‘The Bear’ Season 4, Episodes 4-7: A Contained Dish

Chris and Andy talk about the lack of a defining show of the summer due to the binge-drop releases of ‘Squid Game’ Season 3 and ‘The Bear’ Season 4 (6:00). Then they talk about Episodes 4-7 of ‘The Bear,’ particularly the standout, Episode 4, which was cowritten by Ayo Edebiri and Lionel Boyce (17:48). Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Producer: Kaya McMullen Video Producer: Jon Jones Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:28Chris Ryan?

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• 1:03Speaker 02

  Stand up and walk now.

• 1:06Chris Ryan?

  Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at TheRinger.com. And joining me on the other line, he loves a wedding, it's Andy Greenwald.

• 1:17Andy Greenwald?

  I do love a wedding, actually.

• 1:19Chris Ryan?

  I miss weddings, man. I need my homies out there to have second weddings or something because I don't get invited to enough.

• 1:25Andy Greenwald?

  Here's the issue, I think. I think generally-

• 1:27Chris Ryan?

  We're talking about the bear, by the way.

• 1:28Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, we're gonna talk about the bear. We had a little run. We had a nice little run. You know, people getting married like 10, 15 years ago. And we made the most of it. We left it all on the dance floor.

• 1:39Chris Ryan?

  I sure did. There's a part of my frontal lobe that's still on Sean Fantasy's wedding dance floor.

• 1:46Andy Greenwald?

  I'm still waiting for my invite, but-

• 1:47Chris Ryan?

  Because I drank too many gasolinas that night.

• 1:50Andy Greenwald?

  But, Chris. I don't think I understood how deprived we were until we started working with our good friend Kaya.

• 1:58Chris Ryan?

  Who goes to a wedding every weekend.

• 1:59Andy Greenwald?

  Who has been on this bachelorette wedding train for what seems like years. I want to say years. Now, Kaya, do you think that that's generational? Are you just more popular than us? Or is there some, okay, that one's obvious, but is there some COVID related, like, nothing happened for a while and then everything happened in the last few years?

• 2:18Speaker 04

  I think you guys are just forgetting what it was like to be in your late twenties, early thirties and like, how many of your social circle decides to get married?

• 2:27Chris Ryan?

  It's true.

• 2:28Andy Greenwald?

  I think we forgot most of our late twenties because of the gasolinas we were drinking. I think that's possible, but I still think you're just more popular than us.

• 2:37Chris Ryan?

  Andy, it's great to see you, man. I want to talk to you a little bit about episodes four through seven of The Bear for season four. This is our previously stated plan to break this season up into three. A little bit of like news and notes and observations at the top. One is, you sent me a text the other day that I found very telling about the state of things, which was, I think, a two-part text that was, A, Squid Game is back for the final season.

• 3:04Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 3:05Chris Ryan?

  Did you know that? And B, even though I believe it had only just moments ago or the night before been released, you were like, did you see what, what happens at the end of Squid Game? Now, I'm not going to spoil that for people who are making their way through Squid Game or haven't seen that. But I did want to say, this kind of got me down the road of looking at, is there something missing this summer? Like, I sometimes feel like I associate summers, our summers past, with usually a George R.R. Martin show. Like, I feel like Thrones often ran during the summer, House of the Dragon, the first season at least, I believe, or the second season certainly ran during the summer.

• 3:44Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 3:44Chris Ryan?

  That we often have a tempole show that releases week to week during the summer. And I was like, what is, what was the plan for TV this summer? What's going on? And I went back and read a couple of summer previews for this, uh, for the 2025 summer. And they're all significant titles, but so many of them were binge drops that I feel like we went straight into a black hole of like, yes, Squid Game and The Bear are out, but like, this is the most I've, the most acutely I have felt the negative impact of a binge drop on a period of time in television in a long time.

• 4:18Andy Greenwald?

  Do you also feel that, you know, there, there have been down summer movie seasons in the past and generally like-

• 4:25Chris Ryan?

  Movies are, are so back, yeah.

• 4:28Andy Greenwald?

  But, but, but like in the, in the Entertainment Weekly era, they would be like, oh, this summer has a bad case of sequelitis. And it was like, a lot of the tent poles were continuations of franchises they were cooked or people didn't want more of. Is there an element of that with The Bear and Squid Game? Now, we're going to talk about the second batch of The Bear episodes as you teased, and I'm actually pretty positive about them.

• 4:48Chris Ryan?

  My man went into a microwave. They call him Vinnie Johnson. That's how he microwaved up these bear takes, got a little warmer.

• 4:55Andy Greenwald?

  But there is, there, there definitely is fatigue associated with both of these franchises. So I think that might be into consideration too.

• 5:04Chris Ryan?

  The Bear's not a franchise, it's just a show. I mean, that's the thing is it's not like, I mean, neither Squid Game will be a franchise, but like, these are just TV shows that three years ago were the biggest television shows in the world, or at least in like our world, right? Like Squid Game was literally the most popular show when it came out. And The Bear is one of the most critically adored and like, at least among its fandom, beloved shows in this decade.

• 5:29Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, so anecdotally, do we have any sense that like, is Squid Game still the biggest show in the world for the week that it comes out? Like what the takeaway, my understanding, okay, so my thing, before we talk about the summer generally, my takeaway from season two of Squid Game. Is really based on my own personal experience with season two of Squid Game, which was, oh, Squid Game's back. Let's watch some Squid Game. I'm good.

• 5:51Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 5:52Andy Greenwald?

  Now, I don't think that was necessarily the global response because judging by the way Netflix has talked about it and, you know, in their F Y C campaign and stuff, it seems like it hit whatever internal metric they wanted it to hit on their global servers. So, season three, they're probably equally happy.

• 6:07Chris Ryan?

  And I think along with Stranger Things provides Netflix with homegrown IP that they can riff off of going forward for the next decade.

• 6:16Andy Greenwald?

  But, but I would say the biggest, I think the biggest connector for me about what's different this summer, and it's, it's actually relevant to you bringing up The Bear and Squid Game, is that both The Bear and Squid Game were out of the blue surprises. And surprises that felt organic, that felt natural, that felt like something you could not only enjoy that you weren't expecting, but something that really you could talk to people about. I mean, this, I've said it before, I'll probably say it again before we're done talking about this season of The Bear, but like, one of the reasons why you and I are still just so fond of the show was the experience of collectively discovering it felt like a wonderful blast of nostalgia of how we used to process culture. So, it's

• 7:01Andy Greenwald?

  possible that there is a show of the summer that we haven't, it's not on our radar yet.

• 7:05Chris Ryan?

  I think that there's also a lot of, I think, to some extent, the streamers have definitely invested or seeded Summer to Y A. So, Ginny and Georgia, We Were Liars, Summer I Turned Pretty are all pretty big shows.

• 7:20Andy Greenwald?

  Exo Kitty?

• 7:22Chris Ryan?

  I don't know that one.

• 7:23Andy Greenwald?

  That's a thing. I'm not just, I didn't have a stroke.

• 7:25Chris Ryan?

  What is Exo Kitty?

• 7:26Andy Greenwald?

  Exo Kitty is, I believe, also adapted from a Jenny Han property. I think it's like, it's like a To All The Boys kind of spinoff. I'm looking at Kaia as if Kaia is 14, but she's not.

• 7:35Chris Ryan?

  I mean, maybe we should just call it what it is. It's Jenny Han Summer, and we're just not, we're not in that tent right now.

• 7:41Andy Greenwald?

  Chris? As someone who glamped recently, I actually am in the tent in the same way that I was in a tent with my children, because this hasn't come up on the podcast yet, but my older daughter is Ginny and Georgia Pilled. That is her favorite show in a way that it is maybe her-

• 7:58Chris Ryan?

  There's Mad Murders on that show, right?

• 8:01Andy Greenwald?

  She and I have a, what I like to think of as a loving agreement, that I'm not really gonna ask what's on the show, and she's not gonna start murdering people across multiple states and marrying many people. Like, you know what I mean? This is the first thing that I, that I know of anyway, that at least it's a good sign that she's talking to me about it, that she has just kind of discovered whole cloth on her own. It has never once aired on our television. It is completely a her on her laptop experience.

• 8:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 8:32Andy Greenwald?

  And I have, I've done a little light research on it. Can't say it's really ticking my interest boxes, but yeah, it is super pulpy, super grabby, right?

• 8:46Chris Ryan?

  This should be your Tipper Gore moment. This is where you slap parental advisory stickers on YA shows. This is your-

• 8:52Andy Greenwald?

  No, no, no. Let's lean in a little bit here. Just, let's just you and me talk, right? I think I'm gonna be the cool dad. This is my play, okay?

• 9:00Chris Ryan?

  Well, this is what you can do. Does she, what, does she, did she read or watch Summer I Turned Pretty?

• 9:05Andy Greenwald?

  She didn't read it. She is aware, checked it out, not for her, she said. That's not her vibe.

• 9:14Chris Ryan?

  Okay. She, it's like, you could get ahead of that one, right? And be like, you know, but I think that would be pretty awkward for you two to watch.

• 9:20Andy Greenwald?

  I think there's a couple, there's a couple issues here, then we can get into the adult programming, but, as apparently she is as well. But like, there was a, I remember we like went a New Year's Day hike, like, three years ago, and on the hike, she spent the entire hike telling me in granular, bloody detail, the plot of The Hunger Games trilogy. And at the end of that hike, I was like, well, you can only parent them for so long. You know what I mean? It's like, you can build a ship and then the ship must go out to the ocean, and she now knows things that I never even wanna know. So, yeah. How do you think it's going, my cool parenting? Just like, just again-

• 9:58Chris Ryan?

  So far, so good. Yeah, I think that you probably just need to go meet her where she is, and you can't really expect her to say like, oh, yo, dad, like, what's a cool movie I should watch this summer, you know, like- You know, squid and the whale, like, I don't know, like, you can't, you can't bring them like your sensibility, you have to let them bring it to you.

• 10:16Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, so thus, Ginny and Georgia is on, is on repeat. So, yeah, I, I mean, look, there's, there's a couple extrapolations one could make. I mean, you were suggesting that this is a sign that we have like outsourced our entertainment to young audiences, but like, are you familiar with the Marvel Universe? Like, everything is for young audiences. It does seem strange to me that for all the ways that the streamers, unless so in recent years, but certainly like in the first few years of Netflix's dominance, like, they were being pretty smart about seasonal counter-programming. Remember, we used to talk about how Netflix figured out that actually, you know, contra the way schedulings have been done for decades, holidays are a prime time to put new content up.

• 11:00Chris Ryan?

  Cause you have a captive audience, yeah.

• 11:01Andy Greenwald?

  You have a captive audience, family at home. What that, you know, that means the press might not be, they might be on vacation, but Netflix doesn't really care about that or care about us. It is kind of surprising that some of these streamers haven't really aggressively programmed, I guess I would say, like, thinking persons or adult programming in the summer, which is, you know, more traditionally, like, you know, Jurassic World keeps getting reborn on the big screen. But, A, there's always kind of some stuff, like Department Q is a summer show, but B, the other thing I was gonna say-

• 11:29Chris Ryan?

  Gilded Age is, yeah.

• 11:30Andy Greenwald?

  I want to talk about Gilded Age. The other thing is just that we're still kind of, we're still seeing the after effects of the strike. Like, yes, it is a major, major problem for everyone, creators, streamers, consumers, podcasters, that like CGI-heavy shows, consensus shows like House of the Dragon, take two years to make. But had the strike not happened, I'm not saying that would have been on the summer, but something would have been on in the summer.

• 11:57Chris Ryan?

  Yeah. Well, and also, I think that we need to probably be aware of our own biases where there are and is seemingly now a 12-month-a-year Apple TV schedule that is like up, running, and fully pumping out shows. So, Stick is on, which we both checked out and weren't really into. Smoke, which is the Dennis Lehane Show with Taron Egerton-

• 12:15Andy Greenwald?

  We should check it out.

• 12:16Chris Ryan?

  Is coming, is, is out now, and the first three episodes came out. Morning show is coming back like they basically have a new show every five weeks, pretty much, um, if not more frequently than that. So there's a lot of Apple stuff. And then on HBO, Gilded Age is the Sunday night show. And then just like that is the, is the sort of midweek show that they have. And I'm sure both do quite well. Um, we just haven't really chatted deeply about it.

• 12:41Andy Greenwald?

  Okay. So I asked you to do this.

• 12:43Chris Ryan?

  And there was a glamping, uh, plot line on and just like that this week.

• 12:46Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, how'd they do?

• 12:47Chris Ryan?

  They went to Governor's Island.

• 12:49Andy Greenwald?

  Oh, famous, famous outdoorsy location. Did they?

• 12:54Chris Ryan?

  There actually was a very amusing plot on and just like that this week where Carrie and Miranda are, uh, forced to not forced to, but they, they are roommates for a week because Miranda's having some real estate difficulties.

• 13:06Andy Greenwald?

  Oh.

• 13:07Chris Ryan?

  And, uh, they have a lot of like, they're, they, you know, first it's a bunch of nostalgia about how they used to live on Bank Street back in the nineties together and how fun that was. And then instantaneously, it's like Miranda eats Carrie's last yogurt and it's, it's like War of the Roses. And I was kind of wondering what it would be like if we lived together.

• 13:24Andy Greenwald?

  Could you, for, okay. So many great topics springing off of this, just branching off into a delightful podcast tree. My first question for you is just off the dome, could you tell me Carrie and Miranda's rank choice voting in the recent Democratic primary?

• 13:37Chris Ryan?

  I think they're lander people. Yeah.

• 13:41Andy Greenwald?

  I think maybe best case scenario. No, I think Carrie like put Scott Stringer first because she respects like just long-term professionalism in office.

• 13:48Chris Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 13:49Andy Greenwald?

  I think she probably put lander.

• 13:50Chris Ryan?

  Miranda's no, Miranda might've gone Zo.

• 13:53Andy Greenwald?

  I Cynthia Nixon.

• 13:55Chris Ryan?

  She works for Human Rights Watch kind of stuff now. Like she does a lot of like, yeah, she's.

• 13:59Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, fine. I think she could be, she's convertible. You know what I mean? Like she's probably okay with, she, she is now like, let's rally around the blue.

• 14:06Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 14:07Andy Greenwald?

  But I, I swear to God, I have not watched a frame of and just like that. But I think Carrie is right now meeting with significant business leaders, wondering like who they can put on.

• 14:16Chris Ryan?

  You think Carrie and Bill Ackman?

• 14:17Andy Greenwald?

  I think Carrie and Bill Ackman. I think they're taking a meeting with Eric Adams, being like, he's suggestible. Maybe we could suggest some things.

• 14:24Chris Ryan?

  Why are we talking so much about the New York mayor race on this podcast now?

• 14:27Andy Greenwald?

  I want that enthusiasm back in my life. I just drove through a police action to get here. You know what I mean? I want to go glamping on Governor's Island for God's sake. Okay. If we live together.

• 14:37Chris Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 14:37Andy Greenwald?

  And obviously we would watch the bear. We are going to keep talking about it. What do you think would happen?

• 14:42Chris Ryan?

  Well, I would ask you to watch Gilded Age with me.

• 14:45Andy Greenwald?

  That's it? That would be the only?

• 14:47Chris Ryan?

  No, I think if we live together, if I had to be completely honest, we would start one of the greatest career modes on FIFA ever seen.

• 14:57Andy Greenwald?

  This is such a dream.

• 14:59Chris Ryan?

  We would talk about our youth program all the time for Nottingham Forest and how we were like building up the academy. And we would, we would trade off seasons like, I have to go play every European match tonight. I'll see you later.

• 15:12Andy Greenwald?

  One of my favorite things about us living together is that I no longer have children. So, because in my version of this,

• 15:18Chris Ryan?

  Oh yeah, that's right.

• 15:20Andy Greenwald?

  I talk about my kids and then you talk about your quote unquote, "youth program." You know what I mean? And like, that's how we find a way to connect.

• 15:28Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 15:29Andy Greenwald?

  I think you, we should just get an apartment in New York. We could just like, we could vote in the mayoral race, you know, we could play video games, whatever you want.

• 15:35Chris Ryan?

  I'm not paying fucking New York rent just to vote for Zorit. That's not, that's not what I'm doing.

• 15:40Andy Greenwald?

  I'm saying, you know, you're liquid.

• 15:43Chris Ryan?

  If we get stabilized, if he wins and we can get that a cap on that, maybe I'll go back.

• 15:48Andy Greenwald?

  Do you think you're one of the working people that he's campaigning for?

• 15:52Chris Ryan?

  I work a lot.

• 15:55Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, Gilded Age though, for real, I've been teasing this. I really, I don't mean to like make you go off the dome again, but like, I, I am a suggestible voter. You know what I mean?

• 16:05Chris Ryan?

  Andy, I can only do so much, man. You gotta check it out. I honestly do feel like if you started season three, episode one, you would be able to deduce what's going on fairly quickly, even though we are so deep and so far into the rabbit hole of so many plots. There's like 20 different plotlines going from which butlers are rude and which, you know, which maids are rude versus like, which butler wants to create the new alarm clock. There's a bunch of stuff going on with the industrial age and just, it's just a lot of Carrie Coon being a boss bitch and trying to get her daughter married to a duke, even though she's in love with a different guy.

• 16:47Andy Greenwald?

  That's a pretty good sales job.

• 16:49Chris Ryan?

  Cynthia Nixon and Christine Baranski lived together as widower sisters, you know, like, yeah.

• 16:56Andy Greenwald?

  That's us.

• 16:56Chris Ryan?

  If they had FIFA, like.

• 17:00Andy Greenwald?

  Maybe they could go, well, first of all, butlers are inventing alarm clocks. Like, how far away are they from PlayStations in this version of American history?

• 17:08Chris Ryan?

  If we fostered, we incubated that talent correctly, yeah.

• 17:11Andy Greenwald?

  Can you just give me, though, like, not just specifically me, you don't need to be like, and they go to local spice markets, like, you don't need to give the AG version of why I should watch Gilded Age. I genuinely think for people who have heard the first part of this conversation, and they're like, what am I, what's my obsession this summer? Maybe they used to F with Downton Abbey a little bit, so they're not immune to the charms of a show like that, and obviously has the same creator. But they have been digging the pit, or maybe they're off of Last of Us. Like, what is the, what is your pitch? Like, your penny stocks, you like TV, you're a little bored right now. Is it, is it purely Carrie Coon is a boss bitch?

• 17:49Chris Ryan?

  The most expensive soap opera I've ever seen starring every single great Broadway actor we have.

• 17:55Andy Greenwald?

  There you go. Kaya, did that work on you? She says maybe. Not enough to lean forward into the microphone, but she did.

• 18:03Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 18:04Andy Greenwald?

  She said maybe.

• 18:05Chris Ryan?

  Should we get into the 4 through 7 run of The Bear, season two?

• 18:08Andy Greenwald?

  Kaya's just Googling Exo Kitty spoilers in the corner. I could tell. She's completely checked out on this discourse. We have to talk about The Bear now.

• 18:17Speaker 00

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• 20:23Chris Ryan?

  Okay, so when we last spoke.

• 20:25Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 20:26Chris Ryan?

  Andy was, I would say, pretty tepid, pretty, pretty alarmed by the first three episodes.

• 20:35Andy Greenwald?

  I was.

• 20:36Chris Ryan?

  As was I on my first viewing of them. I liked three more than the first two. And then I was like, you know, but as the season goes on, as you sort of start to see maybe where things are going, as you watch certain plotlines emerge out of the montages, out of the vibey filmmaking, which I also am a fan of. Maybe the first three episodes start to make a little bit more sense. And maybe in the general, like the season coheres. I think one of the things that's challenging about the way that we're talking about this, which is very humane to just say, hey, we're going to talk about this hour and a half to two hour block of TV. I think the entire season's a little bit more than six hours. Is that it's not made that way. I don't think it's really been made as a, hey, here's the second act.

• 21:21Chris Ryan?

  And now everything is being set up for the end or anything like that. Episodes don't necessarily have cliffhangers. And when they do. I think you can kind of feel like, oh, I have a feeling it's gonna go one way or another. This is more about like the challenge that this person has to overcome to get to the next stage in their personhood. I was curious whether or not you started to feel the seasonal coherence around this second batch of episodes.

• 21:49Andy Greenwald?

  I love the question. I also love the way you've set me up. I like these episodes a lot, and there's things that I loved, and we're gonna talk about them. But you have managed to formulate a question that's gonna lead me off in a negative way.

• 22:00Chris Ryan?

  Oh, okay.

• 22:01Andy Greenwald?

  So, kudos. This is just, God, we've only been living together for 10 minutes. Friction's already starting.

• 22:09Chris Ryan?

  I just feel like you're always putting me in a bad mood, Chris.

• 22:13Andy Greenwald?

  Can't you just support me and my choices with how I wanna start the day?

• 22:18Andy Greenwald?

  This season of television, if you look at it as a season of television of 10 episodes, is psychotic. It is a chaos menu. And I do not feel differently about the first three after watching the much better four, the okay five, the really good six, and the really pretty wonderful seven. I do not feel at all differently about the first three. This is, and I promised myself I wouldn't start with a food metaphor, but here I am. This is like going to a restaurant that explains its menu to you and says, "The kitchen's just gonna send out dishes as they're ready."

• 22:55Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, right.

• 22:55Andy Greenwald?

  But then, you've been there for 10 minutes, three dishes are on your table, and one of them's a dessert, and then they clear them and bring you a perfectly plated entree. And then before you're done the entree, they throw it on the ground and bring you six more plates of tapas. Because episode four, which is sort of a Sydney, you know, bubble, a bottle episode is overused, it's not really a bottle episode, but it is separate-

• 23:16Chris Ryan?

  Four, five, and six is, I think, fair to say is like a Sydney art.

• 23:19Andy Greenwald?

  It is a, it is a showcase for I.O. the debris. It's- It absolutely can be grouped that way, but particularly Four is not like the other ones in terms of its focus, in terms of its complete remove from the Brusato family, extended family drama. Janix Bravo directed it in a style that is quite different, I think, visually from Chris Stor, and it is a contained dish. And I think you could say the same thing about Seven, even though, you know, Odenkirk's avail for one day, okay, you could feel some of the labor going on behind the scenes, but it is absolutely a contained

• 23:58Andy Greenwald?

  statement. That said, there are moments of such beauty and grace and thoughtfulness in these four episodes that, God, it forgives a lot of sins. You know, this is, I'm gonna make this, I'm gonna try to make this the last restaurant metaphor I can, but I am

• 24:17Chris Ryan?

  No, I think it's actually very useful for the discussion of this show.

• 24:20Andy Greenwald?

  I am a big, big, big, big, big believer. And I'm actually, I feel like we've asked Chris Stor a version of this in the past. I'm a big believer that food is maybe, maybe top five reasons that a restaurant meal is good, except on very, very rare occasions. It is almost entirely the service, the vibe, the company. You forget food. Even the best food you've ever eaten, it's very, very hard to remember, course to course. You remember the experience of being there and having eaten it. And so to that, if you believe in that, then yeah, I'm not, I was alarmed after the first three episodes. I, that's in my rearview. I don't have the desire to revisit them, but I also don't feel, I don't

• 25:05Andy Greenwald?

  have the sour taste in my mouth anymore.

• 25:06Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, I guess, you know, it's really more experiential. I don't, many people, most, I would say 90% of people listening to this, or with Disney Plus or Hulu accounts, don't have six hours to watch all of The Bear in a night, or whatever, maybe in two days. But I wonder whether or not The experience is different the more episodes you watch. Because while it may be very frustrating to start episode after episode and feel like, you know, one of the things that I observed is that, you know, something consequential will happen, or you'll get to a point, Sid's gonna make a phone call, Sid's gonna make a decision, something is gonna happen. And then the subsequent seventeen, eleven to seventeen minutes of television is quite beautiful,

• 25:51Chris Ryan?

  but it is, it's wandering, it's intuitive, it's hey, like, here's, here's people helping each other, here's people talking about what they're afraid of, here's people talking about their insecurities, here's a slight comic scene with the facts. Like, it's, it's not like this has to happen so that this can happen, so that this can happen, so that this can happen. It's way more slice of life. But I think what I was reacting to in the first few episodes and got used to in the second batch of episodes to some extent, was the fact that the slice of life is very specific. The slice of life does not include diners at all. Like, there's never a situational kind of like,

• 26:32Andy Greenwald?

  Right.

• 26:34Chris Ryan?

  This person, I mean, yeah, you have the whole thing with the critics and the Michelin star, and like, whether or not they're gonna get one or whatever, but you would think, if you wanted to make a ten-season show about a restaurant, or even a four-season show about a restaurant, one of the things you could do is pull a bunch of restaurateurs and be like, what are some funny things that have happened in your restaurant? Or some crazy things that have happened in your restaurant? Or some dramatic things that have happened in your restaurant? And The Bear is almost entirely behind the scenes.

• 27:03Andy Greenwald?

  Back of the house.

• 27:03Chris Ryan?

  You know, it's back of the house. Now, I wonder whether or not part of the reason why, like, my emotional reactions come when Richie creates snow for a cancer survivor, is not just because of its beauty, because it's sent a sentimental moment with a person who's overcome something, but because it's a different, it's not a buzzado, and it's somebody who's like, come to this restaurant, and you finally get to see the face and the feelings of someone who's experiencing the dining, rather than laboring over it and dying for it.

• 27:35Andy Greenwald?

  Look, shows are ultimately a reflection or an expression of what the creators are interested in. And The Bear isn't that interested in the food either anymore. Like, there are two examples of-

• 27:49Andy Greenwald?

  I'm not counting Tina making a cauliflower dish for her husband in this. Like in these episodes, there's two examples of plated dishes being tasted, savored, and celebrated. It's Marcus's beautiful dessert. The one that cracks apart? And you eat the dish. Yeah. And Shiso, chef. It's Shiso. And Sydney making a perfect two-component, maybe because of the... Scallop. The scallop. They're like, they've lost all the other opportunities to do it. And so both of those dishes are in the service of Carmen recognizing the talent in others and stepping back, which is basically his storyline this season. I think that there is no...

• 28:30Andy Greenwald?

  I think that one of the frustrating experiences of watching the show is that when... If we are operating under the assumption, again, we have never had this officially confirmed, but if we continue to operate under the assumption, and frankly, at this point, there's very little plausible alternative, that they agreed to make more episodes without necessarily making more story. They didn't... There were two choices. One of the choices was to celebrate episodes and create episodes like episode four, which is like, okay, we have a little more time and space than we thought. What else can we do with it? And I think one of the smartest, and it was really exciting, opportunities that Chris

• 29:13Andy Greenwald?

  and Joanna Calo, as showrunners, took was they empowered Io, who's been increasingly more involved creatively, as I think many of the people in front of the cameras have been. She directed last season. This episode, she co-wrote with Lionel Boyce, who plays Marcus, and Janix Bravo comes in and directs it. And this is an episode that I, as a white dude in his 40s, feels comfortable saying could only have been written by black artists who are younger. Yeah. And it reflects that experience. There's elements to it that were really thrilling to see suddenly on this show. A, no brussados. B... Sydney's hair, what that means to her, what it takes to have it done.

• 29:54Andy Greenwald?

  Then the introduction of Chantel, like the brilliant Danielle Dedwiler. There's a moment in, she's so good. And again, what is one of the things that Bear does well? Guest casting and she comes on and there's a moment early in the episode, before you sort of get lost in the emotional hamburger helper of what's to come. When she gets, she's doing Sydney's hair and she gets a call and she code switches so fast. You like, my neck snaps. And that's performance, but that's also insight and perspective. And that is an example of the show successfully taking the opportunity of more time to add nuance and shading to otherwise very, you know, internal dilemma, which is Sydney's gonna have to make a decision.

• 30:39Andy Greenwald?

  Carmen also has one of those. Carmen's gonna have to make a decision about whether to stop being sad or not. That's extremely internal and watching him eat a scallop and be like, huh? Is less dramatically exciting and engaging than what episode four was.

• 30:55Chris Ryan?

  Yes, I thought four was like, was just such a breath of fresh air. And then also helped me, I mean, honestly, I don't want to keep doing this, but like, it was about, it was almost like a palate cleanser. And I felt like ready for the rest of the season, almost after four. Like, I was like, oh yeah, this was A, a gear shift down, B, in a different setting, C, gave Sid the character a much different environment to be in and also allowed, like, there were certain qualities that I think that the Sid from the restaurant had at Sid, at Chantel's house. But at the same time, it was like a much different, like vibe from her, a much different kind of feel from her.

• 31:38Chris Ryan?

  And it was really cool to see her be kind of.

• 31:44Chris Ryan?

  You know, not a maternal figure, but like definitely like hanging out with a kid all day and, and you know, somewhat speaking in metaphors. And I think that the show is somewhat, yeah. I mean, like Sid is definitely speaking in metaphors. Like Sid is putting up a lot of, a lot of hurdles to like just saying what the thing is and trying to make a decision. And she's talking about apples and she's talking about sleepovers and

• 32:06Andy Greenwald?

  Honestly, she sounded like she was thinking about coming over to our apartment in New York because one of us is the greatest video game player. And, you know, the food's pretty good. Um, yeah, there also were, and I want to give credit when it's due, like it's, it's not as if it's just all tossed together. Like there are, there are little ideas, little flavors that reoccur enough to be noted. And in this episode in 404, um, the kid, whose name I'm forgetting, says, you know, something my mom says is, sometimes you go with people, sometimes you go without them. And I was thinking that came into my head

• 32:46Andy Greenwald?

  when in episode seven Richie is telling Uncle Oliver Platt about the Japanese garden. About are you the rocks? Are you the sand? Um, you know, I, I think this idea of people, people are the worst. People are the best. You can't go it alone. Sometimes you have to be alone. How do we navigate this? How do we navigate community, individual genius, collective? Like, these are all rich topics that the show is unafraid of, of dealing with. But sometimes they are just feel less sharp because of the morass that they are occasionally afloat in.

• 33:23Chris Ryan?

  I think, I think I learned, I think I figured this show or this season out a lot more when I let go of

• 33:35Chris Ryan?

  My expectations that there was gonna be,

• 33:39Chris Ryan?

  that a lot of the rewards were gonna come from plot and narrative and more from ideas about like how to, how to heal yourself as a person, you know, and like to your same point of what you just said about the line Sydney had, I think Claire has a line in Seven, or maybe when they're at the hospital, actually with Sydney's father.

• 34:00Andy Greenwald?

  It's a great scene.

• 34:01Chris Ryan?

  And Claire says something about like worrying about people and them worrying about you is all we've got.

• 34:07Andy Greenwald?

  She says that to Sydney.

• 34:08Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, and that's not like the healthiest place to be mentally, but it is actually like a pretty accurate description of.

• 34:14Andy Greenwald?

  Hold on, I'm getting a call from my therapist, who does.

• 34:17Chris Ryan?

  Hold on, I'm getting a call from my mom.

• 34:19Andy Greenwald?

  Well, maybe we should just conference.

• 34:23Chris Ryan?

  Kai, can we have a Zoom with nine people? And then can I go play FIFA?

• 34:28Andy Greenwald?

  And then just run the clip of Karmie saying, "It's really noisy in my head."

• 34:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 34:32Andy Greenwald?

  I, there's some more specifics that I really like, but I, let's stay on Sydney for a second because

• 34:39Andy Greenwald?

  if, if one of the joys in serialized television and one of the joys exemplified by The Bear is falling in love with characters and also falling in love with performers that you weren't familiar with, and then watching them take advantage of opportunities, like Io is the top of that list. And her performance across these three episodes, carrying over into Seven, is exceptional. Like really, really, really tough work, really moving. It's one of those TV things where it's not rocket science, right? Where like, the plot crashes in, like the Kool-Aid Man, into a fixed storyline and blows it up and gives people an opportunity to react to something. And it can be cheap, it can be manipulative. Sydney's dad having a heart attack after a couple scenes of him being like,

• 35:21Andy Greenwald?

  "I can't quite reach you, not feeling so well today, gonna go sailing on my boat, it's called Live Forever."

• 35:27Chris Ryan?

  Yes, yeah, he's McBane'd.

• 35:29Andy Greenwald?

  Who gives a shit? Because of what we got from that, you know? Like her, her, her performance and the way the phone call comes and the way she tells Karmie, "But don't tell everyone," and then she goes and the way it feels and the, the crying scene is just extraordinary. It's extraordinary. And in some ways, I think Molly Gordon is the MVP of the season so far because she.

• 35:50Chris Ryan?

  She's the sin eater.

• 35:52Andy Greenwald?

  Yes. She is such a naturalistic, present actor that she allows every scene partner she has such grace to let loose, to be themselves, to just be present with her. And she's very, yeah, there's nothing, you said that perfectly. She, she just absorbs it and then, and then reflects back just enough. I was so moved by that scene and then also felt weirdly, even though it's mushy, I felt sturdier because I was like, now her decision making, which, you know, it hasn't, it's just been hours of screen time for not opening docu signs.

• 36:33Chris Ryan?

  The, uh, the partnership agreement from the bear.

• 36:36Andy Greenwald?

  That, and then, then ignoring Shapiro's calls and texts and whatevers.

• 36:43Andy Greenwald?

  Suddenly it had a foundation of like, what is actually at stake here, you know?

• 36:48Chris Ryan?

  I would love.

• 36:48Andy Greenwald?

  And I thought it was great.

• 36:49Chris Ryan?

  I feel like you would love especially a bottle episode of like, all of this from Shapiro's perspective. Like, he's working on his new restaurant. He's, he's trying to set the vibe with a playlist. And then he's like, he's, she just won't write me back. What's going on?

• 37:06Andy Greenwald?

  It honestly, it's a little bit like when I, I, I, I've done a first pass setting up our New York apartment and you walk in and I'm playing MOP really loudly. And you're like, yeah, it's good. It's good. It's really cool vibe.

• 37:19Chris Ryan?

  Man, it's cool. You still listen to this?

• 37:20Andy Greenwald?

  Huh?

• 37:21Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, that's fun. How old are we? Um, yeah. So the, basically like after episode four, which is a Sydney bottle episode to some extent, or like a separate Sydney side mission, uh, there is a two episode arc. One that culminates with, uh, finding out that her father has had a heart attack. The second is his recovery ish. I mean, finding out that he's going to be okay and what is going on at the restaurant. I wanted to ask you what you thought of Sydney's insistence that Carm not tell anybody and his failure to do so, but then there being really no consequences to that. I thought that was fine and actually quite normal. Like that's what happens is like, people get very protective or freaked out when something like that happens to them. Sometimes they're like, please don't say anything about

• 38:06Chris Ryan?

  this to anyone. I don't want to, maybe I don't want to have to answer a hundred questions about this or have the same conversation 50 times. But a lot of it is also like, I have a. I walls up, but I don't want to have like multiple real heartfelt conversations with people. But then we see the entire staff of the Bears, just like, we love you. Like, we're sending you an edible arrangement, we're calling you, we're checking in.

• 38:29Andy Greenwald?

  I, I think it's just an example of how sometimes the show fights the more obvious TV solution. Like, so much of the emotional storytelling of the Bears is, is internal. Which is just so hard to, to dramatize, especially when you spread it out over two seasons. So you just drop an I R L bomb into it, and then everyone's reactions are suddenly more appropriate. And they're pitched at a different level, and you could see the shading of Carmy's humanity, right? That he is not just a wall. Like, he does have, there, there's gradations to how sensitive he can be, or how appropriate he can be. That this, you know, unspoken bond between these people who are a found family, like, when tested, is resilient, and there is love there.

• 39:14Andy Greenwald?

  So it's just, it just, it's like a stress test, in a way, that worked for the show. It also, I think, gave some meaning and shape to five and six, coming after the strong four. Because otherwise, back at the restaurant, it's just kinda more of the same, except now with more old friends coming to visit. Because now Will Poulter is there in the regular cast, because the show just can't stop adding people and dishes and love and heart. Was I mad to see him? No.

• 39:42Chris Ryan?

  No.

• 39:43Andy Greenwald?

  Um, but, you know, it, it does feel like a beat we saw at the beginning, when the entire front of house staff from Ever suddenly crashes the party, you know? Um, but, like, what, what I, what I've found so, it's not maddening, but I've found noteworthy, is that you come out of episode four, feeling a certain way about like, goddamn, when the show just focuses, it is so, so, so precise and so sharp. And then you begin five, with what I felt was like a similar display of precision. It, five starts back in an Al-Anon meeting, which, you know, on our podcast last week, I was like, you know, the third episodes always begin with Al-Anon meetings, and I've caught them out, and so, okay, here we are.

• 40:25Chris Ryan?

  It's Kate Berland telling a story about her brother.

• 40:27Andy Greenwald?

  Telling a story.

• 40:28Chris Ryan?

  Think her caricatures brother. Yeah.

• 40:29Andy Greenwald?

  Dude, this is another masterclass of solo performance. It's a phenomenal monologue. She's excellent. Like, this is really, really, I found this to just be really, really high quality, really compelling, vulnerable, screen acting.

• 40:44Chris Ryan?

  A very real story.

• 40:46Andy Greenwald?

  Yes. And a real story that has, is, is not, you know, not everything that the bear sort of tosses out casually lands, like casually like apart from the main story. This did, and I'm feeling it, and it's, you know, it's vibrating in my body. And then Carmen goes and tours a Frank Lloyd Wright house.

• 41:05Chris Ryan?

  See, I, okay, this is a perfect example of, I think, something taken in totality versus something taken in, in its, in isolation. I actually feel like this is where the season Carmy-wise starts to turn.

• 41:21Andy Greenwald?

  Tell me.

• 41:22Chris Ryan?

  And that, yes, it's easy to say, we've been in these rooms with Carmen before. We've been on these creative, uh, sort of sojourns with him before, where he's looking for inspiration. But I think as you start to see him as a blocked, emotionally and creatively blocked person, who can't get over his personal shit to be the professional person that he's capable of being. And then there's that, the fact that those two scenes are together, I do think is crucial because I think that's one of the, maybe not the first time, but it is a time in one of those rooms where Carmen actually hears himself in another person.

• 42:02Chris Ryan?

  And if this entire season is about learning to rely on other people and learning to trust other people and learning to be there for other people, more importantly, it's not surprising to me that his next step is a create, is a creative one. It's almost a creative breakthrough, even though it maybe doesn't lead to anything obvious in terms of his cooking the next scene. But I think I get it. I think I get that this unlocked something in him and that unblocked something in him. And I, I kind of started to see a little bit of a path here. And then that really starts to come clear, become clear in Seven, to me.

• 42:36Andy Greenwald?

  I think that's really interesting. It makes me want to re-watch it. I found it kind of inert and frustrating. Beautiful. And, you know, again, I hope Chicago's giving them tax breaks at this point for the way that they just continually to explore the real city as a real character. But I, it just struck me again as. Another noble attempt to solve what I kind of believe is an impossible problem on television, which is a main character who has no one to talk to. Like, there's a reason why Special Agent Dale Cooper had a tape recorder to talk to Diane. There's a reason why Tony Soprano had therapy with Dr. Melfi. Like, you need access to characters on television.

• 43:16Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, but like, I would way prefer him having these walks around Chicago or stoically staring than have Ghost Mikey show up every five seconds.

• 43:25Andy Greenwald?

  A billion percent. Like, the worst version of this is Jon Hamm's endless self-explaining monologue on your friends and neighbors. Like, there are bad solves for it. And I think it's good faith attempt to not do the bad thing. And I'll say it for the thousandth time. If this was all in the first, in the first go-round of the final season, maybe we would have had three examples of him thinking it over, not six. And then it would have felt different.

• 43:53Andy Greenwald?

  But, you know, it just felt like if you are, it just struck me as, if they suddenly had more space on their whiteboard, there's different ways to fill it. And a Sydney episode is, for me, a good use of the time. Kate Perlant speaking, good use of the time. Him touring a landmark, not as good use of a time. But then also particularly jarring in the way this season has been jarring, because these episodes, you know, four, bang, episode seven, bang, episode five and six, kind of episodes, but then also some other stuff thrown in. Like the Tina cooking with her husband scene. Happy to see her real-life husband David Zias again.

• 44:30Chris Ryan?

  There's a tension here with this season that I think I want to pick at, because it gets completely wiped away in the seventh episode.

• 44:39Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 44:39Chris Ryan?

  But one of the issues with the show that I think maybe I was on a subconscious level responding to, and it was funny that this is coming up, because I actually, we were watching, I was watching In Just Like That with my wife last night, and I was just like, who are all these fucking people? Like, why are there 14 characters on this show and two of them I care about? You know, like, what is going on? I don't know if you know this from like a background standpoint in terms of like behind the scenes, but like when shows are in their third, fourth season and we are spending less and less time with the main characters and the aperture is widening to include the stepkids of a third character or like the gardener or in this case, many, many, many

• 45:23Chris Ryan?

  facts now.

• 45:25Andy Greenwald?

  Yes.

• 45:26Chris Ryan?

  Um, the Gary and Ibrahim's journeys to either financial success with the takeout window or learning how to be a samiye, um, you know, uh, more and more and more layers of family members and staff at the, at the restaurant. Do you think that you like, because that's really what five and six have a lot of is like these sort of digressions of like, of people hanging out with Nat's baby, which are actually quite delightful in and of themselves, but maybe like a little bit of a deviation from what you're talking about in terms of like, I want Richie, Carm and Sid to be in a room together.

• 46:05Andy Greenwald?

  There are rich creative reasons to expand the aperture, as you said, and we see it across the history of television that we love. And the main reason is characters bloom on the page and come to life in the casting.

• 46:15Chris Ryan?

  I was never like, why is there a new person on Mad Men?

• 46:17Andy Greenwald?

  Exactly. And, and then the writers, you want, it is palpable when writers are writing towards things that they get excited about and care about and want to see more of and want to interrogate and give us, you know, different glances and different, different insights into. That's a wonderful thing and it has happened with The Bear to our benefit. There is also, without knowing the specifics of either Just Like That or The Bear, there are practical reasons to do it. And the practical reason is, um, you want to reduce workload on your, uh, top of the call sheet people. And particularly you may need to reduce that workload, um, as the demands on their time increase as they become more and more famous and successful.

• 46:59Chris Ryan?

  Sure.

• 47:00Andy Greenwald?

  Um, the gymnastics required to get a third and fourth season of The Bear on the schedule that they get it out on, which we're always, you know, championing.

• 47:13Andy Greenwald?

  Absolutely. I have full confidence saying this without ever having seen a call sheet. Require just outrageous dexterity and a lot of like, okay, well, we're gonna lose Evan for 10 days here. We're gonna lose Jeremy, or we've agreed to let Io go shoot to do pickups because, you know, projects are generally also very respectful to each other. Everybody wants everybody to be able to do everything and succeed. So, supporting characters, completely separate plotlines suddenly become essential. There are moments in watching this season when maybe I'm seeing things, but I feel like, oh, Bruce Springsteen is in this scene, but Carmen from season two and three is in this scene, which in my

• 47:56Andy Greenwald?

  mind is like, oh, well, this is one of the things that they shot when they were block shooting seasons three and four last year. And then this seems more like something that they shot when they were doing, quote, "a few days of pickups" in February. Having an entire plotline about the sandwich shop that only requires Ibrahim, those dudes whose names I don't know, but I love seeing, the robot and Rob Reiner must have been a huge boon to production. Those storylines, have they crossed over at all?

• 48:23Chris Ryan?

  No. Carm is aware of it, obviously.

• 48:26Andy Greenwald?

  Well, he's not aware of it as of six.

• 48:29Chris Ryan?

  He's aware that Ibrahim's like, "I wanna create opportunity for myself and also for the bear." And he's just like, "I've done a poor job listening to you about this," like, or whatever he says. I bring all this up to say, sometimes it can feel like a distraction or sometimes you can be like, "I have an itch I can't quite scratch," and it's wanting to see more scenes of Carm just interacting with people on like a regular, because like, I wanna see him be like, "Hey, can you hand me that spoon?" You know?

• 48:59Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, but did you feel positively? So, in the midst of Sydney at the hospital, there's a pre-service meeting.

• 49:06Chris Ryan?

  Where it's the group and they have like the rat-a-tat dialogue.

• 49:09Andy Greenwald?

  Yes, and Sophie's there. That's the episode where, you know, Sugar has brought Sophie into the kitchen and Luca's there now and they're doing it. And in the middle of it, it explodes into a classic Richie and Carmy screaming at each other.

• 49:21Chris Ryan?

  Which is also an exposition. Moment so that they could explain who's Francine, who's, why are these people mad? Why are you, why are you upset at your, your kid's stepdad, et cetera?

• 49:30Andy Greenwald?

  And I loved it. It was like, oh, it's the Gary's Old Time Tavern episode of Cheers again. Like, like, here we go. Like, it's the thing that we-

• 49:37Chris Ryan?

  It also perfectly works to set up seven.

• 49:40Andy Greenwald?

  And it's a scene, and it's an example that like, sometimes, clearly, they don't want to play the hits. They can play the hits. I would argue that Richie and Carmen having their squabble spread so thin is, is hurting the show's central relationships. Like Richie bringing up the, you know, locking yourself in the fridge again. Felt a little, like, how much time has passed since that? How many times have they spoken? Have they just not spoken really for three to six months? That felt a little, that felt a little too spread thin for me. Like, like, I kind of wish they had had this out already. But again, because of the nature of the story and how many episodes are left, they couldn't until now. So I was generally glad to see it happen.

• 50:26Andy Greenwald?

  Your mileage may vary, literally yours, Chris, or the viewers, on like, how much you wanted, how much you needed an update on Chester's real estate career with Marcus. Like, yeah, I like Carmine Christopher a lot.

• 50:37Chris Ryan?

  I like Carmine Christopher a lot, too.

• 50:39Andy Greenwald?

  He's on The League. He's on The English Teacher, like, great actor, so funny. But like, that scene, it's, it's, I don't know. Sometimes people, some people are, I'm not, I never want it to be misconstrued that I'm expecting, like, bang, bang. I don't want this to be Ozark. I don't want like, a season, an episode. But the way that it is structured can sometimes be confounding when just when you feel like, okay, we're humming, we're humming, we're having a good service, then suddenly it's Marcus and Chester. Now, is it a nicely written scene, performed by two actors? I'm thrilled to see. Yeah.

• 51:12Chris Ryan?

  Then maybe we're being, so is that, is that a customer problem or a restaurant problem? Is that us?

• 51:18Andy Greenwald?

  I, I think it's a restaurant, I, I think it's a restaurant problem because the show keeps telling on itself by, by reminding us what it's capable of.

• 51:25Chris Ryan?

  Right. So then we find that out in seven.

• 51:28Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, let's, so, so, so let's talk seven. Seven's the big one.

• 51:31Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, so it's worth noting, this was, we, we've talked a little bit about the credits for the previous episodes. I'll mention that- That Karen Joseph Adcock wrote Replicants, which is episode five. Storr directed that. Sophie was written and directed by Storr. That's episode six. And then seven is written by Joanna Calo and directed by Chris Storr. And is a massive, massive Altman-esque assembly of characters. Now, as Andy mentioned, there are a lot of cameos from characters or guest stars who have appeared in previous episodes. The Bears become something of a, one of its signature moves is to have like

• 52:14Chris Ryan?

  an expansive breakout, long episode. Obviously fishes from season three.

• 52:21Andy Greenwald?

  Season two.

• 52:23Chris Ryan?

  Season two, ice chips from season three. And now bears from season four, which is this massive wedding between Tiff, Richie's ex and Frank. Is that? And Frank is played by Josh Hartnett. If you haven't watched this episode yet, I would recommend you skip ahead or maybe come back after you've watched it. Cause there are some like just spoilery cameos and stuff like that. But for the most part, it's people we have seen before.

• 52:48Andy Greenwald?

  I would argue that this is, I don't think, I would, I would push back on that. There's, there's one debut, casting debut that the internet has pretty much spoiled, I think, for most people, especially if you follow this person on social media. She spoiled it herself 24 hours after the show premiered. But two, nothing quote unquote, happens in this episode. Like aggressively, nothing happens. It is a series of, no, I'm pro. I really liked it. I just mean that I think it's essentially spoiler proof because it is an hour of shuffling the deck of pairings and re-pairings of people, talking things through, generally to very beautiful and emotional places.

• 53:29Chris Ryan?

  Yes.

• 53:29Andy Greenwald?

  This is, I love this shit. You should see my top 10 movies of the century list that I'm making for the times. It's all just like dudes.

• 53:35Chris Ryan?

  That you're making for the times? Are you still working on it?

• 53:37Andy Greenwald?

  They've asked me to make it for the, no, I'm acting like this is an assignment. Yeah, because I fucking had it done. And then I forgot Paddington two. That's my brand. So I'm like, ah.

• 53:47Chris Ryan?

  But Andy, just pick the movies that you fucking like. Don't worry about your brand. Don't worry about people reading it.

• 53:52Andy Greenwald?

  Also, I'm never gonna share it with anyone but you, but you're my roommate now. And there are standards, okay? So I'm sorry, I'm not just like, what did Michael Mann direct? Done. Like, I'm just like, you know?

• 54:06Chris Ryan?

  That's not me.

• 54:08Andy Greenwald?

  Okay, so what did Tarantino direct? Anyway,

• 54:13Andy Greenwald?

  I'm not, I love, I love shit like this and I'm a mark for this episode and I was very moved by it. But I, I was just pushing back on the, this isn't the episode where the restaurant shuts down.

• 54:23Chris Ryan?

  Okay, so I, what I really wanted to do here, we could talk about what we liked, what we, you know, I, there was really very little of this that I didn't like. I just want to say that I thought the, and I have finished the season and I, and everything, the Odenkirk scene is the best, one of the best scenes in this show, this, this entire series. The scene between Jeremy Allen White, Bob Odenkirk, Uncle Lee and Carmy in hiding, both for different reasons, hiding out from the wedding in a kitchen, sharing a piece of nicotine gum and...

• 54:54Andy Greenwald?

  But you were an easy mark for that part.

• 54:55Chris Ryan?

  Well, it's just, it's, first of all, it's, it's real, like, it's just like a thing. It gives Carmy something to do. He's like, I'll open this for you. Like, it's, there's an action involved. It's not cooking. And second of all, uh, it really is cool to see this, you're waiting, because Lee's one of the sort of antagonists of fishes to some extent, like, he's the one who's getting under Mikey's skin so much. And Carm references this multiple times and Lee's like, guess what, big dog, like, I was able to change. Like, people can change. They're not who they were in a very special episode of television all the time. And if you listen to me and if you will maybe go listen to your mother,

• 55:40Chris Ryan?

  like, you'll see that people can do work on themselves. And I think that's essentially, Carm comes to us as this damaged genius that we are familiar with from TV shows. And the thing we need to do is keep those guys damaged and smart.

• 55:56Andy Greenwald?

  Yep.

• 55:57Chris Ryan?

  And the whole point of this series might be, what if he can undo the damage a little bit? You know, like, that might actually be what this show is about and not about food.

• 56:07Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, and I think also, um, it's a really beautiful psychological observation too, which is that we carry fixed versions of people in our heads and we are constantly arguing with them, hearing their voices, you know, whether it's criticism or love or whatever, like, we carry something of some, of people with us all the time. And one of the challenges of being an adult is realizing you can't be responsible for other people, you cannot change other people, you cannot expect other people to change. But, they could.

• 56:36Andy Greenwald?

  And then sometimes it's hard to allow that same grace to the fixed version of them that exists in our head. And I thought the scene was beautifully played. I thought it was really well written. Mostly, I was just so grateful because this was a scene when Din Djarin finally took off his fucking helmet.

• 56:53Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 56:54Andy Greenwald?

  Do you know what I mean? Like,

• 56:55Chris Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 56:56Andy Greenwald?

  It it it's almost become a

• 56:57Chris Ryan?

  Thank you for using his given name, by the way.

• 56:59Andy Greenwald?

  Well, you know, this is the way.

• 57:03Andy Greenwald?

  Jeremy Allen White is such a good and intuitive actor that he has been doing these a season and a half in a straitjacket. And I I really think that this was an

• 57:13Chris Ryan?

  Him being a little prick to his uncle is great when he's like, what did you guys throw shit at each other? Like,

• 57:18Andy Greenwald?

  Not his uncle. Who says it later in the episode? I've met that guy seven times and I still don't know who he is, talking about Odenkirk. Like,

• 57:26Chris Ryan?

  Oh, yeah. But I thought it was like, brother's gone, you moved in. I thought that would make him his uncle, his dad's brother.

• 57:31Andy Greenwald?

  No, I think he's like, I think he's more like his mom's boyfriend, like guy in the neighborhood who's like, maybe her boyfriend was the implication. Like, listen, I, I, the closest you could ever get me to doing the Charlie Day crazy, uh, chart?

• 57:47Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 57:47Andy Greenwald?

  Meme?

• 57:48Chris Ryan?

  Is the Brusato family tree?

• 57:49Andy Greenwald?

  To explain how any of these people are related to each other. Um, I can't do that. But I thought that that I agree that that scene was was wonderful in the way that only the bear can be, which is we are going to allow people to act their asses off. We're going to allow them to demonstrate psychological complexity and interiority. And we're going to just be big, open-hearted mushos about it. Um, with great stars.

• 58:13Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 58:14Andy Greenwald?

  It works sometimes, you know, the the formula really, really works.

• 58:18Chris Ryan?

  On top of that, I will say, uh, I, because there's a main part of this episode I really want to talk about, but I just want to mention quickly that, uh, the Pan to Mulaney and then him being like, Pete, shut the fuck up.

• 58:33Chris Ryan?

  First of all, when did Mulaney become so good at cursing?

• 58:36Andy Greenwald?

  Uh, I think after rehab.

• 58:38Chris Ryan?

  Okay.

• 58:39Andy Greenwald?

  I think, I think there's a before and after time for him.

• 58:41Chris Ryan?

  That scene of him being really is, he's hysterical in that scene and then his description of like, how he would almost be disappointed if there wasn't a car crash of

• 58:51Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah.

• 58:51Chris Ryan?

  of bullshit is such a sly line of like, why we're watching this show, you know, like.

• 58:56Andy Greenwald?

  Well, Mulaney is excellent on the show and I think of all the people who were sitting at the table in fishes, as much, I mean, I'm a huge fan, obviously. Uh, we talk about him and we praise him all the time, but of all the people sitting around that table, he was the one when he was revealed and we were watching season two, where I was like, huh? Is this, has Chris Stor's friendships gone too far? Like of just inviting his, uh, his, his favorites on his iPhone. What I love about Mulaney is that the character is delighted to be there, which I think Mulaney kind of is delighted to be there too. And the bit that he doesn't fit into this tapestry at all is also, has been leaned into. And everyone's like, who are you? Why are you here? What is your connection?

• 59:39Chris Ryan?

  Also, I love that like whatever workout plan Mulaney is on over the last couple of years, gets a shout out on this show where they're like, you look like Chris Chelios.

• 59:47Andy Greenwald?

  She's like, you look beautiful?

• 59:50Andy Greenwald?

  Do you feel like, did you see, do you follow Mulaney on social? Do you see that he's now started a book club where he was just like?

• 59:55Chris Ryan?

  I did.

• 59:56Andy Greenwald?

  He's like, Play World is the best novel I've read in a long time. Like, is he just, is this a bespoke F Y C campaign for you at this point?

• 1:00:04Chris Ryan?

  But I'm, I'm already, my comedian book club membership card is already, I gave it to Jezzelnik.

• 1:00:09Andy Greenwald?

  It's already punched.

• 1:00:10Chris Ryan?

  So it's like, and he did Play World earlier this year. So, you know.

• 1:00:14Andy Greenwald?

  Is this like when George Lopez would steal jokes from other comedians?

• 1:00:17Chris Ryan?

  I'm not saying anything, I'm just saying.

• 1:00:19Andy Greenwald?

  Are you going to get aggravated by Marin for this?

• 1:00:21Chris Ryan?

  Don't, why is that?

• 1:00:23Andy Greenwald?

  This is, oh.

• 1:00:24Chris Ryan?

  Why is John Mulaney stealing Jezzelnik's book club ideas?

• 1:00:30Andy Greenwald?

  We're gonna get to the bottom of this.

• 1:00:31Chris Ryan?

  It's a big, it's a big tent. You know what it is? It's also a really big cake table. Um, so.

• 1:00:36Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, wow.

• 1:00:37Chris Ryan?

  This episode, uh, concludes with or culminates with, uh, a.

• 1:00:42Andy Greenwald?

  I'm gonna stop you there. There's 20 minutes after the scene ends.

• 1:00:45Chris Ryan?

  Well, there's dancing, right? Like there's, there's lots of stuff.

• 1:00:48Andy Greenwald?

  There's lots of stuff. It's not bad. There's just lots of stuff.

• 1:00:52Chris Ryan?

  There is a fabulous moment where there's a cake table. Richie's daughter, Richie and Tiff's daughter is hiding under there. She doesn't want to dance in front of everybody for a father, stepfather, daughter dance. One by one, the characters from this show go underneath the table, which continues to sort of grow and expand and eventually house, I think probably a baker's dozen of adults. And they're all sitting cross-legged and talking about what they're afraid of because, uh, what's, what's their daughter's name? Eva?

• 1:01:30Andy Greenwald?

  Ashley?

• 1:01:32Chris Ryan?

  Whatever it is, it's, it's all good. Uh, she needs to hear that other people are also afraid of things and there's, these things vary from AI to not being creative enough, you know, making wrong decisions.

• 1:01:46Andy Greenwald?

  It's Eva.

• 1:01:47Chris Ryan?

  Eva. I was close. Eva.

• 1:01:51Chris Ryan?

  And to me, this scene was like finding the money in the tomato cans. It's like a moment of magical fantasy within, or magical realism within a show that's fairly realistic and fairly gritty and fairly, hey, like, if we don't get the gas turned off, we're going to fail the inspection. It's very, it's very real, but then every once in a while has a kind of, you wouldn't believe how many people we got under this table, you know?

• 1:02:23Andy Greenwald?

  It, if anyone listening has been to the Broad Museum, there is a piece of art there called "Under the Table" by Robert Tarian, which is like a five-foot tall table that you can walk under. And I feel like that was the inspiration for this scene.

• 1:02:35Chris Ryan?

  Do you want to go there together next week and I'll tell you what I'm afraid of?

• 1:02:39Andy Greenwald?

  At, at the museum, then we can go back to our apartment.

• 1:02:41Chris Ryan?

  And I'll just be like, I'm worried we don't have enough depth at Left Wing.

• 1:02:44Andy Greenwald?

  And I'll be like, for FIFA, don't worry, I got Hot Pockets for dinner.

• 1:02:51Andy Greenwald?

  You're so moved by this.

• 1:02:52Chris Ryan?

  I'm worried this 21-year-old Argentinian's gonna turn down our contract offer.

• 1:02:56Andy Greenwald?

  My daughter is binge-watching three seasons of a show about a woman who has killed multiple partners in life. We all have our hopes, dreams, and fears. That's what the episode was about. Look, here's the thing about The Bear. The Bear is at its best when it is a fantasy. Not a fantasy like Wheel of Time, but a fantasy like an inveterate dirtbag like Richie can become a better man, a better father, and a better person over the course of five weeks of polishing forks. That is the kind of fantasy that I can get behind. And I think that sometimes the discourse about the show is going in the wrong direction because it's trying to say, oh, well, this really captures what a kitchen is like. And maybe it captures some of the psychological reasons people go into this kind of work,

• 1:03:41Andy Greenwald?

  the kind of broken toy element of a restaurant kitchen, or of the precision, or of the repetition, or of the stress, or of the demands. But this is a show that's fundamental engine is people can change and get better. And sometimes that's not a fantasy. Like I was saying before, sometimes that's a reality. But building the crescendo, I imagine, of the season, I haven't watched it yet, around something as relatively small as this minor character, the daughter of a major character, doesn't want to do something. And then one person goes under a table, then two, and then three, and then four. And then somewhere around, Brie Larson's Francine, in fact, getting under the table to continue to yell "fuck yous" at Sugar, I'm like, oh, they're doing this now.

• 1:04:26Andy Greenwald?

  And I'm charmed. You know, the show is disarming with its emotional vulnerability. And it's like the way Chris programs the needle drops. Like, there is a shamelessness to it that is absolutely undeniable unless there's something broken inside of you. You know, it just, it fucking hits. Like, I haven't been to as many weddings as Kaia, but I think if we combine the number of weddings we've been to, I think the number will still be zero of those weddings that ended with Emmylou Harris's cover of Bruce Springsteen's "Tougher Than the Rest." But... Invite me to the next one that does that. Because I will be chopping-

• 1:05:03Chris Ryan?

  That would be an amazing DJ request from you.

• 1:05:05Andy Greenwald?

  I will be chopping on it. That's why-

• 1:05:06Chris Ryan?

  So sorry, sir.

• 1:05:07Andy Greenwald?

  That's why they don't invite me to weddings. Cause I'm like, I would help you with the DJing, but I'm still-

• 1:05:12Chris Ryan?

  I'm a sustaining donor to WHYY.

• 1:05:14Andy Greenwald?

  I'm sorry, I'm just completing my New York Times top 10 list of the century. If I could just have another hour, please, I could get to it.

• 1:05:23Andy Greenwald?

  Similarly, like the fantasy of the beautifully integrated modern family of Frank's a good guy. And Frank and Richie can't help but like each other because they do both want what's best for the child. Like, that happens in the world. That's not a fantasy. There, there, you know, beautiful examples in probably everyone's listening lives of people getting over their shit. But it usually doesn't happen at the fucking wedding. You know, right when it's needed most. That's the magic of TV and it's a fantasy I'm here for.

• 1:05:51Chris Ryan?

  We'll continue to talk about The Bear. We'll do the last three episodes on Thursday. Do you have some other notes you wanted to share?

• 1:05:56Andy Greenwald?

  Just last thing.

• 1:06:00Andy Greenwald?

  The only, this isn't, this is more of an observation. It's not meant necessarily as concern trolling, but like, it is evident that everything in this show. You know, like, what, what, what did Obama say? And I think, maybe it's time to fact check it, that the arc of history, he didn't say this, but he said it a lot. He didn't create the phrase, but like, the arc of history bends towards justice. Like the arc of, the character arc of The Bear ends towards hugs.

• 1:06:25Chris Ryan?

  How's that working out for you?

• 1:06:26Andy Greenwald?

  Not great. We got, we're gonna need a bigger arc.

• 1:06:30Andy Greenwald?

  Shout out Indiana Jones.

• 1:06:32Chris Ryan?

  Two copies of FIFA. Two Hot Pockets.

• 1:06:36Andy Greenwald?

  And we're going off grid.

• 1:06:37Chris Ryan?

  The first two seasons of Ginny and Georgia.

• 1:06:40Andy Greenwald?

  That's frankly, we gotta take comfort where we can get it. And we'll all be under the table until you, until you get this all sorted out.

• 1:06:46Chris Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:47Andy Greenwald?

  But the, the character arc on The Bear bends towards hugs and understanding and- We don't know, like, I haven't finished the season. I don't know if it ends with a big to be continued or if it ends in a place that's like, maybe they could do more, maybe they won't. But it is absolutely without question that, that the show has neutered any and all opposition. There isn't really any conflict, other than Carmy's own internal conflict. Oliver Platt could have been a big bad, but he's kind of an asshole sometimes, but he's heart of mush, who loves Billy Friedkin films as much as anyone else, right?

• 1:07:19Chris Ryan?

  He's a fucking G.

• 1:07:21Andy Greenwald?

  Jamie Lee Curtis is softening, and we saw that happen during Ice Ships last year. I would imagine building towards a Carmy confrontation or resolution coming up. Even Odenkirk, right, is like, not an asshole anymore. So there is just a intentional removal of conflict and stakes.

• 1:07:39Chris Ryan?

  I think that the idea is basically like, Carm's the asshole.

• 1:07:41Andy Greenwald?

  Exactly.

• 1:07:42Chris Ryan?

  And it's like, you realize, you wake up one day and you're like, "I think that all these people are standing in my way," or "don't get me," or "don't understand me." And then one day I wake up and realize, all these people wake up and think I'm standing in their way.

• 1:07:56Andy Greenwald?

  Exactly. So I think, and I think that's compelling. I don't know if that's compelling for multiple seasons going forward, but I'm curious what, how that gets addressed. I think that, my main takeaway, having only watched seven, because I'm, I actually, I did the assignment as we had agreed to it, is that, like, I know that Chris Stor, and certainly his sister Courtney, who's the food consultant and executive producer, and Matty Matheson, and a lot of the people, fictional and real, involved in the show, have been to Noma, have been to the French Laundry, can talk about Thomas Keller, can extol the virtues of fine dining at the highest level. But dude, this show is Carmine's. Do you remember Carmine's on the Upper West Side of Manhattan?

• 1:08:38Chris Ryan?

  I don't.

• 1:08:39Andy Greenwald?

  It is a restaurant where the whole thing is, the lasagna costs like $36 and it could feed an army. Like, you sit there and you get garlic bread and you get spaghetti and everything is way too big and it's way too much food and it just all comes onto the table and the tables are groaning under the weight of it and that's the spirit of it. And like, that's- That's what this show is. It's not just that like, that's what Fish's was like.

• 1:09:03Chris Ryan?

  That's a really good point, though. It's not this precise, mind-blowing recycling of ingredients and recontextualizing of things. It's actually a comfort meal. And the comfort is like, maybe hard-fought, like, you really gotta work through that lasagna. But, and you might be eating it for a week, but it's gonna, it's gonna hit when it hits.

• 1:09:26Andy Greenwald?

  The show ultimately, maybe like Sidney with a hamburger helper, like, the show is here to feed you. And it is not here to be a comedy, and it is not here to, to challenge you, or have people act in monstrous ways, or dazzle you with its plot twists. Like, it's just here to feed you, and that's not a bad thing. I feel very, I feel very, very well taken care of after these middle episodes, but I'm curious how it's gonna resolve.

• 1:09:52Chris Ryan?

  Of course. So we'll talk about that on Thursday, in person, and we'll also talk about-

• 1:09:57Andy Greenwald?

  In person, Chris. What's that gonna be like?

• 1:09:58Chris Ryan?

  I'm coming back. I'm coming home. And we'll also do our July 4th barbecue playlist. It's just an annual tradition, which I don't even know if anybody cares about, but we care about it.

• 1:10:08Andy Greenwald?

  I care about it. And I also want to interrogate whether, like, your feelings and your behavior and your vibe on these podcasts is affected by the fact that you have, like, smart water empties all around you, when you're an Aquafina guy. And I just like-

• 1:10:23Chris Ryan?

  You really pulled my card right there.

• 1:10:24Andy Greenwald?

  I'm just like, I, have you changed?

• 1:10:26Chris Ryan?

  I didn't even notice those. I get thirsty, you know?

• 1:10:29Andy Greenwald?

  Yeah, but you said you can only have your thirst quenched.

• 1:10:31Chris Ryan?

  I haven't seen it up here. I told you, this is, we're having a crisis of distribution from Aquafina.

• 1:10:36Andy Greenwald?

  Don't you think that the people, the, you know, the Soviet Socialist Republic of Portland, like, probably have their own Maha agenda and keep that shit out for a reason?

• 1:10:47Chris Ryan?

  It's worth talking about. It's worth, it's worth considering.

• 1:10:50Andy Greenwald?

  I'm just bringing in people who aren't prejudiced in their science. You know what I mean? Like, I just want to bring in people who are open to different points of view.

• 1:10:57Chris Ryan?

  Buddy, it was great to see you. And I'll see you on Thursday, and we'll finish up the bear.

• 1:11:01Andy Greenwald?

  We'll have a cold drink of water. I can't wait.

• 1:11:03Chris Ryan?

  Bye, guys.

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