An intense discussion lately went viral on social media, after a user posed the question for females: which would you prefer be lost in the woods alongside a male or with a bear? Like all the most engaging hypothetical scenarios, it exposed wildly different perspectives and life encounters, illuminated chasms between the sexes, and was likely to induce a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering on it for too long. There was also the predictable follow-up in which men of a certain stripe came online to tell females how foolish they were for choosing the bear and proceeded to describe the punishments they merited for it. This at least enabled the women who had been hesitating about their decision to make it with renewed assurance.
Portraying the Scenario
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively dramatises this clever little setup. This six-episode series is based from Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered two years later for an English audience). It traces the struggles of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his household when they arrive to begin a fresh religious post within Kengis, an isolated village in northern Sweden, in 1852. In a place with few pleasures, none of the inhabitants particularly appreciate his puritanical approach to alcohol and revelry, yet it is his defense of the poor – especially the indigenous Sami, from which hails the preacher’s adopted son the youth Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equality that places him in direct opposition against the Kengis powers that be.
The Antagonists
Quickly in cahoots against him are the sheriff the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating mill owner Madam Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially firing a newly injured worker with a month’s pay as he remains gibbering upon seeing of his pulped hand, and all others who profit from a community easily swayed for a few bottles of liquor provided by the creepy shopkeeper Lindmark (the actor). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes once travelling artist Beronius appears in the story (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of rare discomfiting power). If they are – similar to the clergyman – only a little more than caricatures, they still serve as potent archetypes.
Narrative Development
Once the foundations of conflict planted, it is time to proceed with the storyline. The servant from the doctor’s house, Hilda (the actress), accordingly vanishes in the forest. Signs of her escape and bear markings upon a trunk get discovered but she is nowhere to be seen. Gossip and anxieties of a man/maid-eating beast prowling the woods circulate, but the pastor holds a different view which he and his ward set out to verify.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a somewhat peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the bleakness that allows suspicion and prejudice and dark myths thrive from the native legend that bears can be controlled or possessed by the spirits of humans. And it doesn’t romanticise the tough existence led by the residents, in which violence, whether that of the wild or people, always looms on the edges, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas seldom evolve beyond symbols – or perhaps, while the conflicts amid fairness and vengeance, rationality and faith, good and wickedness escalate, emblematic figures within a moral tale – preventing the whole thing fully coming to life.
Stylistic Shifts
And then, exist numerous tonally jarring moments in which the pastor’s ability to discover clues and discern the maid’s destiny becomes nearly laughable. He positions himself observing shattered containers and strands of fur within storage sheds as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (neither of whom had to taste a mixture of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that, yes, it was definitely coagulated blood on the site), before announcing his latest deduction and extracting a body out of a swamp.
Clashing Agendas
The village elite are determined proving that the maid was killed by a bear, maybe to protect the peace, perhaps to protect one of their own. The pastor is intent on proving the opposite, and the proof so rapidly accumulates in his favour that once more 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 serpent tale, through its portrayal of the competing attractions and fears offered by rational thought and religion. In its low points, it resembles a bear-themed police procedural. Still, it appears to provide the response to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear streams on Disney+ now.
