An heated debate recently went viral on social media, following someone posed 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 vastly opposing worldviews and life encounters, highlighted chasms among genders, and was likely to induce a deep personal dilemma if you thought about it for too long. There was also the almost inevitable follow-up where some males took to the internet to inform women how foolish they had been for choosing the animal and went on to describe the consequences they deserved for that choice. This at least enabled the women who were uncertain over their choice to make it with a new confidence.
Dramatising 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 book of the same name (rendered in 2020 for English readers). It traces the tribulations of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his household when they arrive to start a fresh religious post within Kengis, a remote settlement in northern Sweden, during the mid-19th century. In a place with few pleasures, none of the locals particularly appreciate his strict stance on alcohol and revelry, yet it is his defense of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom comes the preacher’s adopted son Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his belief in social justice and equal rights that sets him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.
The Antagonists
Quickly in cahoots opposing him are the sheriff the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (the actress), observed early on firing a newly injured laborer with a month’s pay as he remains gibbering upon seeing of his pulped hand, and all others 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). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when travelling artist Beronius arrives in the story (the performer, providing a performance of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – like the pastor himself – only a little more being stereotypes, they are at least potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
Once the foundations of tension planted, it is time to proceed to narrative business. The maid employed by the doctor, Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her escape and bear markings upon a trunk are found yet she remains completely absent. Rumours and fears regarding a human-devouring beast roaming the woods spread, but the pastor has another theory which he and his ward embark to prove.
An Odd Beast
To Cook a Bear is a slightly peculiar show. It conjures a fine sense of the bleakness that lets distrust and prejudice and dark myths thrive based on local folklore that animals can be controlled or possessed by the souls of humans. And it doesn’t idealising the hardscrabble life led by the residents, in which violence, be it from the wild or people, always looms on the edges, waiting to erupt. But the characters rarely become more than ciphers – or maybe, while the conflicts amid fairness and revenge, rationality and religion, virtue and wickedness escalate, representative characters in a fable – preventing the entire production truly coming to life.
Tonal Inconsistencies
Additionally, exist numerous tonally jarring instances where the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and determine the maid’s destiny turns nearly laughable. He positions himself observing shattered containers and strands of fur in hay barns like a combined the Belgian detective the English sleuth – with Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (neither of whom were required to lick a mixture of blood droplets and the boss’s spit to confirm that, yes, it was clearly dried blood at the crime scene), before announcing his newest conclusion and extracting a body out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The village elite are determined proving that the maid was killed by an animal, maybe to preserve the peace, perhaps to shield a fellow elite. The pastor is intent on establishing otherwise, and the evidence so quickly stacks up supporting his view that again the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. At its best, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the adaptation some years back of Sarah Perry’s the serpent tale, through its portrayal of the competing allures and terrors offered by rational thought and religion. At its worst, it’s more like a bear-themed police procedural. Nevertheless, it does seem to offer the response to that debated question: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ currently.
