'The Bear' Season 3 builds on its near-perfect reviews of Seasons 1 and 2

Season 3 of The Bear premiered last night on Hulu, almost exactly a year after Season 2 debuted. You can binge the whole thing if you want, because they're still working on an all-in model. -one, which seems to have worked for them. Early reviews and audience reviews are in, and while they're still solid, they're down slightly from the first two seasons' near-perfect scores on Rotten Tomatoes. For reference:

• The Bear Season 1 – 100% based on 80 reviews, 92% audience score
• The Bear Season 2 – 99% based on 109 reviews, 93% audience score
• The Bear Season 3 – 94% from 31 reviews, 82% audience score.

And keep in mind that it's much harder to maintain a 99-100% score when you have that many reviews. Although season 3 could still be cut if the next 70 reviews all like it.

Season 1 of The Bear Swept the Emmys, and People May Not Realize That was for season 1, not season 2, which is destined to gain a lot more given how great it was. I would still expect The Bear season 3 to be pretty well received, even with a small drop, although that puts it below something like The Boys season 4 at 95% and season 4 d 'Evil with 100%. Audience scores are also lower, but there aren't that many of them at the moment.

We can also head over to IMDB to see how it's doing per episode. Things are solid. Five of the ten episodes are above 9.0. None of them are lower than 8.5. These are actually higher than the majority of Season 2 episodes (although Fishes and Forks have a 9.6 and 9.7 respectively) and the same goes for Season 1 (the famous single episode taken, Review, however has a 9.5). But again, there are fewer reviews, and those come from fans big enough to watch the whole movie on day one.

We don't know The Bear's long-term plan, only that his creators have something mapped out for his entire arc. I'm guessing it lasts maybe five seasons, because it feels like a series that won't want to last too long, that's welcome, but still lasts a good while as we watch the characters grow over time, which was already one of the best passages of the series.

I can't wait to watch it myself soon enough here, and then I'll have my own review.

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