An intense debate recently went viral across online platforms, following a user asked the question for females: would you rather find yourself stranded in a forest alongside a male or with a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, illuminated chasms among genders, and could easily to induce a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering about it extensively. There was also the predictable follow-up in which men of a certain stripe came online to tell women how foolish they had been for choosing the animal and went on to describe the punishments they merited for it. This at least enabled the women who had been hesitating over their choice to make it with renewed assurance.
Portraying the Scenario
The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully brings to life this nifty little setup. This six-episode series is adapted from Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 novel with the identical title (rendered in 2020 for English readers). It traces the tribulations of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his household as they come to start a new ministry within Kengis, a remote settlement in Sweden’s north, in 1852. Within a community lacking many joys, not one of the inhabitants especially warm to his strict approach to alcohol and revelry, yet it is his protection of the poor – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom comes the preacher’s foster child Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equality that places him on a collision course with the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Quickly collaborating against him include the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the fearsome mill owner the matron Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially dismissing a recently mangled worker with minimal compensation as he remains gibbering upon seeing 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 shopkeeper Lindmark (the actor). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when itinerant painter Beronius arrives in the story (the performer, delivering a performance of exceptional unsettling intensity). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – only a little more than caricatures, they still serve as effective ones.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of conflict planted, it is time to get down with the storyline. The maid employed by the doctor, the character Hilda (the actress), duly goes missing from the woods. Indications of her escape and bear markings on a tree are found but she is nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woodland circulate, yet the clergyman holds a different view that he and Jussi set out to verify.
A Strange Creation
This Bear Drama is a slightly odd beast. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that lets suspicion and prejudice and dark myths thrive based on local folklore that animals can be controlled or possessed by the souls of men. It avoids romanticise the tough existence led by the residents, where brutality, whether that of nature or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, poised to explode. Yet the personas rarely become beyond symbols – or perhaps, while the conflicts between justice and revenge, rationality and religion, good and wickedness escalate, representative characters within a moral tale – preventing the whole thing truly becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, there are the many stylistically clashing instances in which the clergyman’s skill in finding evidence and determine Hilda’s fate turns almost risible. He stands looking at shattered containers and strands of fur within storage sheds as a fusion of Hercule Poirot the English sleuth – with Jussi a rather hapless Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom were required to taste a blend of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that, yes, it was definitely coagulated blood on the site), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and extracting a body out of a swamp.
Clashing Agendas
The local leaders are determined demonstrating that Hilda was killed by a bear, perhaps to protect the peace, or possibly to shield a fellow elite. The clergyman is intent on establishing otherwise, and the proof so rapidly accumulates in his favour that again the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. At its best, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the TV version some years back of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, with its evocation of the competing allures and fears presented by rational thought and religion. In its low points, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to provide the response to that debated question: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ now.
