After a great episode about Sydney in The Bear, we pick up Carmy's story in The Bear season 4 episode 5, "Replicants." We're officially halfway through the season in this episode, and it's a good one so far!
The fifth episode of the season begins at an Al-Anon or Nar-Anon meeting with a woman, Georgie, sharing a story about her experience with her brother's addiction. It's devastating as Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) watches on.
With the clock under 400 hours on Cicero's clock at The Bear, everyone at the restaurant is getting up early, getting on with the day, and making big moves. We check in with all of the employees of the restaurant, thinking about work, trying to get better, and honing their skills, including Tina (Liza Colón-Zayas), Sweeps (Corey Hendrix), and Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach). Shapiro (Adam Shapiro) asks Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) to call him. While she's waiting to do that, Carmy sends over the updated agreement for The Bear.
Ebreheim (Edwin Lee Gibson) is making moves, too. He invites Albert (Rob Reiner), the investor, to the restaurant. Albert offers advice, but he also praises what Ebreheim and his small team are already doing. He wants to turn the Beef window restaurant into a franchise. Ebreheim just worries about whether the family is going to be up for the idea.
After showing up to work with fewer and fewer items in the order every day, Tina makes a bold pitch to Carmy to keep the menu the same, allow the chefs to hone their skills, and get faster. She also offers him a compliment, too. This sets the stage for another big development in Carmy's journey as a leader.
Later, Marcus (Lionel Boyce) sells his mom's house and heads to work. He has a new dessert for Carm to try, and it's delicious. Carm makes Marcus put it up for tonight, but Marcus is worried about how long it takes to make each dish. Luckily, Carm has the help that he needs. Luca (Will Poulter) walks through the back door. He's back as a stage, which is basically a fancy intern. They could use the help, and Luca's there to help.
Shortly after, Carmy shows Syd the new menu. It's a set menu for the first time since Carmy changed his mind last time. He owns up and admits his mistake, and he tries to apologize to Sydney. He's really on the apology tour this season, which is probably healthy, but it's interesting! The menu isn't quite complete, and he opens up a chance for Sydney to share what she wanted to talk to him about.
Sydney asks him about the updated terms of the agreement. He starts to explain when Sugar shows up with Sophie. She's brought her to the restaurant for the first time. She lets Marcus hold Sophie, but not the Faks, obviously.
Meanwhile, Jessica is quizzing Richie about how all the people at The Bear are related and know each other, but it's very confusing. Sugar, or Natalie as she introduces herself to the new employees, meets all of the hires. Honestly, she's very shocked to learn there have been new hires at all, given Cicero's orders.
While this is all happening, Sydney keeps getting calls from a weird number. She finally takes the call and learns that her dad had a heart attack. She has to go to the hospital. Carmy comes out, and he tries to help, but Sydney refuses help and asks him not to tell everyone.
Just when we thought things were all working out for the better at The Bear, there's more adversity to deal with in The Bear. As I mentioned, we're only halfway through the season, so it wasn't going to stay good forever, but it's a bummer this is happening right as Sydney was on the precipice of making a life-changing decision. I just keeping thinking back to the first moments of the episode when Syd was basically pushing her dad off the phone because she couldn't find her knife. It's going to be even more devastating if she never gets the chance to talk to him again.
We'll find out where the story goes from here in The Bear season 4 episode 6 on Hulu!
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