The Bear Season 1 Ending Explained (In Detail)

The Bear season 1 ending explained how the restaurant has a chance of surviving while teasing a new future for The Original Beef under Carmy’s leadership. The story follows Jeremy Allen White as Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto, a talented young chef taking over his deceased brother’s sandwich shop with its success in question leading to The Bear season 1 ending. The Bear follows Carmy’s attempt to make The Original Beef better than a dirty yet familiar establishment in the Chicago neighborhood.

While Carmy’s “cousin” Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach) wants to keep The Original Beef the same as it has been, Carmy’s ambitions are aided by new hire Sydney (Ayo Edebiri). The unlikely trio rarely see eye-to-eye-to-eye, as they argue about changes to the menu and work styles. Carmy also stresses the financial hardships Mikey’s decisions put The Original Beef in, leading them to experiment with to-go orders. This all builds to The Bear season 1 ending, which provides hope yet uncertainty.

What Mikey’s Letter To Carmy Says

The Note Offers Words Of Encouragement And A Secret Recipe

One of the mysteries lingering before The Bear season 1 ending is what is in Mikey’s letter to Carmy. Early on in the season, Richie finds a letter addressed to Carmy on the floor behind the lockers. While he initially wants to give Carmy the letter, his anger gets the best of him as he puts Mikey’s letter back. The Bear season 1 finale has Richie bring the letter to Carmy’s attention when the young chef is at a low point. Carmy is shocked and takes a moment alone before deciding to open it.

These two short sentences were enough to make Carmy cry.

Mikey’s presence in The Bear is only seen in flashbacks, which makes it powerful when Carmy reads his words now that he is gone. The front of the letter said, “I love you, dude. Let it rip.” These two short sentences were enough to make Carmy cry, as he looked up to his brother but grew resentful of him because Mikey never let him work at The Original Beef.

The letter reminded Carmy that Mikey did love him, while the inclusion of his catchphrase “Let it rip” let him know that he believed in him to take over. The back of Mikey’s letter included the mysterious Family Meal Spaghetti recipe that Carmy failed to crack before.

The Bear’s Money In Tomato Cans Explained

KBL Electric Was A Ruse

After reading Mikey’s letter before The Bear season 1 ending and getting the family recipe, Carmy decides spaghetti is on the menu for family dinner. He follows Mikey’s recipe, even using the 28-ounce cans of tomato paste that he claimed tasted better. These smaller cans of sauce included a special surprise for Carmy. He shockingly finds a wad of cash buried inside the sauce. He immediately calls Richie into the kitchen and gets everyone at The Original Beef to help open cans to find even more money.

The money in tomato cans in The Bear season 1 finale pays off one of the biggest questions Carmy had since taking over the restaurant. He found records of Mikey making large payments to KBL Electric, but no one knew who this company was. The amount of money matched what Mikey borrowed from Cicero/Uncle Jimmy. He was saving money all along. A quick shot in The Bear season 1 ending shows “KBL” is on the bottom of the tomato cans, meaning Mikey was putting the money in them for safekeeping.

Why Carmy Finally Closes The Original Beef

Shutting Down The Restaurant Was The Right Decision For The Family

The Bear season 1 ending includes a major decision from Carmy, as he finally decides it is time to close the Chicago favorite, The Original Beef. Carmy’s character arc throughout the first season sees him struggle with being in this environment and trying to fix the mistakes made by Mikey. With the bank and IRS potentially coming for his sister’s house, since she is a co-signee of the restaurant, she pushes him hard to close The Original Beef.

Carmy finally feels like it is the right time to close the restaurant.

After reading Mikey’s letter and finding the money that will help ease some of the financial stress, Carmy finally feels like it is the right time to close the restaurant. This decision is aided by the knowledge that he has the support of his other chefs and plenty of ideas to make a new restaurant all their own — even if it means closing another recognizable piece of the city of Chicago.

Why Sydney Returns In The Bear Season 1 Finale

Carmy Finally Accepts Sydney As A Partner

The Bear ending also deals heavily with what Sydney’s future is going to look like after she quits The Original Beef when Carmy yells at her about how terrible the to-go orders are going. There was a possibility that the ambitious young chef who lacks patience could take a job somewhere else, while the closing of the bar near The Original Beef and the great review Sydney’s original recipe received even opened the door for her to potentially start a rival restaurant.

Instead of this, however, The Bear season 1 ends with Sydney returning to the restaurant and remaining one of the key characters in The Bear. Despite the bad blood that seemingly existed between them, Carmy’s apology over text and receptiveness to Sydney’s ideas when she comes back to get her last check show that he is ready to accept a partner on this journey to improve the restaurant.

How The Bear Season 1 Finale Set Up Season 2

Money Wasn’t A Solution To Carmy’s Problems

The Bear season 1 ending explained there would be a new direction for the restaurant with Carmy closing The Original Beef and starting a new venture with a restaurant called “The Bear.” After feeling like Carmy was operating the entire season with his head underwater, dealing with the seemingly impossible financial situation as well as one crisis after another, the money seemed like it was a lifeline for him. Watching The Bear season 1, it didn’t feel like it would end on an optimistic note.

The money was not going to be the solution to all the problems.

However, if things just went smoothly from there, season 2 would have been a completely different show than what The Bear had been so far. From the moment The Bear season 2 began, it was clear that money was not going to be the solution to all the problems in the show. Finding the cash helped ease the financial constraints for the time being, but immediately using it created new problems. Even with the restaurant closed for renovations, the fast-paced anxiety of the show presents one problem after another.

This leads to The Bear season 2 ending being a bittersweet finale with triumphs and failures. The Bear season 1 ending was a necessary conclusion as the audience had seen Carmy suffering and struggling all season. They wanted a victory for him to close out the season. The show would have betrayed itself if it suggested all of these issues Carmy is dealing with were fixed by hidden money. Season 2 was able to use that as a jumping-off point to show he had a long way to go to be healthy.

How The Bear Creator Christopher Storer Explains The Finale

Christopher Storer Revealed Uncle Jimmy’s Plans For Mikey And Carmy

With so much going on, it is helpful to have The Bear season 1 ending explained by the show’s creator himself. Christopher Storer discussed (via: Indiewire) various aspects of the final episode, how it completes Carmy’s journey in the first season, and how it leaves the door open for more to be explored.

Storer explained that the money did indeed come from the loan from Uncle Jimmy and was intended to be used by Mikey to open a restaurant with Carmy once he beat his addiction. It makes the discovery all the more heartbreaking, but Storer notes:

“There’s something beautiful in the idea that Carmy could have found this right off the bat if he would have made the spaghetti in the pilot, but then maybe he would have burnt out similarly to the way Michael did.”

The Real Meaning Of The Bear Season 1 Ending

The Episode Is About The Importance Of New Beginnings

At a thematic level, the ending of The Bear season 1 is about new beginnings and, as with the rest of the show, the legacy of family and facing one’s past. Carmy had been conflicted about inheriting The Beef after the death of his brother, Mikey, since the very first episode of the show. It’s not until episode 8, “Braciole”, that he finally seems to accept what happened and decides to use his situation as a chance for a fresh start not only for Mikey’s restaurant, but also for himself.

Changing the name of The Beef to The Bear is symbolic. It shows that Carmy is ready to move on from the death of Mikey, and that he won’t be dishonoring his brother’s legacy by trying to establish something new where The Beef once stood. The Beef clearly represents a lot to Carmy, as it’s almost a physical representation of the place Mikey had in his life — both the good and the bad.

Rather than trying to preserve and at the same time improve The Beef (alongside his memories of Mikey), Carmy instead realizes that the healthiest thing to do is to look forward and build new memories that, as much as part of him would likely wish otherwise, MIkey can’t be part of. The hidden money also played into this in The Bear, as it’s almost a metaphor for the fact that sometimes tragedies can also contain the foundations for how to emotionally move forward.

How The Bear Season 1 Ending Was Received

The Ending Capped Off The Intense First Season And Cemented The Show’s Success

The first season of The Bear immediately cemented it as one of the best new shows on television. That acclaim was established long before the final episode aired, but the final moments of season 1 took the series to another level in terms of popularity and excitement. Over the course of the first season, the audience was put through an intense journey with Carmy and the other characters, wonderfully communicating the stressful environment of a kitchen like this. However, the show knew it needed to allow the audience to breathe.

The ending of season 1 allows Carmy to finally confront Mikey’s death in a way he had been unable to up to that point. It gives the audience that release that seems to have been building up in this character they have come to care about. Seeing him read Mikey’s message and cry is a strange relief, even though it is mixed up with so many emotions. This primes the audience to end the season with a moment of triumph they were not expecting.

The reveal of the hidden money could have been seen as a lazy last-minute save that came out of nowhere, but it fit into the emotional story of the season. Mikey leaving the money behind for Carmy is a bittersweet moment of the realization that he believed in his brother and wanted to help him do with The Beef what Mikey couldn’t do himself. It offers the characters and the audience a life preserver that ends the harrowing season with a sense of hope that was needed. As a result, The Bear season 2 was met with even more enthusiasm.