Children (The Bear)

"Children"
The Bear episode
Chicago "L" train tracks (Adams/Wabash station)
Episode no.Season 3
Episode 5
Directed byChristopher Storer
Written byChristopher Storer
Featured music
Cinematography byAndrew Wehde
Editing by
  • Adam Epstein
  • Joanna Naugle
Production codeXCBV3005
Original air dateJune 26, 2024 (2024-06-26)
Running time35 minutes
Guest appearances

"Children" is the fifth episode of the third season of the American television comedy-drama The Bear. It is the 23rd overall episode of the series and was written and directed by series creator Christopher Storer. It was released on Hulu on June 26, 2024, along with the rest of the season.

The series follows Carmen "Carmy" Berzatto, an award-winning New York City chef de cuisine, who returns to his hometown of Chicago to run his late brother Michael's failing Italian beef sandwich shop. In the episode, The Bear staff prepares to welcome a Tribune photographer as they await for the review, while Carmy and Richie are surprised by the news that Chef Terry will shutter her acclaimed restaurant, Ever.

Plot

Sydney (Ayo Edebiri) helps Marcus (Lionel Boyce) in clearing out his mother's house. Chef Will Guidara, co-founder of Eleven Madison Park, where Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) once worked in New York, shares a news article reporting that Chef Terry has announced the closure of Ever after a dozen years.

To help the restaurant, Cicero (Oliver Platt) brings in a friend, Nicholas "The Computer" Marshall (Brian Koppelman), an accountant, to check on the costs and offer some possible cuts. The Computer suggests reducing the amount of meals while also adding one more day to the restaurant's schedule. He and Cicero also state that another possible way to cut costs is to fire Marcus, as the restaurant does not really need a pastry chef. Natalie (Abby Elliott) immediately shuts down the suggestion.

With just one hour before the Chicago Tribune reporter shows up to photograph the restaurant for the review, the team must quickly organize. Fak (Matty Matheson) and Theodore (Ricky Staffieri) are joined by their brother Sammy (John Cena) as they buff the floors. Sammy gets into an argument with Theodore for stealing his SD cards, and Richie tries to get the brothers under control. When the photographer arrives, the staff struggle to prepare a duck dish mentioned in the review, whose ingredients they do not have on hand due to the daily menu changes. Carmy goes to the basement, where he opens a box containing a notebook. It includes photos of Donna and Michael, Donna, and a baby Sugar, and a close up of young Carmy watching curiously.

Context

  • The preceding episode, "Violet," took place during the first week of July 2023. There has been a leap forward to the last week of July or thereabouts, because Will Guidara texts Carmy, "Funeral dinner next week," and the Ever funeral dinner is held on Sunday, August 6, 2023.
  • The song "Dream Little One, Dream" is from the 1955 black-and-white American-rural-gothic horror film Night of the Hunter.[1] The Criterion Collection describes The Night of the Hunter as a "horror movie with qualities of a Grimm fairy tale."[2] The film was directed by Charles Laughton and stars Robert Mitchum as a murderer masquerading as preacher, in an attempt to rob children of a hidden trove of cash.[3] Mitchum's character, ex-con Preacher Harry Powell, has LOVE and HATE tattooed above his knuckles,[3] not unlike Carmy's SOU tattoo.[4][5][a] Laughton's film "sides...totally with the little ones."[7] Film critic Pauline Kael argued that it is "one of the most frightening movies ever made."[7] The film opens with a warning about treachery.[1]

"Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them."[1]

  • Carmy, the executive chef of the Berzatto family restaurant and sandwich window, is in the dumpster flattening boxes. "Break down all boxes" was on his list of non-negotiables, which, per Vulture, "is why it's hilarious that throughout this season, no one breaks down any boxes before putting them in the Dumpster except for Sydney. It's almost as if Neil and Teddy Fak never bothered to read the list of non-negotiables at all."[8] Carmy is muttering to himself, disgruntled, while he performs this task, leaving the A.V. Club recapper to comment, "This guy truly is both God and Satan to his own Job."[9]
  • The real Will Guidara both runs a fleet of New York City restaurants and is a season three co-producer of The Bear, co-credited with story on episode three, "Doors."[10] The in-universe version of Will Guidara is a friend and former colleague of Carmy's and he thus texts him with the news that Chef Terry is retiring and closing Ever.[10] Guidara and his wife Christina Tosi also appear as themselves in the season-three finale, "Forever."[10]
  • As half-explained by Natalie, lightning crotch is just what it sounds like: a symptom of pregnancy in which the baby headbutting the cervix triggers shooting pains through the vagina.[11][12]

Production

Development

In May 2024, Hulu confirmed that the fifth episode of the season would be titled "Children", and was to be written and directed by series creator Christopher Storer.[13] It was Storer's 12th writing credit and 16th directing credit.[14]

Casting

The episode features a guest appearance by John Cena, who plays Sammy Fak.[15] According to Matty Matheson, "He was a pro. Showed up, didn't even look at a script, just was fully prepared. Genuinely very inspiring, like, that's how I want to show up on another set."[16]

Costuming

During her conversation with Marcus on the steps of his mom's house, Sydney is wearing a Haiks denim jacket with a "contrast collar,"[17] paired with her white Carhartt overalls last seen in "Beef."[18]

Set decoration

The Fak brothers talk about their family history of setting up "fake LLCs" (shell companies) in the espresso vestibule.[19] Their espresso machine is a "two-group Rosito Bisani Synchro, a semi-automatic espresso machine."[19] The Bear serves coffee by local Chicago roaster Milli by Metric.[19][20]

Filming

According to cinematographer Andrew Wehde, the opening scenes were shot with intent of conveying Natalie Berzatto's internal emotional state to the viewer: "You start off with Sugar in the church, and you have that beautiful light coming from behind her, which goes to her waking up and the silhouette in the kitchen and all the blue. It's like we're doing these vignettes of their inner lives."[21]

Music

The episode featured many songs, including "Dream Little One, Dream" by Walter Schumann and Charles Laughton, "Purple Heather" by Van Morrison, and "Mixed Emotions" by the Rolling Stones.[22] Range called "Dream Little One, Dream," one of the season's best needle drops, commenting "Beyond highlighting The Bear's deeply cinematic DNA, the main title from Charles Laughton's seminal gothic noir, The Night of the Hunter, touches on the frayed family dynamics at the show's heart. The eerie nursery rhyme zeroes in on an expecting Natalie, whose fraught relationship with her mother and anxieties about her own impending motherhood feel just as precarious as Robert Mitchum's child-hunting charlatan from Laughton's masterwork."[23]

Food

Carmy is working on something garnished with a baby turnip, served over a béarnaise sauce.[24] Syd is underwhelmed by the sauce, which she finds "like 2014 or something".[24] She shares that her dad gets the same thing every time he goes to a steakhouse, drawing a contrast between a mint reduction and a mint geleé, which seems to help clarify Carmy's thinking.[24] The restaurant is serving gnocchi with beef cheeks that day.[25]

Critical reviews

Jenna Scherer of The A.V. Club gave the episode a "B–" grade and wrote, "I've gone on record as a hardcore stan of the Fak bros. This season in particular, Neil and Ted have been adding much-needed belly laughs to even the most serious, somber episodes. But in this installment—and I really hate to say it—I officially hit the upper limit of my Fak tolerance."[9]

Marah Eakin of Vulture gave the episode a 2 star out of 5 rating and wrote, "When you see Carmy digging through a box of photos in the basement labeled “DD,” you just know something's coming soon in the pipeline."[26] A.J. Daulerio of Decider wrote, "This show is fully capable and, at times, excellent at showing the dark tunnels grief can create. And it's not just grief for the dead – it's the grief for the living that can feel the most impossible, the most volatile."[27] Brady Langmann of Esquire wrote, "I'm not ready for Sydney to split from Carmy. Really, all I want is to see season 1 of Matter of Fak drop before the next episodes of The Bear."[28]

Critics reacted negatively to John Cena's guest appearance. The Washington Post considered his appearance "distracting",[29] while Ben Travers of IndieWire wrote, "Cena is just... too polished for this clan of charmingly schlubby Chicagoans."[30] Vulture wrote, "there was never a moment when he was onscreen in this episode that I believed that was Sammy Fak."[26] The A.V. Club wrote, "he's got great chemistry with his costars. But the vibe is all wrong, and not just because he doesn't look like a Fak boy. It seems like Storer was so eager to write for Cena that he accidentally let Sammy completely dominate the episode."[9] Alan Sepinwall wrote, "When past episodes brought in notable guest stars like Bob Odenkirk or John Mulaney, they instantly felt like people in this world; Cena's the first one to play as stunt casting."[31]

Retrospective reviews

In 2024, The Hollywood Reporter placed "Children" at 11 on a ranked list of 28 episodes produced to that point, in part due to its successful introduction of Koppelman as the Computer.[32] ScreenRant ranked "Children" 22nd out of the 28 episodes produced through the end of season three.[33]

In 2025, Vulture ranked "Children" as 36th-best out of 38 episodes of The Bear, commenting, "The Bear has almost always been able to make great use of its guest stars, from recurring figures like Jon Bernthal and Jamie Lee Curtis to occasional surprise players like Bob Odenkirk and Brie Larson. The lone exception is what it did with John Cena in season three's 'Children.'"[34]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ SOU is pronounced like the beginning of soup or sous-chef, but reportedly stands for "sense of urgency," which is a catchphrase used in Thomas Keller restaurant kitchens.[4][5] In addition to Carmy having been a student of Keller's, in universe, The Bear creator Christopher Storer directed Sense of Urgency, a documentary about Keller.[6]

References

  1. ^ a b c MacArthur, Greg (July 4, 2024). "The Bear Season 3, Episode 5's Opening Song Has A Deep Connection To This 69-Year-Old Movie". ScreenRant. Retrieved October 18, 2025.
  2. ^ "The Night of the Hunter". The Criterion Collection. Retrieved January 3, 2026.
  3. ^ a b "The Night of the Hunter (1955)". BFI. Retrieved October 18, 2025.
  4. ^ a b Plante, Chandler (August 8, 2022). "The Tattoo Artist For "The Bear" Reveals His Favorite Carmy Tattoos". Popsugar. Retrieved October 18, 2025.
  5. ^ a b John, Sarah (July 1, 2025). "The Stories Behind All of Carmy's Tattoos on 'The Bear'". The Daily Beast. Retrieved October 18, 2025.
  6. ^ Sharma, Dhruv; Russell, Tom; Bruce, Amanda (June 29, 2023). "The Bear: Carmy's 8 Tattoos & Their Meaning Explained". ScreenRant. Retrieved October 18, 2025.
  7. ^ a b Thomson, David (July 24, 2025) [April 1999]. "A child's demon: Robert Mitchum in The Night of the Hunter". BFI. Originally published in Sight & Sound magazine. Retrieved October 18, 2025.
  8. ^ Chaney, Jen (June 28, 2024). "The Bear's Non-Negotiables, Ranked by Negotiability". Vulture. Retrieved January 4, 2026.
  9. ^ a b c Scherer, Jenna (July 3, 2024). "The Bear recap: Is Marcus the kindest, softest, sincerest man in Chicago?". The A.V. Club. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  10. ^ a b c Severson, Kim (July 9, 2024). "How an Eleven Madison Park Hospitality Guru Brought Realism to 'The Bear'". The New York Times. Retrieved November 7, 2025.
  11. ^ Murkoff, Heidi (May 31, 2016). What to Expect When You're Expecting: (Updated in 2025). Workman Publishing Company. pp. 315–316. ISBN 978-0-7611-9315-9.
  12. ^ "Epidural, Please: 'The Bear' Zooms In on Trauma in "Ice Chips"". www.theringer.com. July 1, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2026.
  13. ^ "(#301-310) "Season 3"". The Futon Critic. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  14. ^ "The Bear - WGA Directory". Writers Guild of America West. Retrieved June 28, 2024.
  15. ^ Foreman, Alison (July 2, 2024). "'The Bear' Season 3 Proves One Thing: Hollywood Loves a John Cena Cameo". IndieWire. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  16. ^ Peters, Fletcher (June 30, 2024). "'The Bear' Cast Raves About That Big (Really Big) Guest Star". The Daily Beast. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  17. ^ Tan, Azrin (July 10, 2024). "In Season 3 of 'The Bear', Sydney's style speaks volumes". Vogue Singapore. Retrieved October 17, 2025.
  18. ^ Dimitroff, Cassandra (July 11, 2024). "Is Sydney Adamu from 'The Bear' our new style icon? RUSSH". RUSSH. Retrieved October 18, 2025.
  19. ^ a b c Cadwalader, Zac (July 2, 2025). ""The Bear" Now Features A Coffee Program (And We Have Questions) | Sprudge Coffee". sprudge.com. Retrieved December 22, 2025.
  20. ^ "The Bear Season 4 Chicago Filming Spots". Choose Chicago. June 26, 2025. Retrieved October 5, 2025.
  21. ^ "Cinematographer Andrew Wehde: 'The Bear' season 3 episode guide". Panavision. September 2025. Retrieved November 6, 2025.
  22. ^ Gomez, Dessi (June 27, 2023). "Here Are All the Songs in 'The Bear' Season 3". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  23. ^ "The Best Needle Drops from The Bear's Third Season". RANGE. July 5, 2024. Retrieved January 6, 2026.
  24. ^ a b c admin (June 27, 2024). "The Bear - S03E05 - Children | Transcript". Scraps from the loft. Retrieved January 27, 2026.
  25. ^ "Every Dish They Make on Season 3 of 'The Bear'—Plus Recipes to Re-Create the Magic at Home". EatingWell. Retrieved January 8, 2026.
  26. ^ a b Eakin, Marah (June 27, 2024). "The Bear Recap: Meet Sammy Fak". Vulture. Retrieved June 28, 2024.
  27. ^ Daulerio, A.J. (July 3, 2024). "'The Bear' Season 3 Episode 5 Recap: "Children"". Decider. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  28. ^ Langmann, Brady (June 28, 2024). "The Bear Season 3 Episode 5 Recap". Esquire. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  29. ^ Scribner, Herb (June 30, 2024). "The most (and least) distracting celebrity cameos on 'The Bear'". The Washington Post. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  30. ^ Travers, Ben (June 29, 2024). "The Best and Worst of 'The Bear' Season 3". IndieWire. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  31. ^ Sepinwall, Alan (June 27, 2024). "'The Bear' Season 3 Is Everything You've Been Waiting For and (Maybe Too Much) More". Rolling Stone. Retrieved July 10, 2024.
  32. ^ Wigler, Josh (July 8, 2024). "Every Episode of 'The Bear,' Ranked". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved October 9, 2025.
  33. ^ MacArthur, Greg; Lealos, Shawn S. (June 30, 2024). "The Bear: All 28 Episodes, Ranked from Worst to Best". ScreenRant. Retrieved November 5, 2025.
  34. ^ Eakin, Marah (June 27, 2025). "Every Single Episode of The Bear, Ranked". Vulture. Retrieved October 9, 2025.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.