An intense debate recently went viral across online platforms, following someone asked the question to women: which would you prefer find yourself stranded in a forest with a man or with a bear? Like all the best hypothetical scenarios, it exposed vastly opposing perspectives and experiences, highlighted divides among genders, and could easily cause a deep personal dilemma if you thought about it for too long. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable follow-up in which some males came online to inform females how foolish they were for choosing the bear and proceeded to describe the punishments they deserved for that choice. This at least enabled the women who had been hesitating over their choice to make it with renewed assurance.
Dramatising the Setup
The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively brings to life this clever small premise. The six-part drama is adapted on Scandinavian writer Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book with the identical title (rendered in 2020 for an English audience). It follows the struggles of a clergyman (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household when they arrive to begin a fresh religious post within Kengis, an isolated village in Sweden’s north, in 1852. In a place with few pleasures, none of the inhabitants particularly warm to his strict stance on alcohol and revelry, yet it is his protection of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from which hails the preacher’s adopted son the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that sets him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Soon collaborating opposing him include the lawman Brahe (the performer), the intimidating mill owner Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), seen initially dismissing a recently mangled worker with minimal compensation as he remains babbling at the sight his crushed hand, and all others who benefit from a community easily swayed with some containers of the whisky sold by the creepy store owner Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness pales when travelling artist the artist Beronius appears in the story (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – like the pastor himself – only a little more being stereotypes, they are at least potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of conflict planted, the moment arrives to get down to narrative business. The servant from the doctor’s house, Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Signs of her escape and animal scratches on a tree are found but she is completely absent. Rumours and anxieties regarding a human-devouring bear roaming the woodland spread, yet the clergyman has another theory that he and Jussi embark to verify.
An Odd Beast
To Cook a Bear is a slightly odd beast. It creates a strong impression of the desolation that lets distrust and prejudice and grim legends flourish based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or possessed by the souls of humans. It avoids romanticise the hardscrabble life experienced by the villagers, in which violence, whether that of the wild or mankind, lurks constantly at the periphery, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas rarely become beyond symbols – or maybe, while the conflicts amid fairness and vengeance, logic and faith, good and evil intensify, representative characters in a fable – preventing the whole thing fully becoming immersive.
Stylistic Shifts
Additionally, there are numerous stylistically clashing instances where the pastor’s ability to discover clues and discern the maid’s destiny turns nearly laughable. He positions himself observing shattered containers and strands of fur within storage sheds like a combined the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (neither of whom were required to lick a mixture of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that, yes, it was definitely dried blood on the site), prior to declaring his latest deduction and extracting a body from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The village elite are determined proving that the maid met her end by an animal, perhaps to protect the peace, or possibly to protect one of their own. The pastor is bent on establishing otherwise, and the evidence so quickly accumulates in his favour that once more the show’s credibility and the viewer’s patience get strained. At its best, the series evokes memories of the TV version a few years ago of the author’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the opposing allures and terrors presented by rational thought and belief. At its worst, it resembles a bear-themed police procedural. Still, it does seem to provide the answer to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”
To Cook a Bear streams on Disney+ currently.
