A intense debate lately spread widely on social media, following someone posed a query for females: which would you prefer be lost in the woods with a man or with a bear? Similar to the most engaging hypothetical scenarios, it exposed vastly opposing perspectives and experiences, highlighted chasms between the sexes, and could easily cause an existential crisis for anyone pondering about it for too long. Additionally, there came the predictable coda in which some males came online to tell women how stupid they were for choosing the animal and went on to describe the punishments they deserved for it. This at minimum allowed those females who were uncertain about their decision to decide with a new confidence.
Dramatising the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively brings to life this clever little setup. The six-part drama is based on Swedish author Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered in 2020 for English readers). It traces the struggles of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his household as they come to start a new ministry within Kengis, an isolated village in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. Within a community lacking many joys, none of the locals particularly appreciate his puritanical stance on alcohol and dancing, but it is his defense of the poor – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom hails the preacher’s adopted son Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in social justice and equality that sets him in direct opposition against the Kengis powers that be.
The Opposing Forces
Soon in cahoots against him are the lawman the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome mill owner Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), observed initially firing a newly injured worker with a month’s pay while he is still gibbering upon seeing of his pulped hand, and all others who benefit from a populace easily swayed for a few bottles of liquor sold by the unsettling shopkeeper the merchant Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, to be fair, Lindmark’s creepiness pales once itinerant painter Beronius arrives in the story (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of exceptional discomfiting power). If they are – like the pastor himself – just slightly beyond than caricatures, they still serve as potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of tension planted, the moment arrives to proceed with the storyline. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her escape and animal scratches on a tree get discovered yet she remains completely absent. Rumours and fears regarding a human-devouring beast roaming the woods circulate, but the pastor has another theory that he and Jussi set out to verify.
A Strange Creation
This Bear Drama is a slightly odd beast. It conjures a strong impression of the bleakness that allows suspicion and bias and dark myths thrive from the native legend that animals might be dominated or possessed by the spirits of men. And it doesn’t romanticise the tough existence experienced by the residents, where brutality, whether that of nature or people, lurks constantly at the periphery, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas seldom evolve beyond symbols – or perhaps, while the conflicts amid fairness and revenge, rationality and religion, good and wickedness escalate, representative characters in a fable – which stops the whole thing truly becoming immersive.
Stylistic Shifts
And then, exist numerous stylistically clashing instances in which the clergyman’s skill to discover clues and discern Hilda’s fate becomes nearly laughable. He positions himself observing shattered containers and strands of fur in hay barns like a combined Hercule Poirot the English sleuth – alongside Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (neither of whom had to lick a mixture of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that indeed, it was clearly coagulated blood at the crime scene), before announcing his latest deduction and pulling a corpse from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined demonstrating that the maid was killed by an animal, perhaps to protect the peace, or possibly to protect one of their own. The clergyman is intent on establishing the opposite, and the evidence so quickly accumulates in his favour that again the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the adaptation some years back of the author’s the serpent tale, through its portrayal of the competing attractions and terrors offered by rational thought and religion. At its worst, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it does seem to offer the answer to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series is on Disney+ now.
