You Can't Spoil The Bear

[Warning: Funnily enough, the following contains spoilers for Season 4 of The Bear.]

"Worms" was the breaking point.

I'm referring not to the tube-like animal often found in gardens, but to the fourth episode of The Bear's fourth season. "Worms," directed by Janicza Bravo and written by series stars Ayo Edebiri and Lionel Boyce, is, in fact, easily the best episode of the frustratingly inert fourth season of Christopher Storer's kitchen dramedy, an intimate half-hour that finds Sydney (Edebiri) spending an afternoon unexpectedly babysitting her cousin's young daughter (Arion King) while waiting on a hair appointment. The episode features the best performance from a guest star on The Bear in about two seasons (that would be a luminous Danielle Deadwyler, who plays cousin Chantel), and a lovely, if repetitive, monologue from Sydney, who's still wrestling with whether or not to leave behind the chaos Carmy (Jeremy Allen White) has created at The Bear in favor of a more lucrative offer. Let's ignore the fact that Sydney has been toying with this decision since the midpoint of Season 3, and that The Bear can't seem to find anything new for its co-lead to do. At the stage we're at with this show, we must take what we can get.

The most baffling thing about "Worms" has nothing to do with the content of the episode, but with the manner in which we found out the episode was called "Worms." Much has been made of the rollout of The Bear's fourth season, a rare instance where inside-baseball entertainment media drama has made its way beyond just the pages of the trades, becoming a part of fan discussion as well. There was the inexplicable review embargo, set six hours after the season dropped in its entirety on Hulu; FX's insistence that all coverage (including reviews) be marked with a spoiler warning; and, of course, the pièce de résistance, which was the network's choice to withhold episode titles and descriptions until the day after the full season premiered.

All of these precautions were taken, FX told The Hollywood Reporter, with the goal of preserving the fan experience by avoiding spoiling the show's trademark robust lineup of celebrity guest stars, or revealing how Season 4 ends. I'm still not quite sure how telling journalists that the fourth episode of the season is called "Worms" (which refers not to a major plot point, but to Sydney's affinity for gummy worms, which she continues to eat even though they hurt her teeth — do you get it? Carmy is the gummy worms) would have ruined the fan experience, or why we're allowing The Bear to be treated with the same level of secrecy as a Marvel movie. If networks have reached the point of being this nervous about letting it "leak" that Ayo Edebiri eats gummy worms in one scene in one episode of Season 4, I fear that the word "spoiler" has lost all meaning.

It's worth mentioning that the Season 4 finale is titled "Goodbye," and that the episode ends with Carmy telling Sydney, Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), and Natalie (Abby Elliott) that he's decided to walk away from The Bear, and maybe the culinary world as a whole. While the series hasn't yet been renewed for a fifth season, "Goodbye" leaves the door open for more: The final shot of the episode is of Uncle Jimmy's (Oliver Platt) countdown clock, introduced as a pervasive reminder of how much time Carmy and co. have before the money dries up, ticking down to zero. In the interest of being generous to FX, that's likely a large part of the reason for the caginess surrounding the episode titles. Of course the word "Goodbye" would prompt speculation about the show's future, which fans and critics are now doing anyway. The withholding of information, though, creates an expectation for something that isn't there, leaving the viewer on edge throughout the season. It clouds the overall viewing experience and makes it that much harder to appreciate what The Bear does have going for it: strong characters, thoughtful musings on grief, a huge music budget.

Overreacting to potential spoilers didn't start with The Bear, of course. It's the most recent and probably one of the most flagrant examples, but the paranoia around Christopher Storer's series is simply a symptom of a larger issue with how people engage with television and film in 2025. If it feels especially egregious for a show like The Bear, a show that is primarily about the internal feelings of its characters rather than the plot, that's because it is.

Consider the "cliffhanger" that capped off Season 3: the long-dreaded restaurant review of The Bear in the Chicago Tribune, the outcome of which is revealed early in Season 4 and only tangentially impacts how the rest of the season plays out. The review — which the show largely withholds from the audience, aside from a few excerpts — is middling, but still hopeful of the business's future. The review is brought up occasionally as the 10-episode season stumbles on but is never scapegoated as the thing that is going to make or break the restaurant. It's not the reason Jimmy puts The Bear on a two-month deadline to become profitable, nor does it seem to affect anyone's willingness to believe in Carmy's vision.

Despite my tone, I'm actually in favor of the review mattering less than anyone thought it would at the end of Season 3. For a show that is less plot driven than it is emotionally driven, the only thing that matters is that we get to see how the characters feel about the review, which, to The Bear's credit, we do. The eternally tortured Carmy continues to be tortured by his latest professional disappointment, while Richie blames himself for not noticing that the food critic dined at the restaurant three separate times before writing the review. This character-focused storytelling is a good thing, and a reminder of what The Bear did well in its first two seasons before becoming utterly muddled in its bloated, dragging third season.

The best television shows are about the journey, not the destination. The trepidation surrounding spoilers has had such a remarkably negative impact on the way people watch TV; a feelings-forward dramedy like The Bear should not be marketed with the gravity of Game of Thrones. What even constitutes a spoiler for The Bear? Carmy smokes another cigarette? Three characters talk over each other? There's yet another appearance from a real-life chef who can't really act? I can't imagine that knowing about any of those things would have ruined anyone's enjoyment of Season 4. Lest we forget the mass hysteria that consumed the internet after Severance's relatively straightforward second season finale just earlier this year. The fact is that not all TV shows are created equal, and not all TV shows are a complicated puzzle waiting to be solved.

It's easy to blame FX and Christopher Storer for The Bear's obsessive approach to spoilers, but ultimately, every precaution they took has been a natural escalation of the environment fans have demanded. A meal can still be good even if you watched it get made. 

Season 4 of The Bear is now streaming on Hulu.