In a nutshell

After waiting in line at the store impatiently, overhearing the soul-crunching, vacuous small talk at the checkout, Danny (Steven Yeun) is unable to return the electronics he bought with the intention of ending his life, because he’s lost the receipt. Consumed with frustration that this is his life, he pulls out of the parking lot a little hastily, narrowly avoiding a fancy white SUV, the driver of which lays on the horn for an accusatory amount of time and then seals the deal with a middle finger out the window that catches him at exactly the right moment to break the camel’s tense, knotted back and send him in furious pursuit. 

Just two minutes in, we’re zooming through red lights, we’re mounting curbs and throwing bottled drinks onto windscreens; and the whole incident is over just as quickly. But Danny manages to memorise his aggressor’s number plate, and this short, unnecessary explosion of mutual road-rage sets off a chain reaction of rapidly escalating aggression and cyclical revenge. Only after the car chase has ended do we see Amy (Ali Wong), the other driver’s face and consider that she’s a human with her own shit going on. There’s so much turbulent emotion hidden in the inexplicable anger of this early interaction.

The series could definitely be pitched as a fable of the stupidity and pointlessness of road rage and any other kind of rage at a stranger, but it also digs deeply into several bigger and more universal themes masterfully. The collision of two people who are worlds apart despite both being Asian Americans in their thirties in Los Angeles unearths brilliant commentary on class-clashing and by investigating their mutual cynicism and depression we’re unwittingly lured into a shockingly relatable discussion about burnout and toxic positivity.

Young Mazino as Paul, Steven Yeun as Danny in ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Steven Yeun as Danny, Ali Wong as Amy in ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Ali Wong as Amy in ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Steven Yeun as Danny in episode 101 of ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Where to watch it

Beef is available for streaming on Netflix.

What’s the vibe?

The pissed-off character-comedy of reluctantly interacting people from different walks of life will remind you of Breaking Bad – it’s just as sassy and adorable. 

The portrayal of society’s toxic positivity and honest representation of protagonists who struggle to keep up the impression of cheerfulness is reminiscent of The White Lotus, as well as the uneasiness of the series in general – there is a simmering anxiety throughout the series which is horrible and yet exhilarating, knowing that Amy or Danny could pop off at any moment. That quality is expressed in the sound design with background ticking or the churning of someone’s stomach, but most of all through Yeun and Wong’s expressive, uncomfortable acting.

It may seem a little obvious to compare an Asian American-led A24 production to Everything Everywhere All At Once, but there are deeper connections between the two – their wild roller coaster plots are vehicles for profound journeys into their characters’ psychologies and trauma. Both are sensitive to family dynamics that are stereotypical of (but certainly not limited to) Asian American families and are two of the best examples of Hollywood representation of that demographic. Beef’s emotional and philosophical climax (a moving, hilariously confusing body-swapping scene involving psychedelic berries) shares a cheerful absurdism with that of the talking rock scene in Everything.

Trigger warnings

The violence in Beef is not graphic; the most triggering thing about the series for some viewers is likely to be the depiction of attempted suicide. 

A closer look

The stratospheric rise of A24 has an irony comparable to the success of indie rock band Alt-J, or the popularity of the irreverent anti-establishment cartoon Rick and Morty, or the trend of Gen-Zs wearing Nirvana-branded T-shirts despite having never heard their music. The messages of these counterculture movements in music, TV, fashion, or any other artform are undermined by their thoughtless adoption in the mainstream.

The A24 brand is decidedly “alternative”, but what’s cooler than being alternative, right? So, a small pivot from A24 to make their movies just a smidge more accessible to the masses without compromising their core values has sky-rocketed their popularity. Clever movies that can be enjoyed by a wide audience who feel good about enjoying them – that’s gold. The incorporation of counterculture art movements into the mainstream is an unstoppable trend, and while it’s sad for those who identify strongly with those movements, it can also bring about a lot of good – the popularisation of more unusual bands can only be good for the music industry; Rick and Morty, while rude and unstoppably silly, normalises intelligent rhetoric on therapy, existentialism and depression; and Gen-Zs in Nirvana T-shirts… we’ll leave it up to you to decide.

The popularisation of A24 is exciting considering the kinds of issues they manage to address in such popular content. The most interesting of these in Beef is rage. The representation of Asian Americans in the series is arguably even better than in Everything Everywhere All At Once, in that it’s barely noticeable. The series would have worked equally well if the characters were cast differently and the comedy and storytelling were not contingent on ethnicity. The representation that is most noticeable and interesting in Beef is that of angry people. 

Danny and Amy are deeply lonely people, and it comes from living in communities where their anger is not accepted. Danny’s parents express no faith in him and complain at him to meet a nice Korean girl at church and get married and start a family, and he just has to keep smiling. Amy has to grit her teeth through nauseating therapy sessions just to show face, and feels unseen by her supportive husband’s pretentious suggestions to breathe deeply and focus on the positive and “start writing a gratitude journal again”.

The series is refreshingly open about the nonsense people spout as reflexive socialised responses, and Amy and Danny’s pessimistic irritability at it is scarily relatable. Their vindictive, pent-up rage matches one another perfectly. It’s interesting that at the end of episode one, Amy smiles, almost as if she’s excited about the purity of the hatred between her and her new nemesis. At least this is honest, at least in this she can be real.

For much of the series their specific conflict is just peripheral – the beef in question is not just between the two of them, it spreads and infects their lives and the lives of people around them. The series could so easily have leaned on the entertainment value of a constantly escalating conflict but instead it ebbs and flows – it slows down so much in the middle that it seems like everything might even resolve, but then quick as a flash it is mayhem of a variety you would not even have considered. The writing is transfixingly unpredictable, cycling through dark comedy, spicy drama and itchy thriller in an erratic pattern. 

Ali Wong as Amy in ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Ali Wong as Amy in ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Steven Yeun as Danny in ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Steven Yeun as Danny in ‘Beef’. Image: Andrew Cooper / Netflix © 2023

Beef has all the A24 trappings – the characters, soundtrack and general sensibility are appropriately modern and quirky, effortlessly “hip”, with the exception of the ironically trashy last song of each episode. The humour sneaks up on you with soft jabs rather than “funny haha” pot-shots, so much so that you might miss a joke entirely and realise moments later that this very tense scene was actually kind of hilarious.

Steven Yeun is a stellar actor with impressive range, but he’s arguably at his best playing the likeable fool, as in Nope. Danny is a bit of a lowlife, with some clear prejudices, but he’s still probably the best example of this role in Yeun’s repertoire. Yeun doesn’t sink his teeth so deeply into any one of Danny’s potentially archetypal traits for him to feel like a recognisable caricature – he’s not a familiar character we can immediately relate to because of some resemblance to a real person we know. Instead we come to know him so well over time as a wholly unique person with a combination of personality quirks that humanises people with any one of them who we may have dismissed in the real world.

Amy, on the other hand, is unbelievably unlikeable from the first moment and yet she never becomes the villain. Her awful decisions never seem so selfish with the understanding of her situation, so that, bafflingly, no matter how put off you are by her nastiness, you still want her to succeed. She does embody a particular stereotype, but one that’s often shown little to no sympathy on-screen: the rich, ambitious businesswoman. She’s lauded as an inspiration for her career success, and forced to maintain a fractured façade of well-being despite a textbook case of burnout, and asking herself why she still isn’t happy. “Everything fades. Nothing lasts. We’re just a snake eating its own tail.”

Ultimately the pair’s inability to let go of hatred or express it in a healthy way is what denies them the lives they want. The series picks up dramatically in the last few episodes and provides enormous returns on the time you’ve put in, in the way of surreal, abstract, deeply philosophical and satirical dialogue, character redemption arcs and an unquestionably perfect tragic ending. DM/ML

Beef is available in South Africa on Netflix.

You can contact We’re Watching via tevya@dailymaverick.co.za