The fifth and final season of 'The Bear' delivers fresh stresses and sublime relief in equal measure

It's the final service of "The Bear" and things could not be any more stressful: heavy downpour, car accidents, traffic jams, severe plumbing problems, a lot of excrement, their reservation app down, someone canceling a delivery that forces them to stretch their ingredients, all while Uncle Jimmy remains steadfast in his decision to sell the building.

Meanwhile, members of the team are grieving, like Tina who tells her husband, "I didn't do what I love the last time," when he catches her her cooking in the kitchen looking downtrodden on the morning of the restaurant's swan song. And then there's also Richie, who leans on grounding exercises to keep him in the present, and help prevent him from spiraling to hard memories of the past.

In case you needed a little back track: "The Bear" is an award-winning series about Carmy Berzatto, a highly acclaimed young chef from the fine-dining scene returning to Chicago to helm his family's sandwich shop. He transforms it into a proper and respectable, if prestigious restaurant that now even aims for a Michelin star, all while navigating grief, loss, mental health issues, and a bombastic cast of personalities.

Created by Christopher Storer, and starring Jeremy Allen White (Carmy), Ebon Moss Bachrach (Richie), and Ayo Edebiri (Sydney), "The Bear" in its four seasons has collected a number of awards including a handful of Emmys, Golden Globes, and Critics Choice.

Its fifth and final season tells the story of the restaurant's final night in eight episodes. It follows its long tradition of stressful moments — this might be the most stressful it's ever been — and lends itself to elaborate indulgence, to the point of being a slog.

But staying with these sluggish moments has its rewards. They act as breathers for super gorgeous moments, as a pivot points to highly stressful sequences (think fights, goodbyes, a broken pipe that repeatedly spews out an unidentified brown matter), which in turn act as an outlet to showcase the motley crew's talent, determination, capability, respect for one another, and love for the job.

It is a near full-on sensory assault, with background music that constantly highlights the tension, gorgeous camera work that captures the mood, the smart dialogue that bring heart, the tight editing for a pleasurable watch — they all seemingly make up for the fact that viewers of the show still cannot taste the food they are making and serving.

It is beautiful and it's touching. The highs are incredibly high and the relief that comes with seeing the team overcome every obstacle they face with aplomb is transcendent.

Throughout the show, "The Bear" served a deliciously good reflection of work — of what we can achieve when we respect the work and the people we do it with, and when we are able to do work that we love with people that we love. The finale season gave more of the same.

The fifth season of "The Bear" starts streaming on Disney + Philippines on Friday. — LA, GMA News