Season 2 of Hulu’s acclaimed series The Bear has been met with near-unanimous praise. This season has managed to both expand upon the already beloved cast and preserve the original heart and tone of the first season. However, a few new elements left some viewers with mixed feelings.
One of those elements was the introduction of a love interest for Carmy Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White). In episode 2, Carmy randomly reconnects with Claire (Molly Gordon), a girl he grew up with but lost touch with. Immediately, you can tell that Claire disarms Carmy in a way that nobody else has been able to do. For most of what we’ve seen of Carmy, he’s always a little tired and “on,” and there’s an aspect to him that’s subtly combative in any situation. But with Claire, he’s playful, softer, and even a little shy.
As the two reconnect throughout the season, they eventually get together—a thing that many viewers found irksome, specifically within the show’s overall context. These viewers felt that a show like The Bear was better off without having any romantic subplots and that adding romance only served to take away from the things about the show that made it so special in the first place. This aligns with a cultural shift against forcing romances in TV, which, admittedly, sometimes do distract from a show’s core narrative.
On top of this, many fans felt that in a show with such fascinating, complex characters, Claire was a little one-dimensional and uninteresting by comparison. She was the Girl Next Door who popped into Carmy’s life and turned it upside down, Garden State-style.
And all of these are certainly valid critiques! HOWEVER. I actually like “Claire Bear,” and I thought her presence this season added a lot and gave it more dimension, rather than taking any away.
Yes, a lot of this had to do with fleshing out the Berzatto family history. Claire was a core part of Carmy’s upbringing, so by introducing her, we automatically learn more about Carmy and ultimately gain a better understanding of him. We also get to see what Carmy is like when removed from his comfort zone—which, ironically, seems to be the utter chaos of his work—and what sort of person he is when he’s around someone who lets him be himself.
And that’s ultimately the sort of person Claire is, which is another reason why I liked her. To me, she didn’t feel like some random girl thrown in to add “spice” to the story. She felt like a very genuine, down-to-earth person who was very naturally curious about, and warm towards, other people. Just look at the fondness she holds—and has always held—for Carmy, how she lets him know she was able to see the best in him, even though he was a fairly withdrawn and intense kid. I mean, all those tender scenes of the two of them once they actually start dating? They felt real, man! Not too sugary-sweet, not forced, just very real and delightful to see, after all the tension the show had been riding on.
Now, in that sense, I get why some people felt like she was kind of a cardboard cutout love interest who was only written for Carmy. But The Bear has always been a fast-paced show that oscillates between heaviness and choppiness, leaving little room for character development unless you’re a main character. This season, from my perspective, was written to expand upon these characters with more depth than the first season ever could. So we were never going to get that in-depth with Claire (or any new character) in the first place.
It’s my hope that the next season will expand further on her character, and also, that the show won’t lean too hard into the “it’s your girlfriend or your job” trope. Until then, I’ll stay out here defending Claire Bear, even though my heart goes out to Sydney for what seems to be a pretty uncomfortable crush on Carm.
(Featured Image: FX on Hulu)
