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An heated discussion lately went viral on social media, after someone asked the question for females: would you rather be lost in the woods with a man or a bear? Similar to the most engaging hypothetical scenarios, it revealed vastly opposing worldviews and experiences, illuminated divides between the sexes, and was likely cause an existential crisis for anyone pondering on it for too long. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable follow-up in which some males came online to inform females how stupid they had been for choosing the animal and proceeded to describe the consequences they merited for that choice. This at minimum enabled the women who were uncertain about their decision to make it with renewed assurance.

Dramatising the Scenario

To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this clever small premise. The six-part series is based on Swedish author Mikael Niemi’s 2018 book with the identical title (rendered in 2020 for English readers). It traces the struggles of a pastor (the lead actor) and his family as they come to begin a new ministry in Kengis, an isolated settlement in northern Sweden, in 1852. Within a community with few pleasures, not one of the locals particularly appreciate his strict approach to drinking and revelry, but it is his protection of impoverished people – particularly the indigenous Sami, from among whom comes the pastor’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that places him on a collision course against the Kengis local authorities.

The Antagonists

Quickly collaborating opposing him are the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating mill owner Madam Sjödahl (the actress), seen early on dismissing a newly injured worker with minimal compensation as he remains babbling upon seeing his crushed hand, and anyone else who benefit from a populace easily swayed for a few bottles of the whisky sold by the unsettling store owner Lindmark (the actor). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s creepiness diminishes once travelling artist the artist Beronius arrives on the scene (the performer, delivering a performance of rare unsettling intensity). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – only a little more than caricatures, they still serve as effective ones.

Plot Progression

With the seeds of tension planted, the moment arrives to proceed to narrative business. The maid from the doctor’s house, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly goes missing from the woods. Indications of her flight and animal scratches upon a trunk are found yet she remains nowhere to be seen. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woodland circulate, yet the clergyman has another theory which he and his ward set out to prove.

An Odd Beast

This Bear Drama is a somewhat peculiar show. It conjures a fine sense of the desolation that allows suspicion and bias and dark myths thrive from the native legend that bears can be controlled or possessed by the spirits of humans. And it doesn’t romanticise the hardscrabble life experienced by the residents, where violence, be it from nature or mankind, lurks constantly on the edges, waiting to erupt. But the characters seldom evolve more than ciphers – or maybe, while the conflicts amid fairness and revenge, logic and religion, good and wickedness escalate, emblematic figures in a fable – preventing the entire production fully becoming immersive.

Stylistic Shifts

Additionally, exist the many tonally jarring instances in which the clergyman’s skill in finding evidence and determine Hilda’s fate becomes almost risible. He stands observing shattered containers and clumps of hair within storage sheds like a combined Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom were required to taste a blend of blood spatter and the boss’s spit to agree that, yes, it was clearly dried blood at the crime scene), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and extracting a corpse from a bog.

Clashing Agendas

The village elite are determined proving that the maid was killed by an animal, perhaps to preserve the peace, or possibly to shield one of their own. The pastor is bent on proving the opposite, and the proof so quickly stacks up in his favour that once more the show’s credibility and audience tolerance get strained. In its finest moments, To Cook a Bear evokes memories of the TV version some years back of Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the opposing attractions and terrors presented by science and religion. In its low points, it resembles a bear-themed police procedural. Nevertheless, it does seem to provide the response to the earlier query: “Ladies, take the bear.”

• To Cook a Bear streams on Disney+ currently.