There had better be some actual effort from Carmy - if Sydney forgives him behind the scenes I will lose it.
To me, Carmy retiring is still him running away. He needs therapy, needs to find his way forward, but the whole series we see him run after something external to “fix” him. Even when he retires, his past, his trauma, grief, and his brother will still be waiting. It’s easy to be like oh I just need Al-Anon, my dream restaurant, my (alleged) dream girl, my mom’s approval, retirement…. that isn’t a magic fix. Each time, he figures it out too late that these things didn’t fix him, and he plummets further into crisis.
And I get Sydney’s emotional distance! Over and over, Sydney has been left to pick up the pieces, to look after him, his family, and his restaurant. And even by the end of s4, he still deflects her fear and anger instead of engaging. Their relationship doesn’t really leave the restaurant, and she must be so exhausted (Richie too, like he has always been a menace lol).
She gets to matter too, you know? That still matters, even if Carmy is in crisis.
I get the romance of him doing one thing right while soft music plays and suddenly Sydney forgives Carmy and is really in love with him, but that would be such a betrayal of her character. I love Carmy so much, I relate to him in so many ways, and I’m deeply invested in him finding peace and happiness. But not at Sydney’s expense. And he really, really hurt/betrayed her this time.
The way that the show has handled Sydney’s character has been so frustrating. I don’t know how eight final episodes can deliver; it’s kind of killed my writing for them.
I also feel like Charlie Brown with that fucking football where sydcarmy is concerned lol. I want to hope - I have this massive post-s4 story half-written but I kinda want to read the last page of this story before I get invested any further.
Fingers crossed, I guess?
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