Everything and nothing

Frankly, never in my life have I felt as historically gaslighted by a piece of media as I have while watching this show for the past few years. It has genuinely made me feel like an idiot, a clown, and a crazy person just for using my eyes.

From the very moment of the S1 finale when Carmy just stares at Sydney after she comes back, I was like... okay, it’s giving. There are some vibes in here, but we’ll see.

It was only after letting the season marinate a little I came round to taking into account that yes Carmy said he would set her up before he left , Nat and Richie would be there etc, so I stopped spiralling so much about that possibility lol.

That said, still cautious over how they handle this, and Sydney’s direction. Fans have been crying out for more of her personal life for several seasons now, Worms was good , but it’s not enough if she’s supposedly the ‘The Bear’ and a lead character too.

The worst ending would be Carmy swanning off into the sunset and Sydney remaining the faithful workhorse of The Bear (especially when she could leave and go elsewhere with her talents) , struggling on, and with little to no personal life.

That girl has been through it- her mom is dead, her business failed , she’s had to put up with the stress of The Bear and carrying it when Carmy has gone missing or been spinning out. Oh and they had her dad end up in hospital. When does our girl get to live a little , have some fun, friends, (cough Sydcarmy) anything outside of The Bear other than her dad?

And yes this is where some might say well it’s realistic that people are lonely , and married to work- especially in the restaurant industry. Yeah I don’t care , this is a fictional show lol. If Carmy can have his situationship, Richie gets to have his flirtation with Jess , Marcus has a friend outside The Bear in Chester, Tina has a husband , don’t Black Female Character with No Personal Life Trope, my girl Syd. And no, the lil 2 second flirts with Luca don’t cut it lol.

carmy with cl**re: being with you felt like fire, no, no, it wasn't awful, it was great, you're peace, i love you, you're wonderful

carmy with sydney: you're considerate, you allow yourself to feel things, you allow yourself to care, you're a natural leader and teacher, you're doing all this stuff for every right fucking reason, and i'm gonna do everything i can to set you up for success, any chance of any kind of good in this building, it started when you walked in, and any possibility of its surviving, it's with you. i belive in you more than i ever believed in myself. you're the bear. (aka the dream i had and built with you)

and i'm supposed to root for the first one?

Fak number 1 did not deserve space for a romantic storyline, he just didn’t, he is the most unpopular character by far in the show. I did not care one bit about Tiff or her new husbands insecurities. They forced us to sit trough Claire’s “noble struggle” after the breakup. They teased the Francine drama for so long, and then yeah kudos for her and Nat for having an actual conversation. This were just a bunch of white people behaving childishly and yeah ok trauma but in the meantime…

Ebra is a fucking child soldier survivor and refugee. Tina lost her job after 20 years and was afraid to not be able to feed her family. Sweeps lost his dream job due to a hacked drug test and was homeless for a while. Marcus was the sole caregiver to a mother that had not time left guaranteed and wasn’t present in her last moments because he was at work. Sydney lost her mother as an infant and was a black woman in an industry that is famous for being abusive and racist.

Unlike, the majority of this fandom, I don’t have a hate boner for Claire. So, I wanted to explore why Claire seems to trigger Carmy that isn’t just an excuse to paint her as a villain.

So, let me get something out of the way first. I don’t think Claire being a trigger for Carmy at this moment in his life means she is a bad person or even that she is bad for Carmy. Clearly, she’s not always a trigger. We know that she has helped Carmy through at least one panic attack offscreen (the night before their scene in Bolognese) and that he talks about the restaurant a LOT to her (mind you, he should be having these conversations with Sydney but I digress!) Basically, she gives him the opportunity to be honest with her. About whether he really wanted her to have his number, about how he’s feeling, about his past, etc. Her dialogue does tend to be cheesy/chaotic, but that’s more a personality thing that I am just going to say works for Carmy because he finds it charming and is clearly smitten with her. “This is really nice.” “I wished you talked to me more.” “I feel like I missed out on a lot” Signs that he was enjoying himself despite of all the noise in his mind.

Getting into the noise a bit… he’s made it very clear he’s afraid of the other shoe dropping and she says some dumb shit about no one keeping track of shoes. In other words, that she’s not worried about what a “shoe dropping” might look like for him and their relationship. As long as they continue communicating when it happens (within reason). Now, everyone around him who knows Claire seems to love Claire and seems to be happy that he’s spending time with her. Natalie, Richie, Neil, and the dearly departed Mikey all wanted her for him. They had a crush on each other when they were kids, and he constantly drew pictures of her.

When they finally get together, we do see moments where he does look content and happy, until he gets in his head about it. And when he gets in his head, things tend to spiral quickly. Claire is inextricably linked to his past, and to his family, and when he has that panic attack in Omelette, it’s because he’s thinking about her while he’s at work. Then, it becomes a myriad of shit in his life that went south. His experience as a sous chef working under David, his family shit where every time something goes down, it goes to shit, and then there’s his first ever relationship… he has no other choice but to think that it’s going to go badly. He doesn’t want it to go badly, but his anxiety, trauma, ptsd and honestly, from what I can see, ocd, swerves in that direction. The first (and only) time he believed he was truly great at something, he had an absolute sociopath telling him he was worthless and that he should kill himself. That he should always work harder, faster, focus even under the most strenuous of circumstances. With Claire, he had a lack of focus. Not his fault (how he handled it sure is though!) but the way for him to truly focus was on Sydney. Someone who came back when the other shoe dropped and shit didn’t end badly. Someone he can rely on, someone who is actively relying on him. So, he’s able to calm down.

Now, in the Season 2 finale, we see Carmy get flustered when he calls for hands for Claire’s table. He decides to go out there himself, something clearly no one was expecting him to do. And then, it fucks him up bc right after, he sees David in the corner, a reminder that he will always be a fuck up, that he doesn’t deserve to be alive, that his only value is as a chef. And in that moment, he’s a failure, unworthy of Claire bc he made up his own mind. That, of course, sends him in a tailspin, all the way to his monologue in the freezer where he promptly blames Claire for all of his shortcomings. If he was honest in their relationship about what his fears were specifically, and how he was worried about his focus splitting between her and the restaurant, I’m sure Claire would have been a lot more understanding than she was hearing all that by happenstance after she was really proud of him for what he accomplished. That shows how incongruent Carmy’s mind was to the reality of the moment. Claire was so happy for him and thought things had gone splendidly. And now, she learns that not only does Carmy think that isn’t true, that the night was a failure, but also that it’s a failure because he was spending time with her. Yeah, that would hurt!

So, all of this is to say, I think Claire becomes this trigger when he feels like he’s on fire, when he feels like it’s the best feeling in the world, when he feels like he’s reached some sort of flow state, that’s when something terrible has happened in his life. So he links those feelings to negative experiences, even if at some point, it started out positively. The positive experiences get wiped away and what he feels for Claire is left ruined in the wake of all the other negativity because that’s all he knows. The other shoe dropping. He just became the other shoe this time around.

In Season 3, he zones out sometimes and thinks of her at work too. I believe he’s in a major depressive episode in addition to his other illnesses and is not all there because he’s now associating her with loss. Richie takes note of this throughout, and it’s basically Carmy teetering between going through the motions and experiencing life/death anxiety. He doesn’t even get to go home and talk to anyone and he won’t reach out to Claire. So, it becomes a bit of a Groundhog Day situation, like he explains in the first episode of Season 4. Idk I find it all very interesting and I find the “Claire is an evil bitch” thing very UNinteresting.

In the phone number call scene i don’t think Claire’s intention was wrong and maybe she could have wanted to give him a choice, but! with Carmy as the person receiving that question, let be real, he was never really going to say no (and let’s remember the version of Carmy Claire knew was this shy quiet boy too so she might have know this too idk). Can you imagine Carmy saying “No, I do not want you to have my number,” and then having to explain why? Lmao, he would have to take a position, disappoint someone, and actually know where he stands which is very unlike Carmy. He is very easily pushed one way or another because he does not know where he is standing in his own life, so even if it was not on purpose, the result still pushed him toward the only answer he could give. I understand what she was trying to do and it would have been charming with any other person that had a backbone and a clear idea of what he wanted. Maybe Claire just assumed he had grown out of being this shy quiet boy but he clearly hasn’t and that relationship looking like a puppy teen love clearly shows it.

And…

This connects to the bigger issue, that is that Carmy and Claire don’t really know each other. When they were young they had a crush and maybe observed each other, but like they said they never really talked, and that is not the same as knowing someone which she said she does lol. When they reconnect as adults, Carmy is still only showing her this sweet, romantic, wounded, almost teenage version of himself. He is not showing his petty side, his bratty side, his mean side, his obsessive side, his kitchen self, or his talent, and he is not really showing the part of him that communicates through cooking and the restaurant for obvious reasons. So does she really loves him? I just think she loves the version of Carmy he showed her, it is not her fault, but I do not think the feeling fully holds until she actually knows him, and the Season 4 conversation is pretty much showing this.

When Carmy talks about the the other shoe about his hypervigilance, and Claire says nobody is counting shoes, I understand that she is trying to make it lighter, but that is not really something you can say to someone in that state. You cannot just tell someone to act like the shoes do not exist when their body is already waiting for them. It is interesting to me because Claire is a doctor, so you would think she would have some idea of how that works, but the line shows that she does not really understand where it is coming from.

About the panic attack matters, is interesting that you don’t mention the scene before it, of them in an intimate soft moment, but the last part was Carmy looking at the ceiling which reads to me as dissociation. My read is that the next morning, Carmy might partially be panicking about this like why did I shut down?, why can I not just feel good normally?. I’m not even sure if Claire is the reason for the panic attack or if he was trying to think of Claire (in a dead wife setting lol) to get himself out of it, but either way it did not help and he panicked more. About the syd part I do agree with you mostly, I think syd was the grounding person because she is connected to the version of Carmy that feels real, cooking, the restaurant, creativity, the way he communicates and she is also proof that he might not be always abandoned even when he shows his worst side, that he’s worth something to her. The nature of it is not clear (probably not even to Carmy) but it is still very interesting how both Claire and syd are part of it.

Also is categorically wrong to say that the only time Carmy believed he was really great at something was when he had a psychopath telling him he was worthless. That was his latest job that made him worse, but he had other experiences in kitchens before that, and cooking is a core part of his identity and how he communicates through creativity. But cooking (his need to smoke everyone) was and still is connected to his family trauma and his abandonment issues from Mickey.

About the “on fire” part, I read that very differently. To me, the fire association in the show is connected to Carmy not wanting to feel his emotions or deal with them, so he burns his hand because he is trying not to feel the emptiness of grief, basically replacing one feeling with another, as a way of self harm, and for Carmy avoidance works in a similar way. So when he talks about “the best feeling in the world,” I do not read that as something simply positive or healthy, because something can feel good while still being bad for him. It is like an addiction, where the euphoria is real and the relief is real and the mechanism is still destructive. Claire gives him good feelings, and it also gives him a way to avoid his grief, his trauma, he’s making the dream restaurant he planned with his brother, but without him, ofc he’s avoiding that lol. Also those good feelings depend on him withholding his real self from Claire, so he fixates on the sweetness of the relationship while hiding huge parts of himself to keep that version of things going.

In the walk i don’t think he’s blaming Claire, he is blaming himself and he correctly calls Claire distraction which is awful to hear but is ultimately correct. From Claire’s side, she had every right to leave, and I’m not saying she should have stayed after hearing that but just think from Carmy’s perspective for a second. What happened it kinda confirms exactly what he already feared, which is that if he gets ugly and shows the worst self hating part of himself, people just leave him, which is reinforcing to never show himself as he is again, bc how is he supposed to trust that he will not be left next time. and there will be a next time bc even if he gets better, he will still panic sometimes and say ugly shit, he will still see the shoes, even if he learns how to manage it, and in those weak moments he still needs to feel like he will not be abandoned.

But, it’s interesting because I also think that Carmy loves a version of Claire that’s in his head, so it’s almost like they are both trying to date past versions of themselves that don’t really exist anymore! I think the lighter side of Claire is poor writing in my opinion, and I think the issue with the scene in the walk-in for Claire is that he never gave Claire a chance to show her his dark side. The only reason she heard any of that was because she decided to check in on him. His breakdown in the walk-in was a version of him still hiding himself, but being able to communicate to other people that she was a waste of his time when just earlier in the day (or the day before) he was telling her that this is really nice. It was whiplash for her because she had no indication he felt this way. Why didn’t he just SAY that he was having issues focusing to HER? Or even allude to it? He led her to believe that she was actually helping, not distracting, because they talked a LOT about the restaurant together.

I think because we get that scene of Claire and Carmy in an intimate setting that she’s the reason for the panic attack! I agree on your read of that situation, but he still wasn’t able to communicate that worry to his girlfriend. And I’m not sure he even tried. The closest we get is that Bolognese scene and maybe Claire saying that there’s no one is keeping track of shoes felt like a conversation being shut down for Carmy while I think Claire was trying to get at “because I’m not keeping track of shoes, you can trust me with this stuff.” Not sure. Again, I really do hate how most of their scenes are written lol

And I recognize he had other amazing experiences that fed his passion , but the one that shaped him the most and soured his relationship to cooking forever is that job in New York. That’s what I mean. Everything is tainted by that experience. He doesn’t think he can get that initial passion for cooking back. And honestly, I don’t think so either.

I do not think Claire is badly written in the way people say, i think she is superficially written on purpose. If you do not read the relationship as avoidance, then yes, it can look like weak writing or like Carmy is a bad boyfriend who failed to communicate. But if you read it as avoidance, Claire’s function makes sense. The superficiality is part of the point really.

Carmy felt “happy” with Claire in the moment, but I do not think that contradicts the idea that the relationship was avoidance. Claire represented his effort towards “fun and enjoyment” and something he never had: feeling like a normal person, and that feels good bc it looks like you can be “fixed” by someone. That does not automatically mean the thing giving you that feeling is good for you.

I think he liked feeling he could be a version of himself that was not constantly defined by grief, failure, family trauma, and shame. But that is exactly why I read it as avoidance bc instead of working through it and processing it he, thought he could be that version directly, so for the fantasy to work, he cannot fully see Claire as a complicated real person and he also cannot show himself as a complicated real person. He has to idealize her, romanticize the situation (Which is why Claire is shown like that in his flashbacks from his pov), and keep himself in that sweet, wounded, teenage version of Carmy that feels safer (remember how he faked being another person in that house party?), because if he actually faces the reality of it, then he also has to face himself and the fact that he is not emotionally equipped for the relationship he is trying to have.

Part of the problem of the whole relationship is that he is not intentional with her, he is not moving through the relationship with clarity. He is being pulled by comfort, fantasy, nostalgia, and the feeling of being normal.

I don’t really understand some of the questions you ask about him, like why didn’t he just tell Claire he was having trouble focusing, why didn’t he try show her his dark side, why didn’t he say he did not like the jokes, or why didn’t he give her a chance. Like did you understand his character?lol it’s very much clear he would never ask those questions which leaves us with him only having one way to behave.

I understand those questions from Claire’s perspective, because it was painful and confusing for her, but from Carmy’s perspective, why would he do that? Why would Carmy, especially Season 2 Carmy, openly show the part of himself he believes makes people leave? He could not even say no to Claire when she asks for his number. Instead of directly saying he was busy with the restaurant and couldn’t handle it or didn’t have the time then, he avoids by giving her the wrong number. And then faced with a direct confrontation he folds in that phone call. Carmy does not confront things directly. That is his level of emotional confrontation at that point, not knowing how to disappoint people openly and neither how to take a clear emotional position and stand in it. So the idea that he would sit Claire down and say, “I am worried this relationship is affecting my focus and I am scared of what that means for the restaurant,” feels completely out of character to me. So without those scenarios, what do we have left of that relationship? Let’s be for real lol. Also, what do you think trauma and mental illness do lol (Like you mentioned that and then you introduced those contradictory questions that were more aimed to an emotional mature and healthy individual). They make you unable to act like a healthy, mature, emotionally available person so you avoid, hide, freeze, people please, split yourself into pieces, and then explode when you cannot hold it together anymore. Being like that is not a moral failure like you seem to suggest. Yes the consequences are concrete and painful and fucked but thinking that the action is done to purposely led on someone is just?

And that connects to the creativity part too. I do think Carmy’s relationship with cooking is damaged but is this permanent? I’m not sure. Carmy is an artist tho so If even if he doesn’t cook, the need is still going to come out through whatever form he can access which will likely be connected to food. What is interesting is that Claire is the present time even after their relationship, doesn’t seem to be activating the creative part of him. At the wedding, Claire and Sydney are both there, and the creative outcome is connected to Sydney. For a character like Carmy whose creativity is one of the deepest ways he communicates, is very interesting and pointed that Claire doesn’t trigger that (he only created drawings of her when he was a teen, he hasn’t really done anything for her in the present time). I also do not think he looks smitten with Claire, specially in season 4 (he kinda did in Season 2 or in the Season 3 flashbacks but that as him seeing her as fantasy so). In s4 he seems more relaxed chill, and less caught in the fantasy, I do not necessarily read that as romantic movement forward, it can also mean he is not trying so hard to perform for her anymore bc the fantasy of avoidance broke, which to me it read as Carmy moving out of it, Season 5 could prove me wrong who knows.

I just don’t think Chris Storer is on the same page, which is why I ask the questions about Carmy’s character because I want to be fair to Claire and treat her as a human being. I’m not suggesting Carmy is a moral failure for not communicating in this way, but I also know that mental illness doesn’t excuse the pain you cause others. That was my point! I understand Carmy’s character very much. Those were rhetorical questions that I’m asking because it feels like Claire is being blamed for not being Carmy’s therapist and interrogating him about where he’s at. (Not saying you’re doing that, just seems like the vibes generally).

Any intentionality behind her being superficial or the relationship representing pure avoidance was erased in Season 4 for me, and of course, the very short time period we have for season 5. There is not enough story in the show to build to these conclusions. Before Season 4 aired, I would have fully bought this, but it just doesn’t seem like the story Chris is telling, which is why I am speaking from this angle. I think it’s interesting that he tries to avoid the relationship totally when he gives her the wrong number, and I think that’s telling that the writers believe that on some level, Carmy wanted to have that relationship and that conversation with her in the grocery store felt good and was ultimately good. I also think it means something that the people who care the most about him are frustrated with him when the relationship goes south. That’s why I think the show wants us to believe that it isn’t pure avoidance and there was good to glean from that relationship.

and, I think their last conversation in Season 4 is meant to show romantic movement forward. That he thinks she’s wonderful and that he retrieved the green sweater. Now whether he returns the green sweater is another thing, but I think the writing would have to backpedal if their relationship is meant to end in the way you say it should. I could see them just realizing it not working out, but it being a mutual agreement, not something that Carmy arrives to himself.

The fire thing shouldn’t have to mentioned bc the avoidance angle was already clear before, they are saying and reinforcing she makes him feel like how he feels when he self harms 😬 yeah no that’s bad. And again I’m not saying Claire is the villain is just they way they include things like that at this point and also don’t give us the specificity of his feelings for her as a unique person is interesting.

Then the wedding, he told her the truth about his hand, ok great but then the rest of the conversation is very superficial lol. Also Claire made him participate? When lol, I got it was supposed to be charming and I guess it was for Carmy but they are still stuck in that same flirty superficial state, that doesn’t really show much advancement after everything lol. Also they are still withholding seeing syd and Carmy as platonic purely bc why the hell didn’t they dance lol, it would have been the perfect moment to set things straight, him and Claire dancing like showing us see this is romance then Carmy and syd dancing and showing us how platonic should look like. They never did that, not even once in the show that claims to want to represent a platonic love lol.

Finally the green sweater phone conversation and him calling her wonderful. First of all wonderful is such a generic thing to say (specially after all the specific things he said about syd the next ep 😬), I think it pretty much highlights how much he doesn’t know her, if the only adjetive he could conjure is such a basic one. I don’t know how saying that means romantic forward movement, it also seemed like closure from his pov ngl, then Claire opened it again with the sweater thing.

But the reason why I see the direction of the relationship differently in Season 4 is that his eyes nearly bugged out of his head upon seeing Claire at the wedding. The emotional center was focused on his mom, but also, he was dreading going to the wedding because Claire was going to be there. But the way she invites him under the table, starts to put him at ease. The conversation that they have is “superficial” afterwards because Carmy still doesn't know how to communicate with her because he has never observed her in the way he’s observed Syd. He is able to notice those things about Sydney bc sure, there could be romantic feelings there, but also because he’s watching Syd in her element and is finally able to articulate that he’s not in his element and she’s exactly where she needs to be. It took him all season 3 long and miscommunication after miscommunication until he was able to sit back and watch and acknowledge “that’s how it’s supposed to be. I am not in that place anymore.” He sees how better she is at that than he is.

He’s still finding his way on how to talk through his feelings outside of the restaurant bc he doesn’t know who he is. So, yeah, I guess Claire then couldn’t possibly know who he is. And what’s really heartbreaking about Syd in Goodbye is that she thought she did find a partner and someone she knew and trusted, and he sort of just craps all over it. Of course then, she shows how much she understands him by saying how shitty his life is, and how he always self sabotages, and that pain is palpable. But my brain is currently exploding so I don’t really want to get into the sydcarmy of it. That’s an entirely separate post for me lol

Anyways, I thought Carm revealing the truth to Claire about his hand in that way was a way of showing that he’s taking a step in that direction of being honest about who he is currently and where he wants to go. And him quitting the restaurant is a desire to explore that part of himself too, which is why he makes that decision to leave after talking to Claire in Scallop.

I agree, wonderful is a very generic thing, and with Claire’s offering (and possibly Carmy’s return of the sweater) seemed to be an invitation to “let’s actually try and do this thing for real if you believe I’m so wonderful.” I think it would be a disservice if they don’t give it the “good college try” after Carmy has been working on healing himself and discovering who he is outside of the restaurant. The relationship seemed doomed to fail, for sure, but I think a lot of air has been cleared and they both want to try again it seems. But, I also can see reading that as closure and Carmy not being able to close the door Claire is opening up. But then again, he does retrieve the sweater, which to me, is not closure.

The most strong argument I have against them being together again is that it hasn’t developed enough for it to show it could be something healthy, it actually showed the opposite. Sure it could show interest from both sides but will the finale really show us that path considering it spend s2,3,4 showing their incompatibility?

Bc the show was giving us a deadline for restaurant and for Claire residency, since season 2 so I don’t think actually not going through with it is a disservice of anything lol.

Unlike, the majority of this fandom, I don’t have a hate boner for Claire. So, I wanted to explore why Claire seems to trigger Carmy that isn’t just an excuse to paint her as a villain.

So, let me get something out of the way first. I don’t think Claire being a trigger for Carmy at this moment in his life means she is a bad person or even that she is bad for Carmy. Clearly, she’s not always a trigger. We know that she has helped Carmy through at least one panic attack offscreen (the night before their scene in Bolognese) and that he talks about the restaurant a LOT to her (mind you, he should be having these conversations with Sydney but I digress!) Basically, she gives him the opportunity to be honest with her. About whether he really wanted her to have his number, about how he’s feeling, about his past, etc. Her dialogue does tend to be cheesy/chaotic, but that’s more a personality thing that I am just going to say works for Carmy because he finds it charming and is clearly smitten with her. “This is really nice.” “I wished you talked to me more.” “I feel like I missed out on a lot” Signs that he was enjoying himself despite of all the noise in his mind.

Getting into the noise a bit… he’s made it very clear he’s afraid of the other shoe dropping and she says some dumb shit about no one keeping track of shoes. In other words, that she’s not worried about what a “shoe dropping” might look like for him and their relationship. As long as they continue communicating when it happens (within reason). Now, everyone around him who knows Claire seems to love Claire and seems to be happy that he’s spending time with her. Natalie, Richie, Neil, and the dearly departed Mikey all wanted her for him. They had a crush on each other when they were kids, and he constantly drew pictures of her.

When they finally get together, we do see moments where he does look content and happy, until he gets in his head about it. And when he gets in his head, things tend to spiral quickly. Claire is inextricably linked to his past, and to his family, and when he has that panic attack in Omelette, it’s because he’s thinking about her while he’s at work. Then, it becomes a myriad of shit in his life that went south. His experience as a sous chef working under David, his family shit where every time something goes down, it goes to shit, and then there’s his first ever relationship… he has no other choice but to think that it’s going to go badly. He doesn’t want it to go badly, but his anxiety, trauma, ptsd and honestly, from what I can see, ocd, swerves in that direction. The first (and only) time he believed he was truly great at something, he had an absolute sociopath telling him he was worthless and that he should kill himself. That he should always work harder, faster, focus even under the most strenuous of circumstances. With Claire, he had a lack of focus. Not his fault (how he handled it sure is though!) but the way for him to truly focus was on Sydney. Someone who came back when the other shoe dropped and shit didn’t end badly. Someone he can rely on, someone who is actively relying on him. So, he’s able to calm down.

Now, in the Season 2 finale, we see Carmy get flustered when he calls for hands for Claire’s table. He decides to go out there himself, something clearly no one was expecting him to do. And then, it fucks him up bc right after, he sees David in the corner, a reminder that he will always be a fuck up, that he doesn’t deserve to be alive, that his only value is as a chef. And in that moment, he’s a failure, unworthy of Claire bc he made up his own mind. That, of course, sends him in a tailspin, all the way to his monologue in the freezer where he promptly blames Claire for all of his shortcomings. If he was honest in their relationship about what his fears were specifically, and how he was worried about his focus splitting between her and the restaurant, I’m sure Claire would have been a lot more understanding than she was hearing all that by happenstance after she was really proud of him for what he accomplished. That shows how incongruent Carmy’s mind was to the reality of the moment. Claire was so happy for him and thought things had gone splendidly. And now, she learns that not only does Carmy think that isn’t true, that the night was a failure, but also that it’s a failure because he was spending time with her. Yeah, that would hurt!

So, all of this is to say, I think Claire becomes this trigger when he feels like he’s on fire, when he feels like it’s the best feeling in the world, when he feels like he’s reached some sort of flow state, that’s when something terrible has happened in his life. So he links those feelings to negative experiences, even if at some point, it started out positively. The positive experiences get wiped away and what he feels for Claire is left ruined in the wake of all the other negativity because that’s all he knows. The other shoe dropping. He just became the other shoe this time around.

In Season 3, he zones out sometimes and thinks of her at work too. I believe he’s in a major depressive episode in addition to his other illnesses and is not all there because he’s now associating her with loss. Richie takes note of this throughout, and it’s basically Carmy teetering between going through the motions and experiencing life/death anxiety. He doesn’t even get to go home and talk to anyone and he won’t reach out to Claire. So, it becomes a bit of a Groundhog Day situation, like he explains in the first episode of Season 4. Idk I find it all very interesting and I find the “Claire is an evil bitch” thing very UNinteresting.

In the phone number call scene i don’t think Claire’s intention was wrong and maybe she could have wanted to give him a choice, but! with Carmy as the person receiving that question, let be real, he was never really going to say no (and let’s remember the version of Carmy Claire knew was this shy quiet boy too so she might have know this too idk). Can you imagine Carmy saying “No, I do not want you to have my number,” and then having to explain why? Lmao, he would have to take a position, disappoint someone, and actually know where he stands which is very unlike Carmy. He is very easily pushed one way or another because he does not know where he is standing in his own life, so even if it was not on purpose, the result still pushed him toward the only answer he could give. I understand what she was trying to do and it would have been charming with any other person that had a backbone and a clear idea of what he wanted. Maybe Claire just assumed he had grown out of being this shy quiet boy but he clearly hasn’t and that relationship looking like a puppy teen love clearly shows it.

And…

This connects to the bigger issue, that is that Carmy and Claire don’t really know each other. When they were young they had a crush and maybe observed each other, but like they said they never really talked, and that is not the same as knowing someone which she said she does lol. When they reconnect as adults, Carmy is still only showing her this sweet, romantic, wounded, almost teenage version of himself. He is not showing his petty side, his bratty side, his mean side, his obsessive side, his kitchen self, or his talent, and he is not really showing the part of him that communicates through cooking and the restaurant for obvious reasons. So does she really loves him? I just think she loves the version of Carmy he showed her, it is not her fault, but I do not think the feeling fully holds until she actually knows him, and the Season 4 conversation is pretty much showing this.

When Carmy talks about the the other shoe about his hypervigilance, and Claire says nobody is counting shoes, I understand that she is trying to make it lighter, but that is not really something you can say to someone in that state. You cannot just tell someone to act like the shoes do not exist when their body is already waiting for them. It is interesting to me because Claire is a doctor, so you would think she would have some idea of how that works, but the line shows that she does not really understand where it is coming from.

About the panic attack matters, is interesting that you don’t mention the scene before it, of them in an intimate soft moment, but the last part was Carmy looking at the ceiling which reads to me as dissociation. My read is that the next morning, Carmy might partially be panicking about this like why did I shut down?, why can I not just feel good normally?. I’m not even sure if Claire is the reason for the panic attack or if he was trying to think of Claire (in a dead wife setting lol) to get himself out of it, but either way it did not help and he panicked more. About the syd part I do agree with you mostly, I think syd was the grounding person because she is connected to the version of Carmy that feels real, cooking, the restaurant, creativity, the way he communicates and she is also proof that he might not be always abandoned even when he shows his worst side, that he’s worth something to her. The nature of it is not clear (probably not even to Carmy) but it is still very interesting how both Claire and syd are part of it.

Also is categorically wrong to say that the only time Carmy believed he was really great at something was when he had a psychopath telling him he was worthless. That was his latest job that made him worse, but he had other experiences in kitchens before that, and cooking is a core part of his identity and how he communicates through creativity. But cooking (his need to smoke everyone) was and still is connected to his family trauma and his abandonment issues from Mickey.

About the “on fire” part, I read that very differently. To me, the fire association in the show is connected to Carmy not wanting to feel his emotions or deal with them, so he burns his hand because he is trying not to feel the emptiness of grief, basically replacing one feeling with another, as a way of self harm, and for Carmy avoidance works in a similar way. So when he talks about “the best feeling in the world,” I do not read that as something simply positive or healthy, because something can feel good while still being bad for him. It is like an addiction, where the euphoria is real and the relief is real and the mechanism is still destructive. Claire gives him good feelings, and it also gives him a way to avoid his grief, his trauma, he’s making the dream restaurant he planned with his brother, but without him, ofc he’s avoiding that lol. Also those good feelings depend on him withholding his real self from Claire, so he fixates on the sweetness of the relationship while hiding huge parts of himself to keep that version of things going.

In the walk i don’t think he’s blaming Claire, he is blaming himself and he correctly calls Claire distraction which is awful to hear but is ultimately correct. From Claire’s side, she had every right to leave, and I’m not saying she should have stayed after hearing that but just think from Carmy’s perspective for a second. What happened it kinda confirms exactly what he already feared, which is that if he gets ugly and shows the worst self hating part of himself, people just leave him, which is reinforcing to never show himself as he is again, bc how is he supposed to trust that he will not be left next time. and there will be a next time bc even if he gets better, he will still panic sometimes and say ugly shit, he will still see the shoes, even if he learns how to manage it, and in those weak moments he still needs to feel like he will not be abandoned.

But, it’s interesting because I also think that Carmy loves a version of Claire that’s in his head, so it’s almost like they are both trying to date past versions of themselves that don’t really exist anymore! I think the lighter side of Claire is poor writing in my opinion, and I think the issue with the scene in the walk-in for Claire is that he never gave Claire a chance to show her his dark side. The only reason she heard any of that was because she decided to check in on him. His breakdown in the walk-in was a version of him still hiding himself, but being able to communicate to other people that she was a waste of his time when just earlier in the day (or the day before) he was telling her that this is really nice. It was whiplash for her because she had no indication he felt this way. Why didn’t he just SAY that he was having issues focusing to HER? Or even allude to it? He led her to believe that she was actually helping, not distracting, because they talked a LOT about the restaurant together.

I think because we get that scene of Claire and Carmy in an intimate setting that she’s the reason for the panic attack! I agree on your read of that situation, but he still wasn’t able to communicate that worry to his girlfriend. And I’m not sure he even tried. The closest we get is that Bolognese scene and maybe Claire saying that there’s no one is keeping track of shoes felt like a conversation being shut down for Carmy while I think Claire was trying to get at “because I’m not keeping track of shoes, you can trust me with this stuff.” Not sure. Again, I really do hate how most of their scenes are written lol

And I recognize he had other amazing experiences that fed his passion , but the one that shaped him the most and soured his relationship to cooking forever is that job in New York. That’s what I mean. Everything is tainted by that experience. He doesn’t think he can get that initial passion for cooking back. And honestly, I don’t think so either.

I do not think Claire is badly written in the way people say, i think she is superficially written on purpose. If you do not read the relationship as avoidance, then yes, it can look like weak writing or like Carmy is a bad boyfriend who failed to communicate. But if you read it as avoidance, Claire’s function makes sense. The superficiality is part of the point really.

Carmy felt “happy” with Claire in the moment, but I do not think that contradicts the idea that the relationship was avoidance. Claire represented his effort towards “fun and enjoyment” and something he never had: feeling like a normal person, and that feels good bc it looks like you can be “fixed” by someone. That does not automatically mean the thing giving you that feeling is good for you.

I think he liked feeling he could be a version of himself that was not constantly defined by grief, failure, family trauma, and shame. But that is exactly why I read it as avoidance bc instead of working through it and processing it he, thought he could be that version directly, so for the fantasy to work, he cannot fully see Claire as a complicated real person and he also cannot show himself as a complicated real person. He has to idealize her, romanticize the situation (Which is why Claire is shown like that in his flashbacks from his pov), and keep himself in that sweet, wounded, teenage version of Carmy that feels safer (remember how he faked being another person in that house party?), because if he actually faces the reality of it, then he also has to face himself and the fact that he is not emotionally equipped for the relationship he is trying to have.

Part of the problem of the whole relationship is that he is not intentional with her, he is not moving through the relationship with clarity. He is being pulled by comfort, fantasy, nostalgia, and the feeling of being normal.

I don’t really understand some of the questions you ask about him, like why didn’t he just tell Claire he was having trouble focusing, why didn’t he try show her his dark side, why didn’t he say he did not like the jokes, or why didn’t he give her a chance. Like did you understand his character?lol it’s very much clear he would never ask those questions which leaves us with him only having one way to behave.

I understand those questions from Claire’s perspective, because it was painful and confusing for her, but from Carmy’s perspective, why would he do that? Why would Carmy, especially Season 2 Carmy, openly show the part of himself he believes makes people leave? He could not even say no to Claire when she asks for his number. Instead of directly saying he was busy with the restaurant and couldn’t handle it or didn’t have the time then, he avoids by giving her the wrong number. And then faced with a direct confrontation he folds in that phone call. Carmy does not confront things directly. That is his level of emotional confrontation at that point, not knowing how to disappoint people openly and neither how to take a clear emotional position and stand in it. So the idea that he would sit Claire down and say, “I am worried this relationship is affecting my focus and I am scared of what that means for the restaurant,” feels completely out of character to me. So without those scenarios, what do we have left of that relationship? Let’s be for real lol. Also, what do you think trauma and mental illness do lol (Like you mentioned that and then you introduced those contradictory questions that were more aimed to an emotional mature and healthy individual). They make you unable to act like a healthy, mature, emotionally available person so you avoid, hide, freeze, people please, split yourself into pieces, and then explode when you cannot hold it together anymore. Being like that is not a moral failure like you seem to suggest. Yes the consequences are concrete and painful and fucked but thinking that the action is done to purposely led on someone is just?

And that connects to the creativity part too. I do think Carmy’s relationship with cooking is damaged but is this permanent? I’m not sure. Carmy is an artist tho so If even if he doesn’t cook, the need is still going to come out through whatever form he can access which will likely be connected to food. What is interesting is that Claire is the present time even after their relationship, doesn’t seem to be activating the creative part of him. At the wedding, Claire and Sydney are both there, and the creative outcome is connected to Sydney. For a character like Carmy whose creativity is one of the deepest ways he communicates, is very interesting and pointed that Claire doesn’t trigger that (he only created drawings of her when he was a teen, he hasn’t really done anything for her in the present time). I also do not think he looks smitten with Claire, specially in season 4 (he kinda did in Season 2 or in the Season 3 flashbacks but that as him seeing her as fantasy so). In s4 he seems more relaxed chill, and less caught in the fantasy, I do not necessarily read that as romantic movement forward, it can also mean he is not trying so hard to perform for her anymore bc the fantasy of avoidance broke, which to me it read as Carmy moving out of it, Season 5 could prove me wrong who knows.

I just don’t think Chris Storer is on the same page, which is why I ask the questions about Carmy’s character because I want to be fair to Claire and treat her as a human being. I’m not suggesting Carmy is a moral failure for not communicating in this way, but I also know that mental illness doesn’t excuse the pain you cause others. That was my point! I understand Carmy’s character very much. Those were rhetorical questions that I’m asking because it feels like Claire is being blamed for not being Carmy’s therapist and interrogating him about where he’s at. (Not saying you’re doing that, just seems like the vibes generally).

Any intentionality behind her being superficial or the relationship representing pure avoidance was erased in Season 4 for me, and of course, the very short time period we have for season 5. There is not enough story in the show to build to these conclusions. Before Season 4 aired, I would have fully bought this, but it just doesn’t seem like the story Chris is telling, which is why I am speaking from this angle. I think it’s interesting that he tries to avoid the relationship totally when he gives her the wrong number, and I think that’s telling that the writers believe that on some level, Carmy wanted to have that relationship and that conversation with her in the grocery store felt good and was ultimately good. I also think it means something that the people who care the most about him are frustrated with him when the relationship goes south. That’s why I think the show wants us to believe that it isn’t pure avoidance and there was good to glean from that relationship.

and, I think their last conversation in Season 4 is meant to show romantic movement forward. That he thinks she’s wonderful and that he retrieved the green sweater. Now whether he returns the green sweater is another thing, but I think the writing would have to backpedal if their relationship is meant to end in the way you say it should. I could see them just realizing it not working out, but it being a mutual agreement, not something that Carmy arrives to himself.

The fire thing shouldn’t have to mentioned bc the avoidance angle was already clear before, they are saying and reinforcing she makes him feel like how he feels when he self harms 😬 yeah no that’s bad. And again I’m not saying Claire is the villain is just they way they include things like that at this point and also don’t give us the specificity of his feelings for her as a unique person is interesting.

Then the wedding, he told her the truth about his hand, ok great but then the rest of the conversation is very superficial lol. Also Claire made him participate? When lol, I got it was supposed to be charming and I guess it was for Carmy but they are still stuck in that same flirty superficial state, that doesn’t really show much advancement after everything lol. Also they are still withholding seeing syd and Carmy as platonic purely bc why the hell didn’t they dance lol, it would have been the perfect moment to set things straight, him and Claire dancing like showing us see this is romance then Carmy and syd dancing and showing us how platonic should look like. They never did that, not even once in the show that claims to want to represent a platonic love lol.

Finally the green sweater phone conversation and him calling her wonderful. First of all wonderful is such a generic thing to say (specially after all the specific things he said about syd the next ep 😬), I think it pretty much highlights how much he doesn’t know her, if the only adjetive he could conjure is such a basic one. I don’t know how saying that means romantic forward movement, it also seemed like closure from his pov ngl, then Claire opened it again with the sweater thing.

If Carmy ends up alone but never deals with his issues -> bad ending. Could lead to his death.

If Carmy ends up alone but in therapy and doing some sort of job he cares about -> good ending. We’re all happy for him.

If Carmy ends up kissing or something else with Syd but never going to therapy -> bad ending. Syd will leave him eventually.

If Carmy ends up alone but never deals with his issues -> bad ending. Could lead to his death.

If Carmy ends up alone but in therapy and doing some sort of job he cares about -> good ending. We’re all happy for him.

If Carmy ends up kissing or something else with Syd but never going to therapy -> bad ending. Syd will leave him eventually.