An heated debate lately spread widely on social media, following a user asked a query for females: would you rather be lost in a forest with a man or a bear? Similar to the best thought experiments, it exposed wildly different perspectives and life encounters, highlighted divides among genders, and was likely cause an existential crisis if you thought about it extensively. Additionally, there came the predictable coda where men of a certain stripe took to the internet to inform females how foolish they were for choosing the bear and proceeded to limn the consequences they merited for that choice. This at minimum enabled those females who had been hesitating about their decision to decide with renewed assurance.
Dramatising the Setup
To Cook a Bear effectively brings to life this clever small premise. The six-part drama is based on Scandinavian writer Mikael Niemi’s 2018 novel with the identical title (translated in 2020 for an English audience). It follows the struggles of a clergyman (the lead actor) and his family as they come to start a fresh religious post in Kengis, an isolated village in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. Within a community lacking many joys, none of the locals especially appreciate his puritanical approach to alcohol and revelry, but it is his protection of the poor – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom hails the preacher’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equal rights that sets him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.
The Antagonists
Quickly collaborating opposing him are the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), seen early on firing a recently mangled laborer with a month’s pay as he remains babbling at the sight his crushed hand, and all others who profit from a populace who can be bought for a few bottles of liquor provided by the creepy store owner the merchant Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). Although, in fairness, Lindmark’s creepiness diminishes once itinerant painter the artist Beronius appears in the story (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of rare discomfiting power). If they are – like the pastor himself – only a little more than caricatures, they still serve as potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of tension planted, the moment arrives to get down with the storyline. The servant from the doctor’s house, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Signs of her escape and animal scratches upon a trunk get discovered but she is nowhere to be seen. Gossip and anxieties of a man/maid-eating beast prowling the woods spread, yet the clergyman holds a different view which he and his ward embark to verify.
An Odd Beast
To Cook a Bear is a somewhat odd beast. It creates a fine sense of the bleakness that allows distrust and bias and dark myths thrive from the native legend that bears might be dominated or possessed by the souls of men. And it doesn’t romanticise the tough existence experienced by the residents, where brutality, whether that of the wild or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, poised to explode. Yet the personas seldom evolve more than ciphers – or maybe, as the struggles amid fairness and vengeance, rationality and faith, virtue and evil escalate, emblematic figures in a fable – preventing the entire production fully becoming immersive.
Stylistic Shifts
Additionally, there are numerous tonally jarring instances in which the clergyman’s skill in finding evidence and determine the maid’s destiny turns nearly laughable. He positions himself looking at broken milk pots and strands of fur in hay barns as a fusion of Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (none of whom had to taste a mixture of blood droplets and saliva from his superior to confirm that indeed, it was clearly coagulated blood at the crime scene), prior to declaring his latest deduction and pulling a body out of a swamp.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined demonstrating that Hilda met her end by an animal, maybe to preserve the peace, perhaps to shield a fellow elite. The pastor is intent on proving otherwise, and the proof so rapidly stacks up in his favour that again the drama’s plausibility and audience tolerance are tested. In its finest moments, the series evokes memories of the TV version a few years ago of the author’s the serpent tale, with its evocation of the opposing allures and fears offered by rational thought and religion. At its worst, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it does seem to provide the answer to that debated question: “Females, choose the animal.”
To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ now.
