Ever since Season 2 of the popular FX series premiered on Hulu last week, fans have once again become vocal about their desire for the show’s two leads — the Michelin star-winning chef Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto (Jeremy Allen White) and his former protégé and current business partner Sydney Adamu (Ayo Edebiri) — to embark on a romantic relationship.
Carmy and Syd also share some very intimate and emotionally mature moments throughout Season 2. In one episode, Carmy and Syd confess to one another while fixing a wobbly table 30 minutes before they open their new restaurant for a friends and family preview that they make the other one a “better” person. In another scene in Season 2, Carmy explains to Sydney that whenever two cooks in a prior kitchen he worked in would get into heated arguments, they’d use the ASL sign for “I’m sorry,” which includes rubbing one’s heart with their right fist, to signify the spat has gotten out of hand and that they respect one another enough to take a beat. In a later scenes, Carmy and Syd use the sign during intense moments and their shouting matches evolve into more empathetic conversations.
Although the belief that Syd is a lesbian is purely speculative (the show has never directly indicated that she is queer), another big argument that exists between Team Romance and Team Platonic is that both sides have wildly different interpretations of a scene in Season 2, Episode 9 in which Carmy has a panic attack.
Vulture’s Roxana Hadadi offers a pretty strong argument for Team Platonic, comparing Carmy and Syd’s tumultuous-yet-satisfying dynamic to Don (Jon Hamm) and Peggy (Elisabeth Moss) in “Mad Men.” Hadadi argues that the friendship between Don and Peggy was much more fulfilling to watch unfold than any of their romantic entanglements.
“In ‘Mad Men,’ the relationship between Don and Peggy felt like the show’s most meaningful both because it rejected the fickleness of romance and because they pushed each other to extremes of good and bad in ways that had nothing to do with physical attraction,” Hadadi wrote. “There were no ulterior motives to their fights or agreements past the work, and each season incorporated a professional challenge for Don and Peggy to illustrate how they deeply understood, appreciated, and sometimes couldn’t stand each other.”
“I do not think that I’ve seen a friendship between a heterosexual man and woman that is as solid and intimate as SydCarmy’s is depicted on television in quite some time,” Goffe wrote. “Their friendship is full of disappointment and love—yes, love—and it survives because they trusted each other before they even really knew each other. Imagine being in love with your best friend, but with zero romantic undertones. It feels like fate brought you together, and they help make your current reality worth living.”
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