An heated discussion recently spread widely on social media, following a user asked a query to women: would you rather be lost in a forest alongside a male or a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it exposed vastly opposing perspectives and life encounters, illuminated divides between the sexes, and was likely to induce an existential crisis if you thought on it extensively. There was also the almost inevitable coda where men of a certain stripe took to the internet to tell females how foolish they had been to select the bear and went on to limn the punishments they deserved for it. This at least allowed the women who had been hesitating about their decision to decide with a new confidence.
Portraying the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively dramatises this clever small premise. This six-episode series is adapted from Scandinavian writer Mikael Niemi’s 2018 novel with the identical title (rendered in 2020 for English readers). It follows the struggles of a clergyman (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his family as they come to start a new ministry within Kengis, a remote settlement in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. In a place lacking many joys, not one of the locals especially appreciate his strict approach to drinking and dancing, yet it is his protection of the poor – particularly the indigenous Sami, from which comes the pastor’s adopted son the youth Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his conviction in social justice and equal rights that sets him on a collision course with the Kengis local authorities.
The Antagonists
Quickly in cahoots opposing him are the lawman the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome mill owner the matron Sjödahl (the actress), observed early on dismissing a newly injured laborer with minimal compensation as he remains babbling at the sight his crushed hand, and anyone else who profit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of liquor sold by the unsettling store owner the merchant Lindmark (the actor). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s creepiness pales once itinerant painter Beronius appears on the scene (the performer, delivering a performance of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – like the pastor himself – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they are at least effective ones.
Plot Progression
Once the foundations of tension sown, the moment arrives to get down with the storyline. The servant employed by the doctor, Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her flight and bear markings upon a trunk are found yet she remains nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woods spread, but the pastor holds a different view which he and his ward set out to verify.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a slightly odd beast. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that lets distrust and bias and dark myths flourish based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or possessed by the souls of humans. And it doesn’t idealising the tough existence led by the villagers, where violence, be it from nature or people, always looms on the edges, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas rarely become beyond symbols – or perhaps, while the conflicts amid fairness and vengeance, logic and religion, virtue and wickedness intensify, representative characters in a fable – preventing the whole thing fully coming to life.
Stylistic Shifts
And then, exist the many tonally jarring instances where 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 like a combined the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (neither of whom had to lick a mixture of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to confirm that, yes, it was clearly coagulated blood on the site), before announcing his latest deduction and pulling a corpse out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The village elite are bent on proving that the maid met her end by a bear, perhaps to preserve the calm, perhaps to shield one of their own. The pastor is intent on proving the opposite, and the proof so rapidly stacks up supporting his view that once more the show’s credibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the TV version a few years ago of the author’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the competing attractions and fears offered by science and religion. At its worst, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to offer the response to that debated question: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series is on Disney+ currently.
