A heated debate recently spread widely on social media, after a user posed a query to women: which would you prefer be lost in a forest alongside a male or with a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and life encounters, illuminated divides among genders, and could easily to induce an existential crisis for anyone pondering on it for too long. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable follow-up in which some males took to the internet to inform women how stupid they were for choosing the bear and proceeded to limn the consequences they deserved for that choice. This at least allowed the women who had been hesitating over their choice to decide with a new confidence.
Dramatising the Setup
To Cook a Bear effectively brings to life this clever small premise. This six-episode series is adapted on Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 novel of the same name (translated in 2020 for an English audience). It traces the struggles of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his family 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 warm to his strict approach to drinking and revelry, but it is his defense of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom comes the preacher’s adopted son Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his belief in societal fairness and equal rights that places him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Soon collaborating opposing him include the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating factory proprietor the matron Sjödahl (the actress), seen early on firing a newly injured laborer with a month’s pay while he is still babbling upon seeing his crushed hand, and all others who benefit from a community who can be bought with some containers of liquor provided by the creepy store owner Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness pales when travelling artist the artist Beronius appears on the scene (Simon J Berger, delivering an acting turn of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond than caricatures, they are at least effective ones.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of tension sown, it is time to proceed to narrative business. The servant employed by the doctor, the character Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Signs of her flight and bear markings upon a trunk are found but she is nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears regarding a human-devouring bear prowling the woodland spread, yet the clergyman holds a different view which he and his ward embark to verify.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a slightly odd beast. It conjures a strong impression of the bleakness that allows suspicion and prejudice and grim legends thrive based on local folklore that animals might be dominated or inhabited by the souls of humans. And it doesn’t romanticise the hardscrabble life led by the residents, in which brutality, be it from the wild or mankind, always looms at the periphery, waiting to erupt. But the characters seldom evolve beyond symbols – or maybe, as the struggles between justice and vengeance, rationality and religion, good and wickedness escalate, emblematic figures within a moral tale – which stops the entire production truly becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, there are numerous tonally jarring moments in which the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and determine Hilda’s fate becomes almost risible. He positions himself observing shattered containers and clumps of hair in hay barns like a combined Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a rather hapless Hastings-cum-Watson (neither of whom were required to taste a blend of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to confirm that, yes, it was definitely coagulated blood on the site), before announcing his latest deduction and extracting a corpse from a bog.
Clashing Agendas
The local leaders are determined proving that the maid was killed by a bear, perhaps to protect the peace, perhaps to shield one of their own. The clergyman is intent on establishing otherwise, and the proof so quickly stacks up supporting his view that once more the drama’s plausibility and audience tolerance 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 allures and terrors presented by science and belief. In its low points, it’s more like a bear-themed police procedural. Still, it appears to offer the answer to that debated question: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ currently.
