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A heated debate lately spread widely on social media, after a user posed a query for females: which would you prefer be lost in a forest alongside a male or with a bear? Similar to the most engaging thought experiments, it exposed wildly different perspectives and experiences, illuminated divides between the sexes, and could easily to induce a deep personal dilemma if you thought on it for too long. Additionally, there came the predictable coda where men of a certain stripe took to the internet to inform females how stupid they were for choosing the animal and went on to describe the punishments they deserved for that choice. This at least enabled those females who were uncertain over their choice to make it with renewed assurance.

Dramatising the Setup

The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully dramatises this clever little setup. The six-part drama is based on Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 novel with the identical title (translated in 2020 for an English audience). It traces the struggles of a clergyman (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household as they come to begin a new ministry within Kengis, a remote village in Sweden’s north, during the mid-19th century. In a place lacking many joys, not one of the inhabitants particularly appreciate his puritanical stance on alcohol and dancing, yet it is his defense of the poor – particularly the indigenous Sami, from which hails the preacher’s adopted son Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in social justice and equality that sets him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.

The Opposing Forces

Soon collaborating against him are the lawman the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the intimidating mill owner the matron Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially dismissing a recently mangled worker with a month’s pay while he is still babbling upon seeing his crushed hand, and anyone else who profit from a populace easily swayed for a few bottles of the whisky sold by the unsettling shopkeeper Lindmark (the actor). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness pales once itinerant painter Beronius appears on the scene (the performer, delivering an acting turn of rare unsettling intensity). If they are – similar to the clergyman – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they are at least potent archetypes.

Plot Progression

With the seeds of tension sown, the moment arrives to proceed to narrative business. The maid from the doctor’s house, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), duly vanishes from the woods. Indications of her escape and animal scratches upon a trunk are found but she is completely absent. Gossip and anxieties of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woods circulate, yet the clergyman holds a different view that he and Jussi set out to verify.

A Strange Creation

This Bear Drama is a somewhat peculiar show. It creates a fine sense of the desolation that lets distrust and bias and dark myths flourish based on local folklore that bears can be controlled or possessed by the spirits of men. It avoids romanticise the hardscrabble life experienced by the villagers, where violence, whether that of nature or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, waiting to erupt. But the characters rarely become beyond symbols – or perhaps, while the conflicts between justice and revenge, rationality and religion, good and wickedness escalate, emblematic figures in a fable – preventing the whole thing truly coming to life.

Stylistic Shifts

And then, exist the many tonally jarring instances in which the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and determine Hilda’s fate turns almost risible. He positions himself observing broken milk pots and strands of fur within storage sheds like a combined the Belgian detective the English sleuth – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate assistant figure (none of whom had to lick a blend of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that indeed, it was clearly coagulated blood at the crime scene), before announcing his latest deduction and extracting a corpse from a bog.

Clashing Agendas

The local leaders are bent on demonstrating that Hilda was killed by an animal, maybe to protect the peace, or possibly to shield a fellow elite. The clergyman is intent on proving the opposite, and the evidence so rapidly accumulates in his favour that again the show’s credibility and audience tolerance get strained. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear is reminiscent of the adaptation a few years ago of Sarah Perry’s the serpent tale, with its evocation of the opposing allures and fears offered by science and belief. In its low points, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to offer the response to the earlier query: “Females, choose the animal.”

• To Cook a Bear streams on Disney+ currently.