The Bear – Season 3 Episode 7 Recap & Review

Legacy

Episode 7 of The Bear Season 3 begins with a clip of Carmy and Claire, back when they were together and happy. Now, we see flashes of both him and Richie at the restaurant, each musing over their own worries. Sydney has moved into her new apartment but hasn’t signed the partnership yet. She now gets a text from Adam Shapiro, who says he has something to talk to her about.

At Carmy’s therapy group, another man talks about how his relative got sober and apologised and now he feels like he needs to be happy but instead he’s stuck with all her terrible behaviour from the past. The group counselor suggests that words should be said out loud instead of festering inside oneself.

At the restaurant, The Fak’s Uncle Gary comes by to give them a new tube light. Sydney meets with Shapiro, who’s actually glad that Terry shut her place down because he is now going to open his own place. And he’s looking to hire a CDC and he’s considering Sydney for the position. His offer is also a partnership offer but he does want to start quickly so he’ll need to know soon. Sydney says she’ll think about it.

While Marcus is going through Carmy’s notebook, he finds a picture of a group of world-famous chefs. Carmy says they talked a lot about legacy and how something one person creates is taken by another and becomes something else. Sydney arrives and joins the conversation. Carmy admits if he had to leave a legacy he’d want to filter out all the bad stuff. Marcus says he want to be someone who listened and learned and was a great emergency contact.

Chucky and Christopher, who used to work with Michael earlier, start work alongside Ebra at the beef window. They help Ebra smoothen out the process and immediately the beef window moves faster and better.

Elsewhere, Ted Fak chats with Gary and asks him about the time he played baseball. He describes how someone convinced him to take drugs in order to bulk up but then he was caught and that was the end of it. Ted, turns out, used to bet on the game.

Natalie laments that two sets of guests have cancelled. Richie, who is sitting with her, talks about how service hours are still total chaos. They talk about her baby, almost here now, and Richie describes how they were going for dinner when Tiffy’s water broke. Just the day before that, he’d gone on a road trip with Michael.

Meanwhile, Sydney is venting out her frustration on the boxes in the dumpster. Inside the kitchen, Tina gives Ebra a clipboard to help with all the papers. She then offers Nat some advice about childbirth as well before telling her that the restaurant is out of C-folds. Nat decides to go buy some. On her way out, she comes by Sydney — who was listening to her father’s voicemail about an issue with his radiator — and tells her to sign the agreement.

Richie tries giving his staff an inspiring speech before service but ends up fumbling it and Sydney has to take over. Sydney goes in to find Carmy working on the next day’s menu and he brushes away all her inputs, not realising it as he does.

Nat is putting boxes from the store into the trunk of her car when all of a sudden she starts getting labour cramps at the end of The Bear Season 3 Episode 7.

The Episode Review

The Bear Season 3 Episode 7 returns to the entire team working at the restaurant once again but the pace continues to be a tad slow. What’s more, this episode doesn’t have the tight structure and crisp writing that some of the series’ best episodes do. This was the same issue in Episode 5 as well and I’m hoping that it’s not a recurring problem with the season.

Some of the focus on side characters like Gary is a great addition but some of the scenes, like those with the Faks, were maybe not entirely needed. As a whole, the story still isn’t addressing the issue with Carmy’s system and it’s getting a bit frustrating. What’s more, the growing distance between Sydney and him isn’t very believable.  

The thing is, the last few episodes have shown Sydney’s growing frustration with Carmy but they haven’t explored it. It’s been surface level with shots of her giving Carmy sidelong glances or looking on with pursed lips and a furrowed brow. But for someone who was given a partnership deal in the restaurant, there should be more for her to consider leaving the place.

Not only have we not seen much of her inner dialogue, she also has barely stood up to Carmy’s behaviour, which is a bit unlike her. She hasn’t openly talked to him about this once. Without all of this, the fact that she would consider leaving just isn’t very convincing.