#ooh really excellent meta chef's

[currymanganese]

@vacationship @devisrina I know you guys love Claire as much as I do so you should see this is you haven't already! 👀😭

Mikey Told Claire About The Bear?

This meta is reflecting on one of my theories on Mikey telling Claire about The Bear instead of Carmy. My meta on Claire’s character called, “Claire: Ominous or Naive?” is going to be a large foundation for this. It’s not necessary, but if you’ll like the full context please read in order:

Claire and Marcus: Pushing

Carmy And Claire: Frozen In Time

Claire: Ominous Or Naive?

Carmy & Claire: Guilt

↓ text / major spoilers for s3 below

I had a theory that Mikey was the one that told Claire about The Bear. As I said above, my previous meta will be the base for this. All of my previous thoughts from my other meta will be in italics except the dialogue.

Before we get into it, @espumado has a post on Carmy’s tattoos timeline. Feel free to check that out to see what I’m working with. If you think I’m being inaccurate in any way, please let me know! I want to get this all correct to solve this. I’d really appreciate it!

French Laundry - Approx. 8 years ago

Ever Restaurant - Approx. 7 years ago

Noma - Approx. 6 years ago

Christmas - Approx. 5 years ago

Daniel Restaurant - Approx. 4 years ago

Chef David NY - Approx. 1 year ago

Reunion By Grocery Store Fridges

claire: “why what are you doing?” carmy: “opening a restaurant.” claire: “you’re doing the thing.” carmy: “trying to, yeah.” claire: “still, i love the name.”

this is when we find out that claire knows the name of the restaurant. this was always strange dialogue to me because wasn’t carmy shy? why would he talk about something that personal? and with a crush, no less.

this is when i started messing with the idea that it wasn't carmy who told her. what if mikey told her?

here’s what @fresaton said in the reblogs:

He did it!! Mikey didn't know the name of the restaurant until Carmy started working and had lost contact with Claire. There's no way Claire knows and Mikey doesn't.

carmy: “how could you remember the name?” claire: “because you’re the bear, and i remember you.”

what if this is when carmy senses the lie or something off behind her words? what if he knew he wasn’t really being seen at all? maybe he senses that claire wasn’t really talking to him. (mikey? his high school presence?)

i can’t get over his reaction to that line either. you would expect it to be this happy expression but it wasn’t. carmy looked lost, almost dissociated.

When I first looked back on those scenes, I got extremely confused. The timeline had already felt off but this is nagging at my brain.

I had speculated that Mikey told Claire about The Bear and even the sketches of her with his cooking endeavors. But did it just get confirmed? This scene had to have happened before Christmas. When did Carmy tell her anything about The Bear?

I was doing research with @espumado’s post on Carmy’s tattoos timeline, and Christmas happened approximately five years ago. Then I looked at (3x06).

Tina was basically a stranger and he was already sharing parts of Carmy’s endeavors. Would it be farfetched he would say more to a family friend?

If I’m doing this correctly, then this had to have happened when he was at Noma which was approximately six years ago.

Then I realized something. Let’s go back to the Fishes episode. (Claire and Carmy’s relationship always seems to go back to fishes.)

The Mention: Fishes

I did a bit of deep dive on Reddit (the hellscape) and I saw a post talking about it a year ago. Before this season aired, people wanted to know the timeline as well. The post had updates after season three aired. People have speculated that Napa happened before the French Laundry and Ever.

In the scene between Mikey and Carmy in the season three finale, Mikey mentions Napa.

Mikey: “Just because you’ve been to fucking Napa, doesn’t make this a not fucked business, you know?” (3x10)

So, based on that, they had that discussion approximately eight to nine years ago. So, when would Carmy have the time to tell her?

Claire said she has six months left of residency in season two. From what I understand, residency is about three to seven years. But residency for emergency medicine is three to four years. (From what I looked up)

Mikey said she was in med school during Christmas. But she went to med school in New York.

claire: “i went to med school in new york so i never drove. so, i try to make up for it. the times i’m not working.” (2x05)

That means she was probably there very briefly before going back to New York.

Keep in mind, Claire told him that information like he didn’t know. (Who gave him the information about med school in the first place? Mikey.)

In (2x02),

Carmy: “No, I don’t think we even…We didn’t even tell anybody what the name was.” Claire: “You one hundred perfect told me the name.” Carmy: “How could you remember the name?”

The question that Carmy should have asked is how she even knew it in the first place?

Notice he said he doesn’t think THEY (Carmy and Mikey) told anyone?

he even said in the s1 finale, carmy realized he doesn’t really know anything about mikey. you could even argue that mikey isn’t that explicitly defined to carmy, similar to claire. he could have even projected a closeness to mikey to make himself feel less alone. he could be doing same projections with claire.

Carmy literally said in the s1 finale, he realized he didn’t even know anything about him. Why would Carmy be that confident in a person he admitted to not knowing? Was it disbelief?

Let’s go back to the Fishes episode.

mikey: “it’s done.” carmy: “who asked you to do that though? that’s what i’m saying.” mikey: “it’s a christmas gift. i fucking put in a good word. i told her about napa about copen, she ate that shit up.” carmy: “nobody asked you to do that.”

So, she didn’t know about Napa or Noma until Mikey told her. If Napa happened before-hand then The French Laundry and Ever definitely would have been the stuff Mikey talked about in between. She was also in New York in med school so the gap between Christmas and Daniel isn’t really a possibility. The only moment they have is literally Christmas night. They also happen to have a scene together.

Did it happen then? But Carmy acted like it’s something he would have told her years ago instead of five years ago. But when on the timeline does it make sense here? So, he potentially told her the same night that Mikey and Donna lose it? Then completely forgot about it?

She knows about The Bear but Carmy doesn’t even know where she’s going to med school?

They were never close. Mikey had to tell her about Napa and Noma (and whatever else in between) to help her catch up on what he was doing. Claire mentions in the car that they “hung out but never actually talked.”

claire: “we’ve hung out, like, so much but we’ve never actually talked.” carmy: “yeah, yeah i know what you mean.”

it’s strange to think that they’ve hung out a lot but never said anything to the other. especially when you with think on carmy, who was shy, talking about a dream he has with his brother? that’s a pretty personal thing to share with someone if they never talk. something strange is going on there, i just don’t know what it is quite yet.

it gets a little stranger with claire mentioning that she sat behind him in algebra class in freshman year. carmy doesn’t seem to remember that, like he’s completely disconnected/dissociated from her entirely. why is claire remembering all of these things but carmy isn’t? why is she doing all the pushing/driving?

what if she knew about the drawings too? is this another thing mikey mentioned to her? maybe she was trying to slowly ooze it out of him. only to end up disappointed that carmy doesn’t bother to mention it. basically erasing its potential importance to the relationship entirely.

He’s completely disconnected to her. They’ve hung out but don’t talk. They don’t talk but she knows about The Bear?

carmy: “i wish you talked to me more.” claire: “i tried. you’re really shy.”

In season three, we have nothing but constant dialogue from her. He barely talked in their scenes.

She tried but couldn’t get the result she wanted. Did she go to Mikey to get that information then? Did she try at Christmas and ultimately couldn’t since his mother literally drove a car into their house? We’re well aware of her lack of boundaries towards this relationship. So, after hearing his endeavors, she knew where to get the information she wants?

He wished she talked to him more? Or he wishes he cared enough to listen? She said she tried, but it seems like he wouldn’t really respond at all. Almost like some of the scenes they had in season three.

I have a theory that he’s still been disassociating during his scenes with Claire. It would explain how they constantly get interrupted by him or Sydney (when she’s with him physically). I haven’t gone further into this theory quite yet in a separate meta but I’ll leave it here.

Though, Carmy barely talks during his scenes, I’m supposed to believe that Carmy talked about something very personal with her?

Mikey could talk to Tina very easily about parts of Carmy’s endeavors. Mikey told Carmy about med school before Claire talked to him about it during Christmas (to which Claire mentions where that med school was located in the present.)

Was he possessed? By Logan Fernello? Kidding. Unless…?

Claire couldn’t have known before Mikey.

This is technically part one in my series of metas I’ve been writing.

Thank you so much to anyone who read this!