Carmy and Sydney Don’t Need to Be a Couple on ‘The Bear’

The Big Picture

• Carmy and Sydney’s relationship in The Bear doesn’t need to be romantic, as Season 2 focuses on their growth as business partners and friends.
• As they navigate opening a restaurant together, they grow closer and establish trust.
• Making Carmy and Sydney a couple would be a lazy development in The Bear. Their individual journeys are distinct, and the show highlights healthy working relationships between men and women without needing to turn them into couples.

We waitied a long time for it, but Season 2 of The Bear did not disappoint, giving us lots more of our favorite kitchen drama and, this time, romance, too! But while some may have been expecting to see Carmy Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White) and Sydney Adamu (Golden Globe winner Ayo Edebiri) getting involved with one another romantically, that’s not really what we get. With the introduction of Claire (Molly Gordon), Carmy finally gets some happy moments before that great Season 2 ending, but, with Sydney, things are very well-defined. They are business partners and friends, and neither of them even consider becoming more than that. That’s great for the show, but some viewers may have expected something different.

Season 1 of The Bear ends with Carmy and Sydney establishing a business partnership and deciding to close The Beef, the scrappy old joint Carmy’s older brother Mikey Berzatto (Jon Bernthal) left him, to open a new restaurant named The Bear. Shortly earlier, though, tensions were high between the two and the staff at the restaurant, which only settled after a letter left by Mikey to Carmy pointed him in the direction of the money he kept in tomato sauce cans. So, for Season 2, Carmy and Sydney were definitely bound to straighten up their bond, but that doesn’t mean it should grow into anything romantic at all.

Carmy and Sydney’s Relationship Doesn’t Need To Be Romantic

While Season 1 of The Bear focuses mostly on the reasons behind Carmy’s grief, Season 2 begins to explore how he could grow past it, and Sydney is one of the most important parts of his life in this sense. Every relationship and character in the series is fleshed out in Season 2, and theirs goes from being one of mentorship (if that’s what it could even be called) to one of equal partnership, and the series doesn’t make a single move in romantic directions, which only makes both of them richer as characters.

Character relationships are what drive the story forward in The Bear, and it’s only natural that Carmy and Sydney’s relationship take center stage as the show goes on. From what we saw in Season 1, they have certainly taken it to the next level by opening a restaurant together, and that comes with a lot of positive changes. They are both attempting to grow closer to one another and establish a relationship of trust, openly asking personal questions, teasing, and cooking together. They even develop their own ways of communicating, with the “I’m sorry” gesture Carmy introduces as a way of letting each other know that their arguments are not personal, only professional.

That’s the natural flow of things, especially because their line of work is a deeply personal one. Cooking for someone is one of the most personal gestures there is, and The Bear makes a point of using this to the max. (Remember when Sydney makes an omelet for Abby Elliott’s Sugar?) If the dynamics between the owners of a restaurant are not good, this is going to reflect in the meals they serve. It’s not about being in sync in the kitchen, but rather about taking on a shared approach to leadership, something that requires them to be in sync with one another.

A Carmy-Syndey Romance on ‘The Bear’ Is Too Easy

It’s easy to think that having this kind of glimpse into another person’s thoughts and feelings the way Carmy and Sydney do could lead to romance. Most of the time, it’s not even wrong to assume that. But this is not what any of them display towards each other. When Carmy takes Sydney to do the chaos menu in his apartment, for example, the look in her eyes is nothing more than surprise at finding out that a renowned chef such as him could be so messy (I mean, he uses his oven as drawers, come on). When they have their conversation under the table before the opening night of The Bear, it’s the same. They’re being honest about who they are to each other and who they want to be. No romance, though.

It’s almost impossible not to root for Carmy by now. We’ve seen how much he struggled with Mikey’s loss and all his effort in trying to keep The Beef afloat. We’ve also seen how much Sydney has changed his life for the better. They really are a good pair in Season 2, and constantly push each other forward in ways that only they can. That’s because they both want to grow, but they have completely different purposes. Making them a couple would betray that and would also be a rather lazy development.

‘The Bear’s Characters Have Dynamic Relationships

The Bear manages to portray working relationships between men and women without any hints of romance. Tina (Liza Colón-Zayas) and Ebra (Edwin Lee Gibson) go together to chef school, but there’s no shipping from anyone. That’s because the point being made here is that men and women can healthily coexist in any kind of environment (especially work) without there necessarily being other intentions. Of course, relationships at work can evolve into something romantic, and that’s what could be happening with Sydney and Marcus (Lionel Boyce).

Furthermore, their individual journeys are nothing alike, and were it not for the restaurant, they probably would never have met. Carmy is a depressed but successful chef who’s trying to put his life in order, while Sydney is a rising star in the field. Carmy already has most of the experience Sydney is still developing, but he still lacks the balance and maturity she has. When Claire is introduced to the staff of the restaurant, everyone is curious to see how Sydney would react, not because of jealousy, but because she is working a lot on building their business, and personal developments in Carmy’s life can indeed get in the way of the restaurant.

Carmy and Sydney would probably never have met were it not for The Beef. Call it what you will, but that’s not a sign of a star-crossed path. Making them a couple would betray the very principle of The Bear, which is to explore how people can move on after experiencing trauma, both individually and collectively. If somehow they do end up as a couple later on, it would require much more development than simply being two people who work together, and it shouldn’t take away from most of their individual growth.

The Bear is available to watch on Hulu in the U.S.

Watch on Hulu