An intense discussion recently spread widely across online platforms, after someone asked the question to women: would you rather be lost in the woods alongside a male or with a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it revealed vastly opposing perspectives and life encounters, illuminated chasms among genders, and could easily to induce an existential crisis if you thought on it for too long. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable coda where some males came online to tell females how stupid they had been for choosing the animal and went on to describe the punishments they deserved for it. This at minimum enabled the women who were uncertain about their decision to decide with a new confidence.
Portraying the Scenario
To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this nifty little setup. This six-episode drama is based from Scandinavian writer Mikael Niemi’s 2018 novel of the same name (translated two years later for English readers). It traces the struggles of a pastor (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household as they come to begin a fresh religious post in Kengis, a remote village in northern Sweden, in 1852. In a place lacking many joys, not one of the inhabitants especially appreciate his puritanical approach to alcohol and dancing, yet it is his protection of impoverished people – especially the native Sami population, from which comes the preacher’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in social justice and equality that places him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.
The Antagonists
Soon collaborating against him are the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), observed early on firing a recently mangled worker with a month’s pay while he is still gibbering at the sight his crushed hand, and all others who profit from a community who can be bought for a few bottles of the whisky sold by the creepy store owner Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when travelling artist Beronius appears on the scene (the performer, delivering a performance of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – only a little more being stereotypes, they still serve as potent archetypes.
Plot Progression
With the seeds of conflict sown, it is time to proceed with the storyline. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (the actress), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her escape and bear markings on a tree get discovered yet she remains completely absent. Gossip and anxieties regarding a human-devouring bear roaming the woods circulate, but the pastor holds a different view which he and his ward set out to verify.
An Odd Beast
To Cook a Bear is a slightly peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that lets suspicion and bias and grim legends thrive from the native legend that bears can be controlled or inhabited by the souls of humans. It avoids idealising the hardscrabble life led by the villagers, in which brutality, be it from the wild or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, poised to explode. But the characters rarely become beyond symbols – or maybe, as the struggles between justice and revenge, logic and faith, virtue and evil escalate, emblematic figures within a moral tale – which stops the whole thing truly coming to life.
Stylistic Shifts
Additionally, there are the many tonally jarring instances in which the clergyman’s skill in finding evidence and discern the maid’s destiny turns almost risible. He stands looking at broken milk pots and clumps of hair within storage sheds as a fusion of Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (none of whom were required to lick a mixture of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to agree that, yes, it was clearly dried blood on the site), before announcing his newest conclusion and pulling a body from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The local leaders are determined proving that the maid was killed by an animal, perhaps to protect the calm, perhaps to shield one of their own. The pastor is intent on proving the opposite, and the evidence so rapidly accumulates in his favour that again the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience get strained. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the adaptation some years back of the author’s the serpent tale, with its evocation of the opposing attractions and terrors offered by science and religion. In its low points, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it does seem to offer the response to that debated question: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series streams on Disney+ currently.
