sonoranbumblebee

[sonoranbumblebee]

I hate to admit it but after meeting Francie I'm kind of curious to meet Avery "the Forgotten" Fak.

[sonoranbumblebee]

Shot: Carmy looking sexy on the street drinking an espresso.

musical cue: [Doris Day, It's Magic]

You sigh, the song begins

You speak and I hear violins

It's magic

The stars desert the skies

And rush to nestle in your eyes

It's magic

CUT TO: His wife Sydney playing basketball and talking to herself and being adorable

CUT TO: His cousin Sweeps at the batting cage talking to himself about wine, which translates to talk about relationships. "Older wines are less astringent, smoother, silkier." Young relationships have a lot of tannins!

[sonoranbumblebee]

Just thinking about how Carm is leaving Syd in in custody of all these loud sandwich-window guys she barely knows, and nine (9!) Faks, and this whole messy house of characters with all their own families and drama

and how they are gonna take such good care of her actually

"Mikey's baby brother's widow is our Queen."

[sonoranbumblebee]

"What are you jealous?" "No, I think it's cool that we have other friends. I think that's healthy."

This is Chester (Carmy), trying and failing to not be panicked and wildly jealous of Marcus' (Syd's) relationships with "other friends"

[sonoranbumblebee]

Wait he never smoked in front of her before?! That makes total sense, but also I never thought of it before.

I continue to marvel at how they've used smoking and cigarettes throughout the show as a visual representation of dysfunction and pain and self-loathing. They're smoking in front of each other in 4x10 "Goodbye" as a form of socially acceptable public self-harm.

Every time one of them inhales in this scene, to see even more clearly how completely destroyed they are, replace it in your mind with a cut from a sharp kitchen knife or a searing burn from a hot surface. When he lights her cigarette he's basically helping light the stove she's about to burn her hand on, but he's so defeated he can do nothing else. When he takes that big inhale and exhale in front of her, it's tantamount to her standing there helpless, while he carefully cuts along an artery in his arm with a paring knife.

During this scene, those two both want to be die and feel like they are being killed because they think they are being forced to separate but also they do not understand what is going on or why this is happening. They are both absolutely crazed with grief. I've personally never seen its equal in anything I've ever watched.

First time Carmy is smoking in front of Sydney is when she offers him a cigarette 🤣🤣🤣.

[sonoranbumblebee]

WORMS

Is 4x04 called "Worms" bc the food that makes her teeth hurt are like candy worms or something? Perhaps.

In any case, at the end of the episode Syd calls Shapiro and says "let's do some paperwork." Then the opening notes of "So In Love" by Curtis Mayfield starts playing. Then she walks on, looking quietly optimistic, and then she puts something in her mouth, bites down, and immediately yells "ow!" like she cracked a tooth or something.

As my grandpa used to write in letters, back before "LOL" was in common use: "Ha ha ha!"

That Adam Shapiro fella never stood a chance, not really.

Which brings me to another minor point about this storyline.

Syd pursued a job with Carmy bc she had tasted his food and it was so good it shook her. We later learn that one of the dishes she tasted was more "his food" than anything else served at Empire. He continues to deliver, although maybe since the restaurant opened his confidence has been shot and he's been inconsistent/wobbly, but I personally believe his "I'm tired and can't think" food is still exceptional and I suspect Syd would say that's right.

Meanwhile, Syd has never tasted Adam Shapiro's food. She had dishes at the Ever funeral that he prepared, but I do not believe they represented his authorial voice. They were Chef Terry's food that he assembled.

Adam told Syd in the pitch meeting in 3x07 "I don't want to cook everyday" as if it was a burden he was shedding. Long story short, I don't think Adam Shapiro food exists. He needs a true creative like Syd or Carmy or Andrea Terry to tell him what the vibe is, to invent the concept, to "jam on menu." He's like David Fields. He really can't do that himself. And there's nothing wrong with leading a restaurant with a non-culinary skillset but it is a problem if you're not appreciating the creatives who give the place its heart and soul. Shapiro is sucking up to her right now but the minute things get tough, he's markedly less encouraging.

In any case, if Adam Shapiro had tried to romance her with his food instead of a building and a contract and promises of empire, the courtship would have ended after one date. Carmy, on the other hand, has kept this girl eating pretty well—nourishing her creatively, culinarily, emotionally—since back when they were living on scraps he scrounged from a meat dealer selling out of a cooler in an alley. At the last hour, he throws in all the same external/superficial stuff that Shapiro was offering, all of which is good and important and it's very honorable of him to yield those investment returns to her. But that's never why she wanted to be with him. Sadly, he either doesn't understand or believe that unless he is involved, all of that other stuff is meaningless to her.

[sonoranbumblebee]

In my fantasy version of season 5, one morning during service Uncle Jimmy rolls into The Bear and tells everyone but Syd, Nat, and Richie to get out of his office (the kitchen) for a minute.

Carmy, who disappeared shortly after the breakup and resurfaced nine months ago at a casino restaurant in Las Vegas, has been sending Unc big monthly checks. As of last week, Uncle Jimmy has been repaid with interest and thus each of the three of them now own their share of the restaurant outright. Here is the paperwork. Merry Thursday, and a happy new year.

None of them knew he was even doing this. They thought he was just gone for his own gratification.

Without a word, Syd walks out of the kitchen, then the restaurant. Taxi, O'Hare, plane, airport, taxi, casino driveway with all the lights and the cars and the noises, walking through a crowded casino, the maze is designed to confuse, but here it is: Carmen Berzatto's Chicago Grill, wait you can't go back there, where is Carmy?

He sees her. Turns off the burner. Comes out into the pass. This is gonna fuck service.

Nuzzling, tears, touching, sniffles, kissing, blinking, whispering. The usual. We love this part of the movie.

Random kitchen staff heckle and cheer and work around them; "yes chef!" She stays for dinner in the dining room. He cooks. She has a drink and smiles, watching the traffic on the Strip. It's late. Lucky for them he works at a hotel.

She takes a shower and gets into bed naked, asleep shortly thereafter. He does the same.

The sun rises. Morning sex. Giggling. Talking. Well, at least that's sorted. They're together. Now they just have to figure out to be together. He has months left on his contract. She is needed in Chicago. What's the plan?

[sonoranbumblebee]

"...the only issue is sometimes he is a lot, and doesn't like to share, and even through sometimes he'll be like, 'oh play this video game with me,' then if I do too well he acts kind of weird and, like, funky with me. And it's not really like always clear or consistent when he wants to share and why he doesn't want to, and like what's going on with his life, and the other people he plays games with. And also just friends outside of playing games, often that comes into the gameplay and the sleepover of it all, and it's actually like a little bit inappropriate sometimes."

[sonoranbumblebee]

$

If Carmy says he's going to get his family $850,000 (before he permanently abandons them for what he claims he believes is their benefit), he's going to get his family $850,000.

But what financial resources could this man possibly have? I don't think he has that many Levi's to sell, and I doubt he can pull that much working as a line cook at Cheesecake Factory.

He *better* not be planning to borrow it from some other set of goons!!

I am genuinely mystified as to what the plan might be.

[sonoranbumblebee]

Meaningful transitions

This moment in the eulogy transitioning into the margins moment��We don’t talk about it enough!

[sonoranbumblebee]

HE HAS BEEN LIKE THIS EVER SINCE THE VERY FIRST TIME HE EVER SAW HER

Maybe if we hit him it would fix his communication settings?!!

All that passion in that conversation. I am clutching my nonexistent pearls right now.

[sonoranbumblebee]

in 4x04 just before the smash cut to title, a Jumping Jack Flash quote, which also has a callback to the Carmy-Andrea Terry scene in 3x10

"Do you want to work here? Or do you want to live?"

"I quit! I quit!"

[sonoranbumblebee]

I literally cannot bear to watch another stilted Claire Carmy scene right now but I'm also 90 percent sure when I dig into this stoop scene it's actually about all the dumb shit Carmy did to alienate Syd. Claire mentions him freezing up and pushing her away and feeling v insecure abt his true feelings. Claire as previously written is kind of a sociopath and a creep and she doesn't really care. If she's being humanized here it's because she's now 100 percent placeholder and no longer a Syd antagonist but rather a very generalized Human Girl.

anyway. That's why his immediate brainstorm is ahhhh must give more restaurant so Syd so she knows I really like her. Dumbass.

[sonoranbumblebee]

Oh I get it. The Mindy Kaling rom-com run to Placeholder Lady is a rough draft of Carmy's attempt to provide Computer's "huge massive change" that will change the trajectory of the restaurant.

He's long leaned on Placeholder Lady to fill in the Mandatory Personal Life slot; maybe that's what he needs to do? He's testing to see if this gets him out of Groundhog Day. I don't think he's motivated by great feelings for her but rather the opposite: she's sort of a ritual gesture.

It...does not pop him out of anything. That's more of the same. Wheels keep spinning. The death rattle sounds.

The song playing under the run is a version of "Go Ask Alice" which is very much about drugs, and as well all know, drugs are a substitute for actually feeling your feelings and changing your thoughts and behaviors.

[sonoranbumblebee]

What's up with all the handwashing (or lack thereof, Neil Geoff) in season 4?

[sonoranbumblebee]

Rewatching S4 with an eye on Carmen Bitchfuck Betrayer is actually really sad bc he visibly loves them all so much and he is so proud of them and he doesn't know what to do to fix the restaurant or make things better for them.

He's also trying very hard to be more connected to everyone even through he's starting to fear that the problem is him; even though Syd in particular testifies over and over again to various other characters that just being present with your people is the most important thing.

Not without his own doing, but Carmy is sort of confused and isolated and creatively blocked for much of the season.

I also feel like there's a note in the story where Marcus doesn't go meet his bio-dad at the restaurant because he already has dad (Carmy) at home

Ahhhhhh!

[sonoranbumblebee]

Every time someone says Carmy doesn't deserve syd a part of me dies and we have been on this merry go round and I probably already fucking said it but RELATIONSHIPS ARE NOT ABOUT WHAT YOU DESERVE

It is not a math equation it is not a fucking barter for goods and services

I don't know how to make people understand this. But people who are deeply traumatized see you when you say this shit and they pay attention.