The Bear
Lamb
Season 5
Episode 2
Editor’s Rating
The restaurant remains flooded, and everyone feels literally and/or metaphorically underwater.
Photo: FX
The list of things that are wrong with The Bear, as laid out in “Lamb,” is extensive and daunting. I won’t even attempt to mention every item because merely thinking about it all is giving me an anxiety attack. That said, here’s a partial rundown of problems as of episode two of season five: The pipes in the basement keep bursting, all the uniforms and service whites are ruined, there are no working sinks in the kitchen, the booths in the dining room are all wet, a huge Wagyu order was canceled so they are running low on actual food, the roof might be caving in, and, oh yeah, the whole building is probably going to collapse sometime soon. Again, I remind you: This list is partial.
Also, there’s this: “Just by looking at this drain, I can almost guarantee you that this entire property is sitting on a sinkhole, giving you about five to ten years before the ground starts to collapse into itself,” says Cheddar, Computer’s niece, whose actual name is Terry, but for the love of God, don’t call her Terry. Cheddar, played by Elsie Fisher of Eighth Grade, is apparently an expert on legal and real-estate issues, and she sees absolutely no way to save The Bear, even if the exterior drain weren’t clogged and the basement weren’t partially flooded. “Restaurants are a horrible business,” she explains.
Restaurants certainly can be horrible businesses, and at this point, The Bear definitely qualifies. It seems borderline delusional to think they can still have dinner service starting at 5:30 p.m. when they are probably violating some significant health codes, lacking a dessert for the menu, and short a ton of meat since Jimmy canceled the Wagyu order without telling anyone. “It costs four grand,” he offers as a defense. Which, I mean, okay. Fair.
But as Sydney points out, if they shut the restaurant down entirely for even one day, they will no longer have enough money to cover the cost of labor. So everyone’s putting their heads down and “fucking drilling” (Richie’s words) even though everyone is also well aware that this endeavor they’re losing sweat, blood, and tears to could evaporate at literally any moment. Welcome to being in the workforce in 2026!
“Lamb,” named after one of the few entrées The Bear is currently capable of prepping in adequate portions, is a case study in how people handle the combination of short-term and long-term emergencies when they’re hit with both at the same time. To put it mildly, some people deal with it better than others. Which is why I have decided to spend this recap ranking, from worst to best, who is handling things most professionally in The Bear’s kitchen. I am not including Jimmy, Computer, or Cheddar, because they are on the business side. I also must leave out Ebra since he is technically not in this episode, though I assume he is off somewhere still freaking out about talking to Carmy and therefore not coping well at all.
The Fak brothers: Neil and Teddy do absolutely nothing in this episode other than make the situation with the pipes somehow worse than it already was. I mean, they do provide a ton of comic relief, which is valuable to those of us watching. But as employees of a restaurant that, at least according to Cheddar, may soon be swallowed by the earth, they are not helping matters at all. If I’m being honest, those guys should stop being paid right away.
Richie: On one hand, Richie is trying to be positive and supportive of his co-workers. For example, he reassures Marcus that he will find a table for his dad for dinner at 7:30, even though he is asking at the last minute. To his credit, he’s also trying to think of long-term ways to save money. But here’s the problem. If there is a four-alarm blaze raging, that is not the time to approach the fire chief about potential renovations to the fire station. And that’s basically what Richie is doing when he tries to talk to Sydney about sustainability programs that could give them a tax break or casually asks, “One more thing, and I promise, I promise, I will leave you alone: Who among us has power of attorney?”
Richie isn’t just trying to think big picture; he’s actively in denial about the smaller, more immediate images directly in front of him. When Marcus says he wants his dad to have a meal at The Bear tonight before it closes down, Richie does not even let him finish that thought, cutting him off instead by saying, “before we get our first star.”
On one hand, Richie’s optimism is appreciated. But it doesn’t seem to be coming from a healthy place. Richie is so, so wound up, you can sense he might pop off, which he eventually does after Jimmy and Computer once again suggest that the restaurant is as dead as a parrot in a Monty Python sketch. (Richie, on the other hand, thinks The Bear is simply pining for the fjords.) “Why don’t you suck my dick?” he says, twice, to Computer, and it’s like Richie has hulked out and turned into his old, more combative, less evolved self again.
Also, if Richie uses one more buzzword with max in it — “Maximilize, let’s go!,” “We’re gonna go maximum towels and maximum fans,” “This organization does not stabilize, we maximize” — do you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to take all of my used oils and fats and donate them to the cause of shoving them down Richie’s throat.
Carmy: God bless Carmy, but holy shit, he is making life more difficult for Sydney. He’s trying not to. At first, he defers to her as the decision-maker for the restaurant and asks what he can do to help. He’s also pitching in to assist with her prep since she’s busy listening to Richie bug her with stuff that is so not important right now. But then he goes out to put a tent over the outdoor drain, like Syd asked him to, and he starts yanking leaves and cigarettes out of the drain, like Syd very specifically asked him not to do.
“It’s gonna make it flood more,” Sydney protests.
“I’m definitely not making it flood more,” Carm insists. Cut to the basement, where a lot more water is spurting out of a pipe because Carmy is definitely making it flood more.
His worst offense, though, is shouting “Let’s fucking go” in the kitchen, which he thinks is motivational but is the opposite of what Sydney needs. Carmy admits he’s overcompensating when Sydney asks him not to be “fake positive.” He just doesn’t know how to cede leadership style to Sydney in addition to ceding leadership responsibilities. He still thinks he knows better. He can’t help it.
Sugar: She is doing her best, making phone calls and busting balls to help stem the budgetary bleeding. But she’s also, understandably, kind of a mess. When Tina catches her crying, she spills out the truth.
“If this place dies, I feel like I will have wasted a lot of time, ’cause my daughter’s asleep when I get home,” she says. “And I have to wake her up to say good-bye in the morning. And I can’t remember the last time I had five minutes of alone time with my husband. My child is with my insane mother. I’m telling Syd to do her job less. Maybe this is a sign.”
Tina reassures her by being brutally honest: Trying to be a parent is always going to be hard, no matter what. Also, your child doesn’t care that you’re ambitious. She just wants your attention. But “if your face is always sad because you’re home and not doing the thing you love, what baby’s gonna want to look at that face?”
This is such a lovely, gently acted scene and such a good example of what The Bear does at its best: show us two people having a real conversation about the kinds of things that every human being struggles with about their jobs. As a mother, I look back at the amount of time I spent on ultimately insignificant work tasks when my son was a baby, and I wish I had that time back. But once it’s gone, it’s gone. Sugar is right to be considering this, even if it’s making her take her eye off the ball a bit.
Gary: The sommelier is keeping it super-professional, but he’s also starting to think about his next move. In one of the most heartbreaking moments in this episode, Tina overhears him on a phone call, telling someone he is about to be out of work and will sweep floors if need be. Which is what Gary started doing at The Beef, before he worked his way up to being a wine specialist. Again, this is extremely relatable at a time when a lot of people in this country have had to accept lower salaries or jobs they are overqualified for just to make ends meet. Happy 250th, America!
Rene: We only see Rene for less than a minute in this episode, when he announces that some aprons and random beer have been saved from the great Bear flood. (The actor who plays him, Rene Gube, co-wrote this episode, so he was kinda busy.) Anyway, Rene is generally pretty even-keeled and probably is managing.
Jessica: The same is true of Jessica, who seems undaunted by the ongoing issues with the digital reservation system that keeps crashing. Hey, you know what Jessica and Rene have in common? They used to work at Ever, for Chef Terry, who ran her kitchen with a deliberately calm, almost Buddhist energy. Perhaps that could be useful, I don’t know, just spitballin’.
Manny and Angel: Even though the Beef sandwich window is closed, they are still pitching in, trying to resolve the dish-pit situation, and being honest about how impossible it’s going to be to wash a high volume of plates and flatware in a locker-room sink. They’re also clearly nervous about what’s happening with the restaurant but still get right back to work after Tina reassures them that things will be fine.
Marcus and Luca: Due to the ruined caviar, Marcus and Luca, a.k.a. the McGriddle Buddies, have to come up with a totally new dessert with not very many ingredients at their disposal and not much time. But when Marcus says his dad is coming that night, Luca immediately says, “We’re not gonna let him down.” You wish you had co-workers this loyal.
Sydney: I am aware that Sydney is having some struggles, but I also think that, among the staff, she has the highest degree of difficulty to overcome. Like Richie, she’s suddenly a partner and has no idea what the logistics of that entail. She’s also the head chef and has to manage the kitchen on a level Richie does not. She’s dealing with multiple disasters at once, while also confronting the possibility, like everyone else, that this might be the end of her employment at a place she loves. If she were not experiencing some panic and uncertainty, she would not be a human being.
What I admire so much about what Sydney does in this episode is that she’s not simply trying to patch pipes with duct tape … although, technically, she is also trying to do that. In the midst of all this chaos, she aims to set a tone that is completely different from Carmy’s. After Richie and Computer and everybody else start screaming at each other the way they always do, Sydney has a moment of Zen. She only reaches it after seeing snippets of all the arguments that Carm and Richie had in previous seasons. There are two other effective sequences like this, one involving Sugar and a previous one involving Sydney, where they basically see their lives at The Bear flash before their eyes. But this third one is most significant, because right after Sydney’s montage of culinary near-violence, she makes a conscious choice to handle things differently.
Right after Jimmy tells her that “sometimes when the world is telling you to go away, you gotta listen,” she responds calmly and assertively, “I don’t listen to the world. I listen to my crew. I’m also going to be doing my best tonight to not speak over anybody and to not curse. If anybody feels like they want to join me, they are welcome.” This is why Syd gets so agitated when Carmy pulls his “let’s fucking go” bullshit. That’s Carmy’s motivational approach. That’s not Syd’s, and it’s not the vibe she wants to bring to her kitchen. She’s already thinking about what kind of leader she wants to be while also staying focused on the urgency of the current situation. That’s a lot, and I think she’s doing a good job.
Tina: Let’s be honest, the MVP of The Bear right now, and maybe always, is Tina. She is keeping track of how much food they have. She is making sure all the prep is being covered. She’s all over the logistics of everything, almost as much as Sydney is, but without the authority Syd now possesses. At every single moment, she is a ballast for her co-workers: for Gary, when she tells him, “We got this”; for Manny and Angel, when she keeps them informed about what’s going on without freaking them out; for Sugar, when she needs a friend to listen to her. That’s because Tina is really, really good at her job. She’s also been a working mom for years, and no one knows how to put their feelings aside so they can multitask and get shit done like a working mom.
Which is why the last shot of this episode has such an impact. It’s of Tina finally getting a moment to herself, looking in the mirror, wiping tears from her eyes, then putting a semi-convincing smile on her face so she can go back to the restaurant and return to the business of trying to keep her head above water.
• When Marcus approaches Richie about reserving a table for his dad, Richie says, “Cousin, that’s the worst time.” This is the first time that I can recall Richie referring to Marcus as “Cousin,” a moniker normally reserved for Carmy. It’s a small thing but a meaningful one, because it conveys how much these co-workers have become like family.
• Can Jimmy really get someone to build a condo on top of The Bear to save the business, like Computer and Cheddar suggest? I am the furthest thing from an expert in Chicago real-estate law that exists, but maybe? It would probably be best to tell potential buyers that the existing building is a sinkhole, though.
• The Bear loves its needle drops, but so far, there have not been any. Hans Zimmer’s score is the only music we’ve heard so far. I’m bracing for some super-cathartic use of Pearl Jam or R.E.M. in the immediate future.
This is the section of the recap where I highlight the laugh-out-loud moments in each episode as part of my crusade to prove that The Bear is actually funny. I laughed a lot in this episode, mostly but not exclusively at Richie and the Fak brothers.
• Richie’s mixed metaphors: During his conversation with Sydney, Richie wonders how their business relationship will work when they disagree about something. “If there’s a jump ball, do we need a tiebreaker?” he asks. Okay, I know what he’s trying to say, but that is not how a jump ball works. After a jump ball, someone just … winds up with the ball. Then he asks an even more amazing question: “Is it 50/50/50/50?” “That’s 200,” Sydney responds, looking deeply confused. “Correct,” Richie says. “That’s what I am saying.” Honestly, I don’t know what you are saying, Richie, but it’s cracking me up, so go ahead.
• The Faks: Again, these dudes should be fired from The Bear. But from The Bear, in italics? Never. Obviously, it is very funny when Neil gets blasted with a fire hose of dirty water right after he’s told he wouldn’t get sprayed again.
• But the more amusing bit between them is after they break another pipe and Neil tells Teddy: “You just opened up a portal to hell. The lights are flickering. The demons are coming. You’re gonna turn into a vampire and you’re gonna have to bite me so we can live together forever.” I wasn’t sure if I was suddenly watching Widow’s Bay or What We Do in the Shadows or what the hell was going on. And I mean that in a good way.
• The headline about Donna: During the montage that traces all the obstacles The Bear faces, there is a completely nonsensical reference to Jamie Lee Curtis’s Donna and “the Lincoln Park Zoo incident.” If you pause the episode, you can read the headline on a newspaper article, which says, “Former Owner of Local Icon The Beef Arrested After Harassing Unsuspecting Animals at the Lincoln Park Zoo.” Boy, would I like a log-in so I can read the rest of that story.
