An heated discussion recently went viral on social media, after someone posed the question for females: which would you prefer find yourself stranded in the woods alongside a male or with a bear? Like all the best thought experiments, it exposed vastly opposing worldviews and life encounters, illuminated divides among genders, and could easily to induce a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering about it extensively. Additionally, there came the predictable coda in which some males took to the internet to tell females how foolish they were to select the bear and proceeded to limn the consequences they merited for that choice. This at least enabled the women who had been hesitating over their choice to make it with a new confidence.
Portraying the Scenario
The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully brings to life this nifty little setup. This six-episode drama is based on Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 novel with the identical title (translated two years later for an English audience). It follows the tribulations of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his household as they come to begin a fresh religious post within Kengis, an isolated village in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. Within a community with few pleasures, none of the inhabitants especially appreciate his strict approach to alcohol and revelry, but it is his protection of the poor – especially the indigenous Sami, from which hails the preacher’s foster child Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief 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 include the sheriff the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating mill owner Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), observed initially firing a recently mangled laborer with a month’s pay while he is still babbling at the sight of his pulped hand, and all others who profit from a community who can be bought with some containers of liquor provided by the unsettling shopkeeper Lindmark (the actor). However, to be fair, Lindmark’s creepiness diminishes when travelling artist Beronius arrives on the scene (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – like the pastor himself – only a little more being stereotypes, they are at least potent archetypes.
Narrative Development
Once the foundations of tension planted, it is time to get down with the storyline. The maid employed by the doctor, the character Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly vanishes in the forest. Indications of her flight and animal scratches on a tree are found yet she remains nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating beast roaming the woods spread, yet the clergyman holds a different view that he and Jussi embark to verify.
A Strange Creation
This Bear Drama is a slightly odd beast. It creates a strong impression of the bleakness that allows suspicion and prejudice and dark myths thrive based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or inhabited by the souls of men. It avoids idealising the tough existence experienced by the residents, where violence, whether that of nature or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, waiting to erupt. But the characters seldom evolve more than ciphers – or perhaps, as the struggles amid fairness and vengeance, rationality and religion, good and wickedness escalate, emblematic figures within a moral tale – preventing the whole thing fully becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
Additionally, exist numerous tonally jarring instances in which the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and discern Hilda’s fate turns nearly laughable. He stands observing broken milk pots and clumps of hair within storage sheds as a fusion of Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom had to taste a blend of blood droplets and the boss’s spit to confirm that, yes, it was clearly coagulated blood at the crime scene), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and extracting a corpse out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The village elite are bent on proving that the maid met her end by an animal, perhaps to protect the peace, perhaps to protect a fellow elite. The pastor is bent on proving otherwise, and the evidence so rapidly stacks up in his favour that again the show’s credibility and audience tolerance are tested. At its best, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the TV version a few years ago of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the competing attractions and fears presented by rational thought and belief. In its low points, it resembles a bear-themed police procedural. Still, it does seem to offer the response to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series is on Disney+ now.
