The fourth episode in season two of Beef is just 33 minutes long, making it the second shortest of eight. Yet ‘Oh, the Comfort, the Inexpressible Comfort’ is the centrepiece of the series. Set largely within the confines of a hospital as Ashley (Cailee Spaeny) endures agonising hours in the waiting room before surgery for ovarian torsion, it crystallises the season’s themes of class, capitalism and generational divide, while also escalating the titular feud between Ashley and Josh (Oscar Isaac), her boss at an exclusive country club in Montecito.
“This season, we have a more passive-aggressive start, versus the aggressive start of last season [in which a road-rage incident between a Korean American man and an Asian American woman escalates rapidly],” says South Korean American creator and showrunner Lee Sung Jin. “I knew we would have to catapult it at the midpoint, and the episode had to reignite the beef between Josh and Ashley.”
Season two starts with Gen Z couple Ashley and Austin (Charles Melton) witnessing — and filming — an explosive marital spat between the middle-aged Josh and Lindsay (Carey Mulligan). Josh is the general manager of Monte Vista Point country club, where Ashley works as a gopher on the golf course, while interior designer Lindsay hails from an affluent family in England. At first, Ashley ponders if she should show the footage to the police, but instead uses the video to blackmail Josh into giving her a middle-management job at the club, replete with healthcare.
By the end of the third episode, the conflict between the two couples has settled somewhat — and then comes Ashley’s dire need for surgery. Josh, with his connections, could get her seen immediately, but he refuses to pull any strings until she deletes the video. The excruciating delay ultimately causes Ashley to lose an ovary, and perhaps the ability to ever have children.
“That episode was based on a real-life incident that I went through, where I had a 10-and-a-half-hour experience at the ER,” explains Lee. “That’s why it was important for me to direct that episode, because I wanted to get every detail right. I’m quite privileged being a working writer, and still the healthcare system fails. It’s indicative of how broken it is in the United States.”
As moving as it is harrowing, the fourth episode unlocks great empathy for Ashley, who has hitherto bordered on being a loathsome brat. Indeed, finding the humanity in characters who do contemptible things is Beef’s raison d’être, with Lee saying he is forever mindful to root all action and psychology, however dark, in the relatable. “I often cite The Sopranos in the writing room. Tony Soprano, in the pilot, is one of the most despicable characters in television history, but we love him because he has the moment with the ducks [he feeds a family of mallards that reside in his swimming pool; when they depart, he has a panic attack].”
‘Oh, the Comfort, the Inexpressible Comfort’ concludes with an understandably bitter Ashley being discharged from hospital, whereupon she breaks into Josh’s house to steal some papers that provide evidence of money laundering. Only she pauses before leaving, then opens the refrigerator, removes a jug of orange juice, and dips her hand down the front of her trousers. It emerges coated in blood, which she swirls into the OJ before replacing it in the fridge. Lee smiles. “My initial draft was too cute; I just had her destroying some of his awards. But I knew it had to be something more visceral. It felt appropriate that she got revenge via the very wound he had caused her.”
Wider and deeper
The second season of Beef certainly has its visceral moments, but it also seeks to go wider and deeper than the first. While that initial season, which dropped on Netflix in April 2023, maintained a streamlined focus and a terrific momentum as the feud between two individuals careened wildly out of control, this outing is steadily paced and increasingly complex, with two more couples entering the fray: baby boomer Troy (William Fichtner) and his young trophy wife Ava (Mikaela Hoover), together with the new owner of Monte Vista Point country club, Chairwoman Park (Youn Yuh-jung), and her billionaire plastic surgeon husband Dr Kim (Song Kang-ho). In time, the fates of all these characters become entwined, the binds tightening until they gasp for survival.
“What we are trying to show through this Russian nesting doll of couples is how quickly humans are wanting more,” says Lee. “If you buy into this system of capitalism fully, you’re screwed. We’re never satiated unless we can find inner peace.”
Happiness came to Lee when the first season of Beef won three Golden Globes and eight Primetime Emmys, including outstanding limited or anthology series and lead actor and actress. Lee also won the outstanding directing Emmy for season finale ‘Figures of Light’, the only episode he helmed (he directs four in season two). Such is the quality of the cast in this sophomore season, Beef is again attracting buzz for the acting awards, with Lee keen to shout out the contribution of Melton.
“The first person I attached was Charles,” he says, stressing that he was bowled over by the actor in Todd Haynes’ May December. “His energy is so earnest and loving, like a puppy dog. Season one covered so much of the Korean American diaspora, but one thing we didn’t get to explore was the experience of someone who is half Korean. I wanted to have a character that was going to have an identity tug of war. Several of the writers in the room are half Asian or half Korean; my daughter’s half Korean. So that felt like fertile ground to cover.”
Lee is currently working on a feature “that will be my directorial debut on the film side” and is also writing an X-Men reboot alongside Joanna Calo, co-showrunner of FX’s The Bear. Both did passes at the script of Marvel’s Thunderbolts*, but this, for Lee, is the Holy Grail.
“X-Men is the best IP in the business,” he states. “I grew up with it, [in] that my dad and I would wake up every Saturday morning and watch the animated series. He got me the comics. It’s a pinch-me moment to go into Marvel every day and just blue sky with [president of Marvel Studios] Kevin Feige.”
Lee considers his future. “I want to remain open to whatever the universe shows me. If that’s another season of Beef, I will of course do that. But if it’s showing me something that needs to be expressed through another medium, whether it’s film or another show or a documentary… I just feel very fortunate that I’m in a position to tell stories.”
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