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A intense discussion lately spread widely on social media, following someone posed a query to women: which would you prefer find yourself stranded in a forest alongside a male or a bear? Like all the most engaging hypothetical scenarios, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, highlighted chasms among genders, and could easily cause an existential crisis for anyone pondering on it extensively. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable follow-up in which some males came online to tell females how foolish they were to select the animal and went on to describe the consequences they deserved for it. This at least allowed the women who were uncertain over their choice to decide with renewed assurance.

Portraying the Setup

The Bear-Cooking Tale effectively brings to life this clever little setup. The six-part drama is based on Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 novel with the identical title (translated in 2020 for an English audience). It follows the tribulations of a pastor (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his family as they come to start a new ministry in Kengis, an isolated village in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. Within a community with few pleasures, not one of the inhabitants particularly warm to his puritanical stance on alcohol and revelry, yet it is his defense of impoverished people – especially the native Sami population, from which comes the pastor’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in social justice and equality that sets him on a collision course with the Kengis local authorities.

The Opposing Forces

Quickly in cahoots opposing him are the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the fearsome factory proprietor Madam Sjödahl (Pernilla August), seen initially dismissing a recently mangled worker with minimal compensation while he is still babbling upon seeing of his pulped hand, and all others who benefit from a community who can be bought with some containers of liquor sold by the unsettling shopkeeper Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s creepiness diminishes when itinerant painter the artist Beronius appears on the scene (the performer, providing a performance of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – only a little more being stereotypes, they are at least potent archetypes.

Plot Progression

Once the foundations of conflict planted, it is time to proceed with the storyline. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Signs of her flight and bear markings on a tree get discovered but she is completely absent. Rumours and anxieties regarding a human-devouring beast roaming the woodland spread, but the pastor has another theory that he and Jussi embark to prove.

A Strange Creation

To Cook a Bear is a slightly peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that lets suspicion and prejudice and grim legends flourish from the native legend that animals can be controlled or inhabited by the spirits of men. It avoids idealising the tough existence experienced by the residents, in which violence, be it from nature or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, waiting to erupt. Yet the personas rarely become more than ciphers – or maybe, while the conflicts amid fairness and vengeance, logic and faith, good and wickedness intensify, representative characters in a fable – preventing the whole thing truly becoming immersive.

Tonal Inconsistencies

Additionally, exist the many stylistically clashing instances where the clergyman’s skill to discover clues and discern the maid’s destiny turns nearly laughable. He positions himself looking at broken milk pots and clumps of hair in hay barns as a fusion of the Belgian detective the English sleuth – with Jussi a rather hapless assistant figure (neither of whom had to taste a blend of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to agree that, yes, it was clearly coagulated blood at the crime scene), before announcing his newest conclusion and extracting a body from a bog.

Clashing Agendas

The local leaders are determined proving that Hilda was killed by an animal, perhaps to protect the peace, or possibly to shield a fellow elite. The clergyman is intent on establishing otherwise, and the evidence so rapidly stacks up supporting his view that again the drama’s plausibility and audience tolerance are tested. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the TV version some years back of the author’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the opposing attractions and terrors offered by rational thought and belief. In its low points, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it appears to offer the answer to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”

• To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ now.