A heated discussion recently spread widely on social media, following someone asked a query for females: which would you prefer be lost in a forest alongside a male or with a bear? Like all the best hypothetical scenarios, it exposed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, illuminated divides among genders, and was likely to induce an existential crisis if you thought on it extensively. There was also the almost inevitable coda in which some males came online to inform women how foolish they had been for choosing the bear and proceeded to limn the consequences they deserved for that choice. This at minimum allowed those females who had been hesitating over their choice to make it with a new confidence.
Dramatising the Scenario
The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully dramatises this clever little setup. This six-episode drama is adapted on Scandinavian writer Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book of the same name (translated in 2020 for an English audience). It traces the struggles of a pastor (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household as they come to begin a fresh religious post within Kengis, an isolated settlement in Sweden’s north, in 1852. In a place lacking many joys, not one of the inhabitants particularly appreciate his puritanical stance on alcohol and dancing, yet it is his protection of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from which comes the pastor’s foster child the youth Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his conviction in social justice and equal rights that places him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.
The Antagonists
Quickly collaborating against him include the lawman Brahe (the performer), the fearsome mill owner Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), observed initially firing a recently mangled laborer with minimal compensation while he is still babbling upon seeing his crushed hand, and anyone else who profit from a community who can be bought with some containers of the whisky sold by the creepy shopkeeper Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness pales when itinerant painter Beronius appears in the story (Simon J Berger, delivering a performance of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – like the pastor himself – only a little more than caricatures, they are at least potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of conflict sown, it is time to get down with the storyline. The maid employed by the doctor, Hilda (the actress), duly vanishes in the forest. Indications of her flight and bear markings upon a trunk get discovered yet she remains completely absent. Rumours and fears of a man/maid-eating beast prowling the woodland spread, but the pastor holds a different view which he and his ward set out to prove.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a slightly peculiar show. It creates a fine sense of the bleakness that allows distrust and prejudice and grim legends flourish from the native legend that bears can be controlled or inhabited by the spirits of men. And it doesn’t romanticise the tough existence led by the residents, in which violence, be it from nature or mankind, always looms on the edges, poised to explode. But the characters seldom evolve more than ciphers – or perhaps, while the conflicts amid fairness and vengeance, rationality and faith, good and evil escalate, representative characters in a fable – which stops the entire production truly coming to life.
Stylistic Shifts
Additionally, exist the many stylistically clashing moments in which the clergyman’s skill in finding evidence and discern the maid’s destiny turns almost risible. He positions himself observing shattered containers and clumps of hair within storage sheds as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (none of whom were required to taste a mixture of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to confirm that, yes, it was definitely coagulated blood on the site), before announcing his latest deduction and pulling a body from a bog.
Clashing Agendas
The local leaders are bent on proving that the maid was killed by a bear, perhaps to protect the calm, perhaps to shield one of their own. The clergyman is intent on proving otherwise, and the proof so rapidly stacks up in his favour that once more the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. At its best, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the TV version a few years ago of the author’s the serpent tale, through its portrayal of the competing attractions and terrors offered by science and religion. In its low points, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it appears to offer the answer to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series is on Disney+ now.
