An intense discussion recently spread widely on social media, following someone posed the question for females: which would you prefer be lost in the woods with a man or with a bear? Like all the best hypothetical scenarios, it exposed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, illuminated chasms among genders, and was likely to induce a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering about it extensively. There was also the almost inevitable coda where some males came online to inform females how stupid they were for choosing the bear and went on to describe the punishments they deserved for it. This at least allowed the women who had been hesitating over their choice to make it with a new confidence.
Portraying the Setup
To Cook a Bear effectively dramatises this clever small premise. This six-episode series is based from Swedish author Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered two years later for English readers). It traces the struggles of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his family as they come to start a fresh religious post in Kengis, a remote village in northern Sweden, in 1852. In a place with few pleasures, none of the locals particularly appreciate his puritanical approach to alcohol and revelry, but it is his protection of the poor – especially the indigenous Sami, from among whom comes the preacher’s foster child the youth Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his belief in social justice and equal rights that sets him on a collision course with the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Soon collaborating against him include the lawman the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome mill owner the matron Sjödahl (the actress), observed early on firing a recently mangled laborer with a month’s pay as he remains babbling at the sight of his pulped hand, and anyone else who profit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of liquor sold by the unsettling store owner the merchant Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when itinerant painter Beronius arrives on the scene (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of exceptional discomfiting power). If they are – like the pastor himself – only a little more being stereotypes, they still serve as effective ones.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of conflict planted, it is time to get down to narrative business. The servant employed by the doctor, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly vanishes in the forest. Signs of her flight and animal scratches upon a trunk get discovered but she is nowhere to be seen. Rumours and fears of a man/maid-eating beast roaming the woodland circulate, yet the clergyman has another theory that he and Jussi set out to prove.
A Strange Creation
This Bear Drama is a slightly peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that allows distrust and prejudice and dark myths flourish from the native legend that animals might be dominated or inhabited by the souls of humans. It avoids romanticise the tough existence led by the villagers, where brutality, whether that of nature or people, lurks constantly at the periphery, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas seldom evolve beyond symbols – or maybe, while the conflicts amid fairness and revenge, logic and religion, virtue and evil intensify, representative characters in a fable – preventing the entire production truly becoming immersive.
Stylistic Shifts
And then, exist the many tonally jarring moments in which the clergyman’s skill to discover clues and discern Hilda’s fate becomes almost risible. He positions himself looking at broken milk pots and strands of fur within storage sheds like a combined the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom had to lick a blend of blood droplets and the boss’s spit to confirm that, yes, it was clearly dried blood on the site), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and pulling a corpse out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are bent on proving that Hilda was killed by an animal, perhaps to protect the peace, or possibly to shield a fellow elite. The pastor is bent on establishing otherwise, and the evidence so quickly stacks up supporting his view that again the show’s credibility and audience tolerance are tested. In its finest moments, the series is reminiscent of the adaptation some years back of Sarah Perry’s the serpent tale, through its portrayal of the competing allures and fears offered by science and belief. In its low points, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to offer the response to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear streams on Disney+ now.
