An heated discussion lately went viral on social media, following someone posed a query for females: which would you prefer find yourself stranded in a forest alongside a male or a bear? Similar to the best thought experiments, it revealed vastly opposing perspectives and experiences, highlighted divides between the sexes, and was likely cause a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering on it for too long. Additionally, there came the predictable follow-up in which men of a certain stripe came online to inform females how foolish they had been to select the bear and went on to limn the punishments they deserved for it. This at minimum enabled those females who had been hesitating about their decision to make it with a new confidence.
Dramatising the Scenario
To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this clever little setup. The six-part drama is based from Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (translated in 2020 for an English audience). It traces the struggles of a clergyman (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household when they arrive to begin a fresh religious post in Kengis, an isolated settlement in northern Sweden, during the mid-19th century. Within a community lacking many joys, not one of the locals particularly appreciate his strict approach to alcohol and revelry, yet it is his defense of impoverished people – particularly the indigenous Sami, from among whom hails the pastor’s adopted son the youth Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equal rights that sets him on a collision course against the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Quickly collaborating opposing him are the sheriff the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome factory proprietor the matron Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially firing a recently mangled worker with minimal compensation while he is still babbling upon seeing of his pulped hand, and all others who profit from a community easily swayed for a few bottles of the whisky sold by the unsettling shopkeeper the merchant Lindmark (the actor). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness pales once itinerant painter the artist Beronius arrives on the scene (the performer, providing an acting turn of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – like the pastor himself – just slightly beyond than caricatures, they are at least potent archetypes.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of conflict planted, it is time to get down to narrative business. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (the actress), duly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her flight and animal scratches on a tree are found but she is nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating beast roaming the woods spread, but the pastor holds a different view that he and Jussi set out to verify.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a slightly odd beast. It conjures a strong impression of the bleakness that lets distrust and prejudice and dark myths flourish based on local folklore that bears can be controlled or possessed by the spirits of men. It avoids idealising the tough existence experienced by the villagers, where violence, be it from the wild or people, lurks constantly at the periphery, poised to explode. Yet the personas rarely become more than ciphers – or perhaps, as the struggles between justice and revenge, rationality and religion, good and evil escalate, representative characters within a moral tale – preventing the entire production fully coming to life.
Tonal Inconsistencies
Additionally, there are the many stylistically clashing moments where the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and determine Hilda’s fate becomes nearly laughable. He positions himself looking at shattered containers and clumps of hair within storage sheds as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a rather hapless Hastings-cum-Watson (neither of whom had to lick a blend of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that, yes, it was definitely dried blood on the site), before announcing his newest conclusion and extracting a corpse out of a swamp.
Clashing Agendas
The village elite are determined proving that the maid was killed by an animal, perhaps to protect the calm, perhaps to shield one of their own. The clergyman is intent on establishing the opposite, 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, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the TV version a few years ago of the author’s the serpent tale, through its portrayal of the competing allures and terrors offered by rational thought and belief. At its worst, it resembles a bear-themed police procedural. Still, it appears to offer the answer to that debated question: “Ladies, take the bear.”
The series streams on Disney+ currently.
