The acclaimed breakout series “Beef” is back for a second season.
The first season, released in 2023, won the Emmy for Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series and picked up the acting trophies for its leads: Steven Yeun and Ali Wong. That story began with a road rage incident pitting both their characters against each other in an escalation of anger and pettiness.
The second season is different. The conflict now involves a quartet: Josh Martin (Oscar Isaac) and his British wife Lindsay Crane (Carey Mulligan), and Ashley Miller (Cailee Spaeny) and Austin Davis (Charles Melton).
Josh is the General Manager at the Monte Vista Point Country Club in Montecito, California where membership sets you back $300,000. Lindsay does design projects for said club. While they’re surrounded by such fanciness, it doesn’t mean they’re doing well — they’re really just wealth adjacent. They dream of owning their own high-end bed and breakfast.
Ashley is a beverage cart girl at the club and Austin is a freelance trainer. Ashley just wants health insurance so she can get the care she needs.
On top of this pecking order is the club’s new owner, Chairwoman Park (“Minari’s” Oscar winning Youn Yu-jung) who happens to be married to a younger man, plastic surgeon Dr. Kim (“Parasite’s” Song Kang-ho, who is terrific).
Watching the eight episodes of this season reminded me of these lines by Sir Walter Scott written in 1808, “Oh what a tangled web we weave, when we first practice to deceive.” There’s a whole lot of lying, blackmailing, sneaking, and manipulation. What happens when truths catch up?
In episode one, the Gen Z couple finds the elder millennial couple in the middle of a very heated quarrel. They record part of the fight and that is but the first of entanglements the quartet gets into.
There’s the dynamic between both couples, and the one the partners have with each other. The characters are so well written, they’re layered and nuanced — and the four main cast members are excellent. The Hollywood Reporter, for example, says this of how Spaeny portrays Ashley: “half Lady Macbeth, half innocent child.”
Save your judgement on any of the characters until after you’ve seen the series in full. One character in particular has had quite an evolution — while remaining true to themselves, an evolution that was earned.
The cast shot for a month in Korea as the plot involves Korean cosmetic surgery travel packages. Creator Lee Sung-jin (who apparently had not been to Korea in 20 years) told comedian Ronnie Chieng in an interview, director Bong Joon-ho showed up on set. Other Korean talent in the cast Seoyeon Jang and Korean American rapper BM
As a friend of mine put it, for this season of Beef, “anger is no longer the inciting force, it’s the residue.”
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All eight episodes of Beef's second season are out on Netflix.
