An heated discussion recently spread widely on social media, following someone asked the question for females: would you rather find yourself stranded in the woods with a man or a bear? Similar to the best thought experiments, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, illuminated chasms between the sexes, and was likely cause a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering about it for too long. There was also the predictable follow-up in which some males came online to inform females how stupid they had been to select the bear and proceeded to limn the punishments they deserved for it. This at minimum allowed the women who had been hesitating about their decision to make it with a new confidence.
Dramatising the Setup
To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this nifty little setup. The six-part drama is based from Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered two years later for an English audience). It follows the struggles of a clergyman (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household as they come to start a new ministry in Kengis, a remote settlement in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. Within a community lacking many joys, not one of the locals especially warm to his strict stance on alcohol and revelry, but it is his defense of the poor – especially the native Sami population, from among whom hails the pastor’s foster child Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equal rights that sets him in direct opposition against the Kengis powers that be.
The Opposing Forces
Soon in cahoots against him are the sheriff the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially firing a recently mangled laborer with minimal compensation as he remains gibbering upon seeing his crushed hand, and anyone else who profit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of liquor sold by the creepy shopkeeper Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when itinerant painter the artist Beronius arrives on the scene (the performer, delivering a performance of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond than caricatures, they still serve as potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of conflict planted, it is time to get down to narrative business. The maid employed by the doctor, the character Hilda (the actress), duly vanishes from the woods. Signs of her escape and animal scratches on a tree are found but she is completely absent. Rumours and anxieties of a man/maid-eating bear prowling the woodland spread, yet the clergyman has another theory which he and his ward set out to verify.
An Odd Beast
This Bear Drama is a somewhat peculiar show. It conjures a fine sense of the bleakness that allows distrust and prejudice and dark myths thrive based on local folklore that animals might be dominated or inhabited by the souls of men. It avoids idealising the hardscrabble life experienced by the villagers, in which violence, whether that of the wild or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, poised to explode. But the characters seldom evolve beyond symbols – or maybe, as the struggles between justice and vengeance, logic and faith, good and wickedness intensify, emblematic figures in a fable – which stops the entire production truly coming to life.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, exist numerous tonally jarring instances in which the pastor’s ability to discover clues and determine Hilda’s fate turns nearly laughable. He stands looking at broken milk pots and strands of fur in hay barns as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (neither of whom were required to lick a blend of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to confirm that indeed, it was definitely dried blood at the crime scene), before announcing his newest conclusion and pulling a body out of a swamp.
Clashing Agendas
The village elite are bent on demonstrating that the maid met her end by a bear, perhaps to protect the peace, or possibly to shield one of their own. The clergyman is intent on proving otherwise, and the evidence so rapidly stacks up in his favour that once more the show’s credibility and audience tolerance get strained. In its finest moments, the series evokes memories of the adaptation some years back of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, with its evocation of the opposing attractions and fears offered by rational thought and religion. At its worst, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to offer the answer to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ currently.
