A heated debate recently spread widely on social media, following a user asked the question to women: which would you prefer find yourself stranded in the woods with a man or a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, highlighted chasms among genders, and was likely cause an existential crisis if you thought on it for too long. There was also the almost inevitable coda in which some males took to the internet to inform females how stupid they were for choosing the animal and went on to describe the punishments they merited for that choice. This at minimum enabled those females who had been hesitating about their decision to make it with renewed assurance.
Dramatising the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully brings to life this nifty small premise. The six-part drama is adapted from Swedish author Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book with the identical title (translated in 2020 for English readers). It traces the tribulations of a pastor (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household when they arrive to start a fresh religious post within Kengis, a remote village in Sweden’s north, in 1852. Within a community lacking many joys, none of the inhabitants particularly appreciate his strict stance on alcohol and dancing, yet it is his defense of the poor – especially the indigenous Sami, from among whom hails the pastor’s foster child Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equal rights that places him on a collision course against the Kengis powers that be.
The Opposing Forces
Quickly collaborating against him include the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating mill owner Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), seen early on dismissing a recently mangled laborer with minimal compensation while he is still gibbering upon seeing of his pulped hand, and anyone else who profit from a community who can be bought with some containers of the whisky sold by the creepy shopkeeper the merchant Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, to be fair, Lindmark’s creepiness pales once travelling artist the artist Beronius arrives in the story (the performer, providing an acting turn of rare unsettling intensity). If they are – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they still serve as potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of tension sown, the moment arrives to get down with the storyline. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her escape and bear markings upon a trunk get discovered but she is nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear prowling the woods circulate, yet the clergyman holds a different view which he and his ward embark to prove.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a somewhat peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that allows suspicion and prejudice and dark myths flourish from the native legend that animals might be dominated or inhabited by the spirits of humans. It avoids idealising the tough existence experienced by the villagers, in which violence, whether that of the wild or people, lurks constantly at the periphery, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas seldom evolve beyond symbols – or maybe, as the struggles amid fairness and revenge, logic and faith, virtue and evil intensify, representative characters within a moral tale – preventing the entire production fully becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, exist the many tonally jarring moments where the clergyman’s skill to discover clues and determine the maid’s destiny becomes almost risible. He stands looking at broken milk pots and strands of fur in hay barns as a fusion of the Belgian detective the English sleuth – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (neither of whom were required to taste a mixture of blood droplets and saliva from his superior to agree that, yes, it was clearly dried blood on the site), prior to declaring his latest deduction and extracting a body out of a swamp.
Clashing Agendas
The village elite are bent on proving that the maid met her end by an animal, maybe to protect the peace, or possibly to protect a fellow elite. The clergyman is intent on establishing the opposite, and the proof so quickly stacks up supporting his view that once more the show’s credibility and the viewer’s patience get strained. At its best, the series evokes memories of the adaptation a few years ago of the author’s the serpent tale, with its evocation of the opposing attractions and terrors offered by science and religion. In its low points, it resembles a bear-themed police procedural. Nevertheless, it does seem to provide the response to that debated question: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ currently.
