An intense debate recently went viral on social media, after a user posed the question to women: which would you prefer be lost in the woods alongside a male or a bear? Similar to the best hypothetical scenarios, it exposed wildly different worldviews and life encounters, illuminated divides between the sexes, and could easily to induce an existential crisis for anyone pondering on it for too long. There was also the almost inevitable coda in which men of a certain stripe took to the internet to inform women how foolish they had been to select the bear and proceeded to describe the punishments they merited for that choice. This at least enabled those females who had been hesitating over their choice to make it with a new confidence.
Portraying the Scenario
To Cook a Bear skillfully brings to life this nifty little setup. This six-episode series is based on Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered two years later for an English audience). It follows the struggles of a pastor (the lead actor) and his family when they arrive to begin a fresh religious post in Kengis, an isolated village in northern Sweden, in 1852. Within a community with few pleasures, none of the locals particularly warm to his puritanical approach to drinking and revelry, yet it is his protection of the poor – especially the indigenous Sami, from among whom hails the pastor’s foster child Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that places him on a collision course with the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Soon in cahoots opposing him are the lawman Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the fearsome mill owner Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), observed early on dismissing a recently mangled worker with minimal compensation while he is still gibbering at the sight his crushed hand, and all others who benefit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of liquor sold by the creepy shopkeeper Lindmark (the actor). Although, in fairness, Lindmark’s creepiness pales when itinerant painter Beronius appears on the scene (Simon J Berger, delivering an acting turn of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond than caricatures, they still serve as effective ones.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of conflict planted, it is time to get down to narrative business. The maid employed by the doctor, the character Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing from the woods. Signs of her flight and bear markings on a tree are found but she is nowhere to be seen. Rumours and fears regarding a human-devouring bear prowling the woodland spread, yet the clergyman holds a different view that he and Jussi embark to verify.
An Odd Beast
This Bear Drama is a somewhat peculiar show. It conjures a fine sense of the bleakness that lets distrust and bias and dark myths thrive based on local folklore that bears can be controlled or inhabited by the spirits of humans. It avoids idealising the hardscrabble life led by the villagers, where violence, whether that of nature or people, lurks constantly at the periphery, poised to explode. But the characters seldom evolve beyond symbols – or perhaps, as the struggles amid fairness and revenge, rationality and faith, good and evil intensify, representative characters within a moral tale – which stops the whole thing fully coming to life.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, there are numerous stylistically clashing instances in which the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and discern the maid’s destiny becomes nearly laughable. He stands looking at shattered containers and clumps of hair in hay barns like a combined Hercule Poirot the English sleuth – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (none of whom had to taste a mixture of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to confirm that indeed, it was clearly dried blood on the site), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and extracting a corpse out of a swamp.
Clashing Agendas
The local leaders are bent on demonstrating that Hilda met her end by a bear, maybe to protect the peace, perhaps to shield a fellow elite. The clergyman is intent on proving the opposite, and the evidence so rapidly stacks up supporting his view that again the show’s credibility and the viewer’s patience get strained. At its best, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the TV version a few years ago of the author’s The Essex Serpent, with its evocation of the competing attractions and fears presented by science and religion. In its low points, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it appears to provide the answer to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”
The series streams on Disney+ currently.
