The Bear Season 3 has self-indulgent stunt-casting, but is still emotional: review

Let it rip. TV’s most stressful show is back – no, not a gritty murder mystery or nail-biting medical drama, it’s “The Bear” (Season 3 is now streaming on Hulu). The show – which all but swept the Emmys and Golden Globes – follows Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White), an uptight chef from the world of Michelin-starred restaurants who returns to Chicago to helm his brother Mikey’s (Jon Bernthal) chaotic sandwich shop after Mikey’s suicide. At first, the ragtag kitchen staff was skeptical, but in Season 2, Carmy and Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) wrangled them into leveling up and giving the place an upscale makeover. Going into Season 3, they’re a more cohesive team.Season 3 is a mixed bag.Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) remains a blowhard (but, he’s matured slightly).

Carmy is still an emotionally stunted mess, although he does try harder to support his staff on a personal and emotional level.Sydney remains earnest yet frazzled.

“The Bear” isn’t interested in plot – while there’s a semblance of it, as the team embarks on their new venture, “The Bear” follows these characters through slice-of-life triumphs, failures, and mundane daily tasks, with frequent dips back into their pasts. Some parts of this succeed more than others.There are aspects of Season 3 where the story meanders.

There’s nothing wrong with characters just existing together onscreen, but having a little bit of narrative direction wouldn’t kill “The Bear.” On the other hand, when this summer’s other biggest show (“House of the Dragon”) sprints through plot too fast and kills off characters before we even get to know them, it’s refreshing that “The Bear” stops to smell the roses.Still, by Season 3, “The Bear” is getting a tad self-indulgent. A flashback should convey essential new information about the characters or deepen our understanding of them, to view them in a new light.Some of these sequences in Season 3 feel like merely an exc...