Brigade – As the third episode of The Bear begins, Carmen ‘Carmy’ Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White) goes for a walk on the beach. Then, a woman (Molly Ringwald) says she can’t explain it, can’t control it, and can’t cure it. She thought she was a victim for most of her life. For instance, she said this would happen because her husband drank so much. She thought she could just throw out his liquor or hide whatever he was on to fix it, but you can’t curb that kind of chaos until the thinking changes. She believes she played a part in his abuse and she is mad at herself for that. It convinced her that the best thing to do was to keep her side of the street clean. Instead of trying to fix everything, she just needed to remove herself from any toxic situation.

At the restaurant, Richard ‘Richie’ Jerimovich (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) yells at the others that they’re behind. Sydney Adamu (Ayo Edebiri) blames him though. Carmy apologizes to everyone waiting for their orders. Marcus (Lionel Boyce) complains about someone taking his trays only for Sydney to stay she prepper them for him. Richie and Sydney get loud arguing while Carmy tries to keep everyone quiet. In the morning, Carmy looks at the pamphlets from al-anon or alcohol abuse. The dos on the list encourage him to be humble, be honest with himself, and forgive. His alarm clock goes off before he goes to work and surprises everyone by coming in so early. He finds that Marcus has taken pictures from his books and hung them on the wall.

Carmy seems okay with that. He tells them that it takes 12 people to prep one of the dishes and he plated it every night. While telling Marcus how it is prepared, he remembers working with Chef de Cuisine (Joel McHale). Carmy admits they could never get the right consistency that the chef wanted until a sous chef got it one day. When asked how he did it, Sydney quickly says veal fat. Carmen says that is right. He pulls Sydney into his office to say last week was a nightmare and they need to stop it because it’ll only get worse. He yells at Ebrah (Edwin Lee Gibson) to ask why Michael wasn’t ordering number 10 of the cans. It would’ve been cheaper to buy bigger cans. Ebraheim says the more he learned about Michael the less he understood.

Carmen tells Sydney that he’d like her to run an old school brigade, but she doesn’t want to. He argues it is defining roles and creating better workflow. Sydney believes it’ll be a mistake because it’ll create a hierarchical crap show. Carmen says they can do it differently because he can’t keep yelling at them every day. He’ll dial the business and she can do everything else. Sydney agrees to try. Carmen wants to start now so he gives Marcus, Tina (Liza Colon-Zayas), Manny (Richard Esteras), Angel, and the others aprons. He tells them that he doesn’t want to mess with their system and would prefer to harness it. He wants to organize it since they can’t keep operating like this. They’ll start operating like a French kitchen with a chain of command.

When Richie enters, he immediately begins making jokes. He doesn’t want to wear the apron. As for Ebrah, he was in a brigade once and many people died. Carmen explains that this is what real kitchens and teams do. Everyone takes care of their station and keeps their side of the street clean. Once he goes to grab the phone, Sydney tries to take over to tell them that Carmy will be the CDC or chef de cuisine and she is the sous. When she reaches Tina, she pretends she doesn’t speak English. Ebra says he is responsible for meat prep. Sydney calls him the chef de partie now and he quickly accepts that title. When Carmen answers the phone, the caller asks if Michael is around. Carmen says he isn’t here. Nico tells him to let Michael know he called.

When Richie learns that Nico called, he says he’ll hit him. Richie says he is just some idiot before checking on Carmen. He says he just felt like Michael was alive for a second. Carmen has to sit down to collect himself while Sydney goes over the roles with the others. She says they’ll start with a pre-shift meeting and do a front-of-house walkthrough. Then, they’ll have an end-of-day review to see what they could do better. She promises that this will make things run smoother and calmer.

Carmen interrupts on his way out as he tells everyone he has to run an errand. He goes to a church. After working for a while, Sydney steps into the cooler for a break. While checking on everyone, she ends up cutting her finger on a box cutter. Tina and the others try to check on her, but she just tells them to close the box cutter and rushes away. Tina turns the stove on. As Carmen returns, he sees Richie talking to a man outside and hears Richie call him Nico. He goes inside and checks on the others. He finds that the stock is bad because the heat was too high. Sydney says he put the heat lower, but Tina changed it earlier although they don’t know. Carmen tells her to reduce and it’ll take about 30 minutes.

He turns his attention to the onions that Sydney claims Tina was supposed to take care of. Sydney gets mad and takes care of the onions herself. Once her alarm goes off, she stops to start the walkthrough. She isn’t impressed with Ebrah’s work and orders Tina to clean her station. She asks her to take care of her nails and for someone else to clean out the fridge. Sydney tells Sweeps she is going to need bags and napkins already ready before service. When she checks Marcus’s bread, she tells him it is fine. If he is happy with this, she is too. She returns to her station only to find that her onions have gone missing. When Sydney enters Carmy’s office, he suggests they start outsourcing bread before saying he didn’t take her onions. They did this to him last week and he thinks it is just part of paying your dues.

Marcus brings back her onions and swears they made him do it. She gets mad and refuses to let Marcus help her with anything. He warns her that the veal stock is heavy, but she won’t let him help. She ends up dropping the entire container on the ground. As Marcus helps her clean up the mess, he tells her to just keep going. Carmen looks through the paperwork that leaves him questioning what Mike was doing. He calls one of the numbers written down only to find that it is no longer in service. Ebrah yells that family is up so Carmy leaves his office. Sydney cleans the cut on her finger. Marcus tells her family is up. Moments later, Carmy joins her outside with a plate full of food. He says the bookkeeping is a mess while she admits the brigade is a mess.

Sydney explains that today was bad for her and he lets everyone act like trash. Carmy expects more from her because he holds her to a higher standard. She believes this place could be so different from all the other places they’ve been at. They’ll have to run things differently for that to be true. When she said she didn’t think the brigade was a good idea, he didn’t listen. She believes they should try to listen to each other to ensure it works like they want it to work. Carmy says that is fine. Sydney is only here because she thinks she can stand out and make a difference here. She complains that he just straight up left. Carmy reveals he went to an Al-Anon meeting because his brother was an addict. He says it isn’t an excuse since he knows.

Sydney now knows that he knows. They agree to get rocked and destroyed tonight. Later, Carmy notices that he has several missed calls from Sugar. He checks the voicemail of Sugar saying it is Michael’s birthday so she is thinking about him. The episode ends with Carmy looking out at the water.

 

The Bear Review

The Bear is getting better with each episode although the chaotic pace might be too much for many viewers. Some aspects of the storyline feel forced enough to make it seem a bit cringy. Specifically, Sydney’s story seems a bit unrealistic even though she is a vital component of the story. The episodes are short so it is going to take a bit longer to truly connect with the characters.

The series regularly feels like it is on the brink of turning into something special, but it hasn’t turned the corner yet. Credit should be given for the originality and risk taken to create something so unique. The episode scores a 6.5 out of 10. Recaps of The Bear can be found on Reel Mockery here. Find out how to support us at this link.