An intense debate lately went viral on social media, after someone asked the question to women: would you rather be lost in the woods alongside a male or a bear? Similar to the best hypothetical scenarios, it revealed wildly different worldviews and life encounters, illuminated divides between the sexes, and could easily to induce an existential crisis for anyone pondering about it for too long. Additionally, there came the predictable follow-up in which some males came online to tell females how foolish they were to select the bear and went on to describe the punishments they merited for that choice. This at minimum allowed those females who had been hesitating about their decision to decide with renewed assurance.
Portraying the Scenario
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively brings to life this clever 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 pastor (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household as they come to begin a new ministry within Kengis, an isolated settlement in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. In a place lacking many joys, not one of the locals especially warm to his puritanical stance on alcohol and dancing, but it is his defense of the poor – particularly the indigenous Sami, from among whom hails the pastor’s adopted son Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that places him in direct opposition with the Kengis powers that be.
The Antagonists
Quickly collaborating opposing him are the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the fearsome factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially dismissing a newly injured laborer with minimal compensation as he remains babbling upon seeing of his pulped hand, and all others who benefit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of liquor provided by the creepy shopkeeper the merchant Lindmark (the actor). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s creepiness pales once itinerant painter the artist Beronius appears in the story (the performer, providing a performance of exceptional unsettling intensity). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they still serve as effective ones.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of tension planted, it is time to get down to narrative business. The maid from the doctor’s house, Hilda (the actress), duly goes missing from the woods. Signs of her escape and animal scratches upon a trunk get discovered yet she remains completely absent. Rumours and anxieties of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woods spread, but the pastor holds a different view which he and his ward set out to prove.
A Strange Creation
To Cook a Bear is a somewhat odd beast. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that lets distrust and prejudice and dark myths thrive from the native legend that animals can be controlled or inhabited by the souls of humans. It avoids idealising the hardscrabble life led by the villagers, in which violence, be it from the wild or mankind, always looms on the edges, poised to explode. Yet the personas rarely become more than ciphers – or perhaps, while the conflicts between justice and vengeance, rationality and faith, virtue and wickedness escalate, representative characters within a moral tale – which stops the entire production truly coming to life.
Stylistic Shifts
Additionally, exist numerous stylistically clashing instances where the clergyman’s skill to discover clues and determine the maid’s destiny becomes nearly laughable. He stands observing broken milk pots and strands of fur in hay barns as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (none of whom had to taste a mixture of blood droplets and the boss’s spit to confirm that indeed, it was clearly coagulated blood on the site), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and extracting a corpse out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined demonstrating that Hilda was killed by an animal, maybe to protect the peace, perhaps to shield a fellow elite. The pastor is intent on proving otherwise, and the evidence so rapidly accumulates supporting his view that again the drama’s plausibility and audience tolerance are tested. At its best, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the adaptation a few years ago of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, with its evocation of the competing allures and terrors offered by science and belief. In its low points, it’s more like a bear-themed police procedural. Still, it appears to provide the answer to that debated question: “Ladies, take the bear.”
The series is on Disney+ currently.
