A intense debate lately went viral on social media, after a user asked the question to women: would you rather find yourself stranded in a forest alongside a male or a bear? Like all the best hypothetical scenarios, it exposed vastly opposing perspectives and experiences, illuminated chasms among genders, and could easily 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 took to the internet to inform females how stupid they had been for choosing the bear and went on to limn the consequences they merited for that choice. This at minimum allowed the women who were uncertain about their decision to decide with a new confidence.
Portraying the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively dramatises this nifty small premise. The six-part drama is adapted from Scandinavian writer Mikael Niemi’s 2018 novel with the identical title (rendered in 2020 for English readers). It traces the tribulations of a pastor (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household as they come to start a fresh religious post within Kengis, an isolated village in northern Sweden, in 1852. Within a community lacking many joys, not one of the inhabitants especially warm to his strict approach to drinking and dancing, yet it is his defense of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom hails the preacher’s adopted son the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that places him in direct opposition against the Kengis powers that be.
The Opposing Forces
Soon collaborating opposing him include the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the fearsome factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (the actress), seen early on dismissing a newly injured worker with a month’s pay as he remains babbling at the sight of his pulped hand, and anyone else who benefit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of the whisky provided by the creepy store owner Lindmark (the actor). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness pales once itinerant painter the artist Beronius arrives on the scene (Simon J Berger, delivering an acting turn of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they are at least effective ones.
Narrative Development
Once the foundations of conflict sown, the moment arrives to get down to narrative business. The servant employed by the doctor, the character Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing from the woods. Signs of her escape and animal scratches on a tree get discovered but she is completely absent. Gossip and fears regarding a human-devouring beast roaming the woods spread, yet the clergyman has another theory which he and his ward embark to prove.
An Odd Beast
This Bear Drama is a slightly peculiar show. It conjures a fine sense of the bleakness that allows suspicion and bias and grim legends thrive from the native legend that bears might be dominated or possessed by the spirits of humans. And it doesn’t romanticise the hardscrabble life led by the residents, where violence, whether that of nature or mankind, always looms on the edges, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas seldom evolve beyond symbols – or maybe, while the conflicts between justice and vengeance, logic and religion, good and wickedness escalate, representative characters within a moral tale – preventing the whole thing fully coming to life.
Stylistic Shifts
Additionally, there are the many tonally jarring instances where the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and discern Hilda’s fate turns almost risible. He positions himself looking at shattered containers and strands of fur within storage sheds as a fusion of Hercule Poirot the English sleuth – with Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (neither of whom had to lick a blend of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that, yes, it was definitely coagulated blood on the site), before announcing his newest conclusion and pulling a corpse from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are bent on demonstrating that Hilda met her end by an animal, maybe to protect the calm, perhaps to shield a fellow elite. The pastor is intent on proving otherwise, and the evidence so quickly stacks up supporting his view that again the drama’s plausibility and audience tolerance are tested. At its best, the series is reminiscent of the adaptation a few years ago of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the opposing attractions and terrors offered by rational thought and belief. At its worst, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it does seem to provide the response to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ now.
