A intense discussion recently went viral on social media, after a user asked the question for females: which would you prefer be lost in the woods with a man or a bear? Similar to the most engaging hypothetical scenarios, it exposed wildly different perspectives and life encounters, illuminated divides among genders, and was likely to induce a deep personal dilemma for anyone pondering on it for too long. There was also the predictable follow-up in which some males came online to inform females how foolish they were to select the animal and went on to limn the consequences they merited for it. This at least allowed those females who had been hesitating over their choice to make it with renewed assurance.
Dramatising the Scenario
The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully dramatises this clever small premise. This six-episode drama is based from Swedish author Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered two years later for English readers). It follows the struggles of a pastor (the lead actor) and his family as they come to begin a new ministry within Kengis, an isolated settlement in Sweden’s north, in 1852. In a place lacking many joys, none of the locals especially warm to his puritanical approach to alcohol and revelry, yet it is his protection of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from which comes the pastor’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that places him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.
The Opposing Forces
Soon collaborating opposing him include the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating mill owner the matron Sjödahl (the actress), seen early on firing a recently mangled worker with a month’s pay as he remains babbling upon seeing his crushed hand, and anyone else who profit from a community easily swayed with some containers of the whisky provided by the unsettling shopkeeper the merchant Lindmark (the actor). Although, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when travelling artist Beronius appears in the story (Simon J Berger, providing an acting turn of exceptional discomfiting power). If they are – like the pastor himself – just slightly beyond being stereotypes, they still serve as potent archetypes.
Narrative Development
With the seeds of conflict planted, it is time to proceed to narrative business. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly vanishes in the forest. Indications of her escape and bear markings on a tree get discovered yet she remains completely absent. Rumours and anxieties regarding a human-devouring beast prowling the woodland circulate, yet the clergyman has another theory which he and his ward embark to prove.
An Odd Beast
This Bear Drama is a somewhat peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that allows distrust and bias and dark myths flourish based on local folklore that bears can be controlled or inhabited by the souls of men. And it doesn’t idealising the tough existence led by the villagers, where brutality, be it from the wild or people, always looms on the edges, poised to explode. Yet the personas rarely become more than ciphers – or maybe, as the struggles between justice and revenge, logic and religion, good and wickedness intensify, emblematic figures in a fable – which stops the whole thing truly becoming immersive.
Tonal Inconsistencies
And then, there are the many tonally jarring moments in which the clergyman’s skill in finding evidence and determine the maid’s destiny turns almost risible. He positions himself looking at shattered containers and strands of fur in hay barns as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom were required to taste a blend of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to confirm that indeed, it was clearly coagulated blood at the crime scene), before announcing his newest conclusion and extracting a body from a bog.
Opposing Goals
The village elite are determined proving that Hilda was killed by a bear, maybe to protect the calm, or possibly to shield one of their own. The pastor is bent on proving otherwise, and the evidence so rapidly accumulates in his favour that again the drama’s plausibility and the viewer’s patience are tested. At its best, the series is reminiscent of the TV version a few years ago of Sarah Perry’s the serpent tale, with its evocation of the opposing allures and terrors offered by rational thought and belief. At its worst, it’s more like Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it does seem to provide the answer to that debated question: “Females, choose the animal.”
The series streams on Disney+ now.
