A heated debate recently spread widely on social media, following someone posed a query to women: would you rather be lost in the woods with a man or a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it exposed wildly different worldviews and experiences, highlighted chasms between the sexes, 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 came online to inform females how foolish they had been for choosing the animal and went on to limn the consequences they merited for that choice. This at least allowed the women who were uncertain over their choice to decide with renewed assurance.
Portraying the Setup
To Cook a Bear effectively brings to life this nifty little setup. The six-part drama is based from Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 novel with the identical title (translated in 2020 for English readers). It follows the tribulations of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his family as they come to start a new ministry within Kengis, a remote village in northern Sweden, during the mid-19th century. Within a community with few pleasures, not one of the locals particularly warm to his strict stance on drinking and dancing, yet it is his defense of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom comes the pastor’s foster child Jussi (Emil Karlsen) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equality that sets him on a collision course with the Kengis powers that be.
The Opposing Forces
Quickly in cahoots opposing him include the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (the actress), observed early on dismissing a newly injured worker with minimal compensation while he is still babbling at the sight of his pulped hand, and all others who profit from a community easily swayed with some containers of liquor sold by the creepy store owner the merchant Lindmark (the actor). However, to be fair, Lindmark’s creepiness diminishes when itinerant painter the artist Beronius arrives on the scene (the performer, delivering an acting turn of exceptional unsettling intensity). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – only a little more being stereotypes, they are at least effective ones.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of conflict sown, the moment arrives to proceed to narrative business. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), duly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her escape and bear markings on a tree are found but she is nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear prowling the woodland spread, but the pastor holds a different view that he and Jussi embark to verify.
An Odd Beast
This Bear Drama is a slightly odd beast. It creates a strong impression of the bleakness that allows distrust and bias and grim legends thrive based on local folklore that bears can be controlled or inhabited by the souls of men. And it doesn’t romanticise the hardscrabble life experienced by the residents, where brutality, whether that of the wild or mankind, always looms on the edges, poised to explode. Yet the personas seldom evolve beyond symbols – or perhaps, while the conflicts amid fairness and vengeance, rationality and faith, virtue and wickedness intensify, emblematic figures within a moral tale – which stops the whole thing fully becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
Additionally, exist the many stylistically clashing instances in which the pastor’s ability to discover clues and discern Hilda’s fate turns nearly laughable. He positions himself looking at shattered containers and clumps of hair within storage sheds as a fusion of the Belgian detective the English sleuth – alongside Jussi a rather hapless Hastings-cum-Watson (neither of whom were required to taste a blend of blood droplets and the boss’s spit to agree that indeed, it was definitely dried blood on the site), before announcing his newest conclusion and extracting a corpse from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The village elite are determined proving that the maid met her end by a bear, perhaps to preserve the peace, or possibly to protect a fellow elite. The pastor is bent on proving the opposite, and the evidence so quickly stacks up in his favour that once more the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. At its best, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the TV version a few years ago of the author’s the serpent tale, through its portrayal of the opposing allures and terrors offered by rational thought and belief. In its low points, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to provide the answer to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series streams on Disney+ currently.
