An heated discussion recently spread widely across online platforms, after someone posed a query for females: would you rather be lost in the woods alongside a male or with a bear? Similar to the best thought experiments, it revealed vastly opposing perspectives and life encounters, highlighted divides among genders, and was likely to induce an existential crisis for anyone pondering on it extensively. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable follow-up in which men of a certain stripe came online to inform females how foolish they were for choosing the animal and went on to describe the consequences they merited for that choice. This at least allowed the women who were uncertain over their choice to decide with renewed assurance.
Dramatising the Scenario
To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this clever small premise. The six-part series is adapted from Swedish author Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book of the same name (translated in 2020 for English readers). 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 settlement in northern Sweden, in 1852. In a place lacking many joys, not one of the inhabitants especially appreciate his strict stance on drinking and revelry, but it is his protection of impoverished people – especially the indigenous Sami, from among whom hails the preacher’s adopted son Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in social justice and equal rights that sets him in direct opposition with the Kengis powers that be.
The Opposing Forces
Quickly in cahoots opposing him are the sheriff the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the fearsome mill owner the matron Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially firing a recently mangled laborer with a month’s pay while he is still babbling upon seeing his crushed hand, and anyone else who benefit from a populace who can be bought with some containers of the whisky provided by the unsettling store owner the merchant Lindmark (the actor). Although, in fairness, Lindmark’s creepiness pales when travelling artist the artist Beronius appears in the story (Simon J Berger, providing a performance of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – like the pastor himself – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they are at least effective ones.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of tension sown, the moment arrives to proceed with the storyline. The servant employed by the doctor, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her escape and animal scratches upon a trunk are found yet she remains completely absent. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woodland spread, yet the clergyman has another theory which he and his ward set out to verify.
A Strange Creation
This Bear Drama is a slightly peculiar show. It creates a fine sense of the bleakness that allows suspicion and bias and dark myths thrive based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or possessed by the spirits of men. And it doesn’t romanticise the tough existence led by the residents, where violence, whether that of the wild or mankind, always looms at the periphery, poised to explode. Yet the personas rarely become beyond symbols – or perhaps, while the conflicts between justice and revenge, rationality and religion, virtue and evil escalate, representative characters in a fable – which stops the entire production fully becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
Additionally, there are the many stylistically clashing moments in which the clergyman’s skill in finding evidence and determine Hilda’s fate turns almost risible. He positions himself looking at shattered containers and clumps of hair within storage sheds as a fusion of the Belgian detective the English sleuth – with Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (none of whom had to lick a blend of blood droplets and the boss’s spit to confirm that indeed, it was clearly coagulated blood at the crime scene), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and extracting a body out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined proving that Hilda met her end by an animal, perhaps to protect the calm, or possibly to shield a fellow elite. The pastor is intent on establishing otherwise, and the evidence so quickly accumulates in his favour that once more the show’s credibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. In its finest moments, the series is reminiscent of the TV version some years back of the author’s the serpent tale, with its evocation of the competing attractions and terrors presented by rational thought and religion. At its worst, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to provide the response to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ now.
