A intense debate lately went viral on social media, following a user asked the question to women: which would you prefer find yourself stranded in the woods alongside a male or with a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it revealed wildly different worldviews and experiences, illuminated chasms between the sexes, and was likely cause an existential crisis if you thought about it extensively. Additionally, there came the predictable coda in which some males came online to tell women how stupid they were for choosing the bear and went on to limn the punishments they merited for that choice. This at least enabled the women who had been hesitating about their decision to decide with renewed assurance.
Dramatising the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully brings to life this nifty small premise. The six-part drama is based on Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered in 2020 for English readers). It traces the struggles of a clergyman (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his family when they arrive to begin a new ministry within Kengis, a remote village in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. Within a community with few pleasures, none of the inhabitants particularly warm to his strict approach to drinking and revelry, but it is his protection of the poor – particularly the indigenous Sami, from which comes the pastor’s foster child the youth Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his belief in social justice and equality that sets him on a collision course against the Kengis powers that be.
The Antagonists
Soon in cahoots opposing him include the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome factory proprietor the matron Sjödahl (the actress), observed initially firing a newly injured worker with minimal compensation while he is still gibbering at the sight his crushed hand, and anyone else who profit from a populace easily swayed for a few bottles of liquor sold by the creepy store owner Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness pales when travelling artist Beronius arrives in the story (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of exceptional discomfiting power). If they are – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they still serve as effective ones.
Narrative Development
Once the foundations of conflict planted, it is time to get down with the storyline. The servant from the doctor’s house, Hilda (the actress), accordingly vanishes in the forest. Signs of her flight and animal scratches upon a trunk are found yet she remains nowhere to be seen. Gossip and anxieties regarding a human-devouring bear roaming the woods circulate, yet the clergyman holds a different view which he and his ward set out to prove.
An Odd Beast
To Cook a Bear is a slightly peculiar show. It creates a strong impression of the bleakness that lets suspicion and bias and dark myths flourish based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or possessed by the souls of men. It avoids romanticise the tough existence led by the villagers, where violence, whether that of nature or people, always looms at the periphery, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas seldom evolve more than ciphers – or perhaps, while the conflicts between justice and revenge, rationality and faith, virtue and evil intensify, representative characters within a moral tale – which stops the whole thing truly becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, there are numerous tonally jarring instances where the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and determine the maid’s destiny becomes almost risible. He positions himself observing shattered containers and clumps of hair in hay barns like a combined the Belgian detective the English sleuth – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom were required to taste a mixture of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to confirm that indeed, it was clearly dried blood at the crime scene), before announcing his latest deduction and pulling a corpse from a bog.
Clashing Agendas
The local leaders are bent on proving that Hilda was killed by a bear, perhaps to protect the calm, perhaps to protect a fellow elite. The pastor is bent on establishing otherwise, and the proof so rapidly accumulates in his favour that once more the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience get strained. 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 belief. In its low points, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it does seem to provide the response to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear streams on Disney+ now.
