A heated discussion recently spread widely across online platforms, following someone asked a query for females: which would you prefer be lost in the woods with a man or a bear? Similar to the best hypothetical scenarios, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and life encounters, highlighted divides between the sexes, and could easily cause an existential crisis if you thought on it for too long. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable follow-up in which men of a certain stripe took to the internet to inform females how stupid they had been for choosing the bear and proceeded to describe the punishments they deserved for it. This at least allowed the women who were uncertain over their choice to make it with renewed assurance.
Portraying the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively dramatises this clever little setup. The six-part series is based on Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 book with the identical title (translated two years later for English readers). It traces the tribulations of a pastor (the lead actor) and his household when they arrive to begin a new ministry within Kengis, an isolated settlement in northern Sweden, during the mid-19th century. Within a community lacking many joys, none of the locals especially warm to his strict stance on drinking and revelry, yet it is his protection of impoverished people – especially the indigenous Sami, from which comes the pastor’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equal rights that places him in direct opposition against the Kengis powers that be.
The Opposing Forces
Soon in cahoots against him include the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (the actress), observed initially firing a recently mangled laborer with a month’s pay while he is still gibbering upon seeing his crushed hand, and all others who benefit from a populace easily swayed for a few bottles of the whisky provided by the creepy shopkeeper the merchant Lindmark (the actor). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes once travelling artist the artist Beronius arrives on the scene (the performer, delivering 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.
Narrative Development
Once the foundations of conflict sown, it is time to get down with the storyline. The maid from the doctor’s house, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly vanishes from the woods. Signs of her flight and animal scratches upon a trunk are found but she is completely absent. Gossip and fears regarding a human-devouring bear roaming the woods spread, but the pastor has another theory that he and Jussi embark to prove.
An Odd Beast
This Bear Drama is a slightly peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that allows distrust and prejudice and grim legends flourish based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or possessed by the souls of humans. It avoids romanticise the hardscrabble life experienced by the residents, where brutality, whether that of nature or people, always looms on the edges, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas rarely become beyond symbols – or maybe, as the struggles amid fairness and revenge, logic and faith, virtue and evil intensify, representative characters in a fable – which stops the whole thing truly becoming immersive.
Stylistic Shifts
Additionally, there are numerous tonally jarring moments in which the clergyman’s skill to discover clues and determine the maid’s destiny turns nearly laughable. He stands looking at shattered containers and clumps of hair in hay barns as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (none of whom were required to taste a mixture of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to confirm that indeed, it was definitely coagulated blood on the site), prior to declaring his latest deduction and pulling a body out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined proving that the maid met her end by an animal, maybe to protect the calm, perhaps to protect one of their own. The clergyman is bent on proving otherwise, and the evidence so rapidly stacks up supporting his view that again the show’s credibility and audience tolerance 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, through its portrayal of the opposing allures and fears presented by science and belief. At its worst, it resembles a bear-themed police procedural. Nevertheless, it appears to provide the response to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ currently.
