REVIEW #307 The Bear (Season 1 & 2)

A young and talented chef from the fine dining world returns to Chicago to run his families sandwich shop, after a tragic death in the family.

Season 1:

The debut seasons finds a fantastic balance between anxiety inducing, intense scenes in the kitchen and amazing character work. Revealing so much about the characters without really showing anything from their life outside of the Beef restaurant. We see glimpses here and there and that adds to the development nicely but other than that, most of the show is set in the small Chicago restaurant. The performance are subtle, yet amazing and I mean that in the best way! They feel so real and authentic and that just pulls you into these characters, where you’re rooting for each and every one of them. The sound and editing is vital to the atmosphere in the show, knowing went to have fast paced cutting, with sharp, abrupt and intrusive bursts of sound to really have the audiences heart racing. That feeling isn’t always maintained in the first season, with the pace letting off here and there, but it’s a great start, more than great really! I loved it.

Overall (9/10)

Season 2:

The follow up season takes everything that made the first season so great and basically just doubled down on it! The performances were even better, the storytelling improved massively and the individual character work was absolutely brilliant to give each one of them their own time to shine. There’s a lot of big name cameos in this season and that’s not just big names thrown in for the sake of it, each one just elevated the scene they were in. You have the likes of Olivia Colman, Will Poulter, Bob Odenkirk, Jamie Lee Curtis and even more Jon Berthnal, who was absolutely brilliant. I’d also say that Jamie Lee Curtis’s performance in episode 6 was much more Oscar worthy compared to her EEAO showing. She killed it in that episode, as did the rest of the cast because I’d confidently say that, that episode alone is one of the best bits of TV I’ve ever watched. Then I thought that the following episode could never live up to it, but no, Ebon Moss-Bachrach steps up and delivers another example of top tier TV! Meanwhile, throughout the entire season, Jeremy Allen White is providing so much complexity to his character, performing time and time again! So season 2 even tops the first, I loved it even more.

Overall (9.5/10)

Thanks for reading.

Callan