The Hint Behind BEEF's Each Episode Title

Each episode title seems like a famous quote, and after checking the information, the director did refer to some classic literature and film and television works to make the title better reflect the character's mentality (refer to the article on Netflix Tudum). In addition, the paintings that appear with the title of each episode, except for the first episode, are works by David Choe who plays Isaac.

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Episode 1: "The Birds Don’t Sing, They Screech in Pain"

^{The trees are in misery, and the birds are in misery. I don’t think they sing. They just screech in pain… Taking a close look at what’s around us, there is some sort of harmony: It’s the harmony of overwhelming and collective murder. — Werner Herzog}

The title of this episode was inspired by the documentary "The Burden of Dreams" by German film director Werner Herzog. Just like the birds mentioned in Herzog's preface, Amy and Danny seem like ordinary people when they first appear: Amy is a successful businesswoman who still loves to wear a fisherman's hat; Danny is an ordinary contractor who is trying to find his footing. After their road rage incident, we realize that these two characters are hiding pain and serious problems beneath the surface.

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Episode 2: "The Rapture of Being Alive"

^{I don’t think the meaning of life is what we’re seeking. I think it’s the experience of being alive… so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive. — Joseph Campbell}

What does it mean to "feel the ecstasy of being alive"? In a 1988 interview with Bill Moyers, American writer Joseph Campbell proposed this answer when asked about his view of the meaning of life. This answer is very suitable for the second episode, because as Amy and Danny become more obsessed with revenge, their struggle touches their most primitive parts, allowing them to express their hidden impulses and emotions — or you could say, feel the ecstasy of being alive.

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Episode 3: "I Am Inhabited by a Cry"

^{I am inhabited by a cry. Nightly it flaps out. Looking, with its hooks, for something to love. — Sylvia Plath}

In her poem "Elm," Sylvia Plath writes about something dark inside her that cries for love at night. Amy and Danny hope that when they get what they crave in life, they can easily escape the darkness within. This title also hints at the seventh episode, when the two characters finally achieve their dreams, but still feel empty inside.

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Episode 4: "Just Not All at the Same Time"

^{You can have it all, just not all at the same time. — Betty Friedan}

When asked at a meeting whether women can have everything, feminist and writer Betty Friedan gave this frank answer. This answer is similar to Amy's plot in the fourth episode: at the Q&A session in Las Vegas, Amy's fans think she has it all — a beautiful family, a picturesque home, and a successful career. She assures her fans that they can follow in her footsteps. But what we see in the plot is that for Amy, balancing marriage, parenting, career, and personal fulfillment is not easy.

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Episode 5: "Such Inward Secret Creatures"

^{We are such inward secret creatures, that inwardness the most amazing thing about us, even more amazing than our reason. But we cannot just walk into the cavern and look around. Most of what we think we know about our minds is pseudo-knowledge. We are all such shocking poseurs, so good at inflating the importance of what we think we value. — Iris Murdoch}

Inspired by this passage in Iris Murdoch's novel "The Sea, The Sea," the 5th episode reveals the shallow values that each character tries to hide. We can see this in Fumi's pride and concern for her son George and Naomi's request for a letter of recommendation from Amy. Each character takes themselves quite seriously, even to the point of narcissism, while also trying hard to hide their ulterior motives.

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Episode 6: "We Draw a Magic Circle"

^{We draw a magic circle and shut out everything that doesn’t agree with our secret games. Each time life breaks the circle, the games turn grey and ridiculous. Then we draw a new circle and build a new defense. — Ingmar Bergman}

This quote is from Ingmar Bergman's film "Through a Glass Darkly". In this episode, Amy is trapped in her own web of lies, desperately wanting to believe that the series of unfortunate events, from the road rage incident to her mother-in-law falling into the hospital, are not her fault.

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Episode 7: "I Am a Cage"

^{I am a cage, in search of a bird. — Franz Kafka}

This quote from Kafka's "Die Zürauer Aphorismen" describes humans as empty vessels constantly seeking meaning. In the process of searching, Danny almost makes a big mistake due to his obsession with the fight and runs to the church for comfort. On the other hand, Amy tells George that she always has a feeling in her chest that "feels like the ground". Both characters feel helpless due to their loss.

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Episode 8: "The Drama of Original Choice"

^{“The Drama of Original Choice”Moral choice is free, and therefore unforeseeable. The child does not contain the man he will become. Yet, it is always on the basis of what he has been that a man decides upon what he wants to be. He draws the motivations of his moral attitude from within the character which he has given himself and from within the universe which is its correlative. Now, the child set up this character and this universe little by little, without foreseeing its development. He was ignorant of the disturbing aspect of this freedom which he was heedlessly exercising. He tranquilly abandoned himself to whims, laughter, tears, and anger which seemed to him to have no morrow and no danger, and yet which left ineffaceable imprints about him. The drama of original choice is that it goes on moment by moment for an entire lifetime, that it occurs without reason, before any reason, that freedom is there as if it were present only in the form of contingency. This contingency recalls, in a way, the arbitrariness of the grace distributed by God in Calvinistic doctrine. Here too there is a sort of predestination issuing not from an external tyranny but from the operation of the subject itself. Only, we think that man has always a possible recourse to himself. There is no choice so unfortunate that he cannot be saved. — Simone de Beauvoir}

Feminist writer Beauvoir discusses in her book "The Ethics of Ambiguity" that the choices we make today are predetermined by our past and the environment in which we grew up. Episode 8 delves into the pasts of Amy and Danny, from birth to childhood to adulthood. Observing their growing backgrounds allows us to understand why they are now deeply mired in their own darkness.

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Episode 9: "The Great Fabricator"

^{Attachment is the great fabricator of illusions; reality can be obtained only by someone who is detached. — Simone Weil}

Simone Weil explored in her first publication, Gravity and Grace, the idea that in order to fully accept reality, you must experience a kind of loss. In Episode 9, two characters are gradually distancing themselves from the people they are closest to: Danny confesses to Paul that he threw away his brother's college application letter because he wanted his brother to stay with him; because Amy's actions triggered a robbery that threatened the safety of her family, George decides to leave with his daughter. As the people they love leave, they may finally realize the chaos they have created.

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Episode 10: "Figures of Light"

^{One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. ― C.G. Jung}

Jung wrote in Volume 13 of "Studies in Alchemy" that in order to move forward, we must first touch our dark side. In the finale, Amy and Danny finally fight to the end: the two enemies drive off the cliff and are trapped in the desert together. By this point, they have shown each other their terrible sides, from peeing on the floor to destroying cars, the contradictions between Amy and Danny have brought out their worst sides. However, their experience in the desert brings them comfort, knowing that the other is equally hurt inside, they are equally bad. This realization allows the two characters to continue being themselves, to continue their lives.

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