An heated debate recently spread widely on social media, following someone posed the question to women: would you rather be lost in a forest with a man or a bear? Similar to the most engaging hypothetical scenarios, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, highlighted divides among genders, and was likely to induce an existential crisis if you thought on it extensively. Additionally, there came the predictable follow-up in which men of a certain stripe took to the internet to inform females how stupid they were to select the animal and proceeded to limn the punishments they merited for that choice. This at minimum enabled those females who had been hesitating over their choice to decide with a new confidence.
Dramatising the Scenario
To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this nifty little setup. The six-part drama is based from Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (translated in 2020 for an English audience). It follows the struggles of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his family as they come to begin a fresh religious post in Kengis, a remote village in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. Within a community with few pleasures, not one of the locals especially warm to his puritanical approach to alcohol and dancing, but it is his defense of the poor – particularly the indigenous Sami, from among whom hails the preacher’s adopted son the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in social justice and equal rights that sets him on a collision course against the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Soon in cahoots opposing him include the lawman Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating mill owner the matron Sjödahl (Pernilla August), seen initially firing a newly injured laborer with a month’s pay as he remains babbling at the sight of his pulped hand, and anyone else who profit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of liquor sold by the creepy store owner Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s creepiness pales once travelling artist Beronius appears on the scene (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of rare discomfiting power). If they are – like the pastor himself – just slightly beyond than caricatures, they are at least potent archetypes.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of conflict planted, the moment arrives to get down to narrative business. The servant from the doctor’s house, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), duly vanishes in the forest. Signs of her escape and bear markings on a tree get discovered but she is completely absent. Rumours and anxieties of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woods spread, but the pastor has another theory that he and Jussi embark to verify.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a slightly peculiar show. It creates a fine sense of the bleakness that lets suspicion and prejudice and grim legends flourish based on local folklore that bears can be controlled or possessed by the souls of humans. It avoids idealising the tough existence led by the residents, where violence, be it from the wild or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, poised to explode. Yet the personas seldom evolve more than ciphers – or perhaps, while the conflicts between justice and vengeance, logic and religion, good and wickedness escalate, representative characters in a fable – which stops the entire production truly becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, there are numerous tonally jarring instances in which the pastor’s ability to discover clues and determine Hilda’s fate becomes nearly laughable. He positions himself observing shattered containers and strands of fur within storage sheds as a fusion of Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (none of whom had to taste a blend of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to agree that, yes, it was definitely coagulated blood on the site), before announcing his newest conclusion and extracting a body from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined demonstrating that Hilda was killed by an animal, perhaps to preserve the calm, or possibly to protect one of their own. The pastor is intent on proving the opposite, and the evidence so quickly stacks up supporting his view that once more the drama’s plausibility and audience tolerance are tested. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the adaptation some years back of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the competing allures and terrors presented by science and religion. At its worst, it’s more like a bear-themed police procedural. Nevertheless, it appears to offer the response to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”
The series is on Disney+ now.
