An heated discussion lately spread widely on social media, following someone asked the question for females: which would you prefer be lost in a forest alongside a male or a bear? Like all the best thought experiments, it exposed vastly opposing perspectives and life encounters, highlighted chasms between the sexes, and was likely to induce a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering about it for too long. Additionally, there came the predictable coda in which some males came online to inform females how stupid they were to select the animal and went on to describe the punishments they merited for that choice. This at least allowed those females who had been hesitating over their choice to decide with renewed assurance.
Dramatising the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively brings to life this clever small premise. This six-episode drama is adapted from Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered two years later for English readers). It traces the tribulations of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his household as they come to begin a new ministry in Kengis, a remote village in Sweden’s north, in 1852. Within a community with few pleasures, not one of the locals especially appreciate his puritanical stance on alcohol and revelry, yet it is his protection of the poor – especially the native Sami population, from which comes the pastor’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equality that sets him on a collision course against the Kengis local authorities.
The Antagonists
Quickly in cahoots opposing him are the lawman Brahe (the performer), the fearsome factory proprietor the matron Sjödahl (Pernilla August), seen early on dismissing a newly injured worker with minimal compensation while he is still babbling at the sight of his pulped hand, and all others who profit from a populace easily swayed with some containers of the whisky sold by the unsettling shopkeeper Lindmark (the actor). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness pales when travelling artist Beronius arrives on the scene (the performer, providing a performance of exceptional unsettling intensity). If they are – similar to the clergyman – only a little more being stereotypes, they still serve as effective ones.
Plot Progression
Once the foundations of conflict sown, it is time to get down to narrative business. The maid employed by the doctor, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), duly goes missing in the forest. Signs of her flight and animal scratches on a tree get discovered but she is completely absent. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating beast prowling the woodland spread, but the pastor has another theory which he and his ward set out to verify.
A Strange Creation
This Bear Drama is a slightly odd beast. It creates a fine sense of the bleakness that allows distrust and bias and dark myths thrive from the native legend that animals might be dominated or possessed by the souls of humans. And it doesn’t romanticise the tough existence led by the residents, where violence, be it from the wild or mankind, always looms on the edges, waiting to erupt. But the characters rarely become beyond symbols – or perhaps, as the struggles between justice and revenge, logic and religion, good and evil intensify, emblematic figures within a moral tale – preventing the whole thing fully becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
Additionally, exist numerous stylistically clashing moments where the pastor’s ability to discover clues and discern Hilda’s fate becomes almost risible. He stands observing broken milk pots and clumps of hair within storage sheds as a fusion of Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom had to lick a blend of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to confirm that, yes, it was clearly coagulated blood on the site), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and extracting a corpse from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined demonstrating that Hilda was killed by an animal, perhaps to protect the calm, perhaps to protect one of their own. The pastor is bent on proving the opposite, and the proof so quickly stacks up in his favour that once more the show’s credibility and the viewer’s patience get strained. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the adaptation a few years ago of the author’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the opposing attractions and terrors offered by rational thought and belief. At its worst, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it does seem to provide the response to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series streams on Disney+ now.
