, okay, all right. Yeah, I get that. As I said, I think it was easier for me because it seemed, so much of it seemed to be the result of work and thought as opposed to just suddenly became incredible. articulate at talking about my feelings. Right.

One thing that I will say is that, you know, chefs and mental health, that's a real thing. And I have a friend named Kat Kinsman who used to have a podcast about this and has done a lot of work around this in the world of sort of chefs and food. And that's a real thing. And I do hope the show has one more season. At the time that we are taping, we do not know if that's going to happen or not. I do hope before it ends, they are able to take a swing at framing this as something that maybe is an issue where Karmie could use some mental health support in addition to Al-Anon, which we know has been really, really helpful to him.

Yeah. He's had, like, grief support and things like that. But I think that mental health support would be something that at least somebody in his life, whether it was Natalie or Sydney or somebody would say something. Or even his mom. Even as mom would say something about, like, maybe you're depressed, among other things, and it would be good to address that before you make a final decision about quitting your career. But I know that maybe they don't.

Like, maybe this is another realistic thing that maybe they don't. Maybe those conversations don't happen in those kinds of spaces. And, you know, what's interesting to me, too, is that I think one reason why the TV industry responds to the bear so much, is that I, part of the progression of these characters is maybe letting go of the idea that excellence only comes from torturing yourself. Right. Excellence only comes when you feel like crap and you've pushed yourself to the maximum. And you've been horrible to other people as well.

Well, yeah, if you're pushing yourself to the maximum, I mean, I think everybody can kind of relate a little bit to resisting the idea that excellence involves, you know, working so hard that you only live your job and you don't enjoy it at all. I do want to mention one last thing that I enjoyed, which is I think that you and I both feel that the use of John Sina last year was sort of a low point for the kind of... It's not that I don't like John Sina because I do. That was the first time... I mean, I really liked the use of all the guest stars and fishes,

and I've talked about why that was. But I felt like this was the one where it was like, all right, now you're just being silly, right? And the same went for the kind of what too many... real chefs showing up as themselves last season as well. They got away from that, but there's this whole buildup of this character they've talked about before named Francie Fack, who everybody knows that Natalie and Francie hate each other. Nobody knows exactly why Natalie and Francie hate each other. And as this wedding is approaching, they're talking about Francie coming to the wedding.

And you're thinking, who's this going to be? It's going to be somebody, right? And as you're coming up to it, it's like, who is this? Who is this? And then it's Brie Larson, and I think she's terrific in this and really funny. She has great comedic chemistry with Abby Elliott. Oh, yeah. I know what that looks about.

I don't like it. You can apologize whenever. No. No. No what? No. No. Well.

Yeah. Well. No. Oh, Will. Well. I'm francy fucking back. Well. Why?

And all the Brie Larson haters out there, I'm telling you, you got to stop. I didn't believe it when it started. I thought she's been great in the MCU. I think she's been great. and lessons in chemistry and other shows, and she knocks it out of the park here. But not just her, you know, cameo. Bob Odenkirk returns as an uncle, quote unquote, and has a really great conversation with Karmie. He told me you made something with ants.

Tell me you worked at the best restaurant in the world twice. Yeah, I believe you. He told me it was proud of you. Great scene. Great scene. I guess this is where I come down on this season. Like I can absolutely find things in here that I don't think work nearly as well. I had issues at the ending.

I have issues with Claire. I think having Karmie sort of say he's going to step away from the restaurant, but I don't know whether that's really what they're doing. And it seems like they're still in a point where Sydney's very worried about that. I don't know that it felt resolved to me. But like when I look at these 10 episodes, there is so much in these 10 episodes. there is so much in these 10 episodes that I think is so, so good. Absolutely.

It makes me really glad that they have done this really complex work and made this piece, which, like, if nothing else, just there's so much good acting. Yeah. That makes us at Facebook.com slash PCHH that brings us to the end of our show. Eric Deggans, thank you so much for being here. It's always wonderful to see you. Yes, chef. Thank you, chef.

heard and just a reminder that signing up for pop culture happy hour plus is a great way to support our show and public radio and you get to listen to all of our episodes sponsor free so please go find out more at plus dot npr.org slash happy hour or visit the link in our show notes this episode is produced by liz metzger and mike katzif and edited by our showrunner jessica reedy and hello come in provides our theme music thank you for listening to pop culture happy hour from npr i'm linda holmes and we'll see you all next time.