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An heated debate recently went viral across online platforms, following a user asked the question for females: would you rather be lost in a forest alongside a male or a bear? Like all the best hypothetical scenarios, it revealed wildly different worldviews and experiences, illuminated divides between the sexes, and was likely cause a deep personal dilemma if you thought about it extensively. There was also the almost inevitable follow-up in which men of a certain stripe came online to inform females how stupid they were to select the bear and proceeded to limn the consequences they merited for it. This at minimum enabled the women who were uncertain about their decision to decide with a new confidence.

Portraying the Setup

To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this clever little setup. This six-episode series is adapted on Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 book of the same name (rendered two years later for an English audience). It follows the struggles of a clergyman (Gustaf Skarsgård) and his household as they come to start a fresh religious post within Kengis, a remote settlement in northern Sweden, in 1852. Within a community lacking many joys, not one of the inhabitants particularly appreciate his puritanical approach to drinking and dancing, yet it is his defense of impoverished people – particularly the indigenous Sami, from which comes the preacher’s adopted son the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that sets him on a collision course against the Kengis local authorities.

The Opposing Forces

Quickly collaborating opposing him are the sheriff the sheriff Brahe (the performer), the intimidating mill owner Madam Sjödahl (the actress), seen initially dismissing a recently mangled worker with minimal compensation while he is still gibbering upon seeing his crushed hand, and all others who profit from a populace who can be bought for a few bottles of the whisky provided by the unsettling shopkeeper Lindmark (the actor). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s creepiness diminishes when travelling artist Beronius arrives on the scene (Simon J Berger, delivering a performance of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – like the pastor himself – only a little more than caricatures, they are at least potent archetypes.

Narrative Development

Once the foundations of tension sown, the moment arrives to proceed to narrative business. The servant employed by the doctor, Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), accordingly goes missing in the forest. Indications of her escape and bear markings upon a trunk get discovered yet she remains completely absent. Gossip and anxieties regarding a human-devouring beast roaming the woodland circulate, but the pastor holds a different view which he and his ward set out to verify.

A Strange Creation

To Cook a Bear is a slightly odd beast. It creates a strong impression of the bleakness that allows suspicion and prejudice and grim legends thrive based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or possessed by the souls of men. And it doesn’t romanticise the hardscrabble life experienced by the villagers, in which violence, whether that of nature or mankind, always looms at the periphery, poised to explode. Yet the personas rarely become beyond symbols – or maybe, while the conflicts between justice and revenge, logic and religion, good and evil escalate, emblematic figures in a fable – which stops the entire production truly coming to life.

Tonal Inconsistencies

Additionally, there are numerous tonally jarring instances where the pastor’s ability to discover clues and discern Hilda’s fate turns nearly laughable. He stands observing broken milk pots and strands of fur within storage sheds as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a rather hapless Hastings-cum-Watson (neither of whom had to taste a mixture of blood spatter and saliva from his superior to agree that, yes, it was clearly dried blood on the site), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and pulling a body out of a swamp.

Opposing Goals

The local leaders are bent on proving that the maid met her end by a bear, maybe to protect the peace, or possibly to protect a fellow elite. The clergyman is bent on establishing otherwise, and the proof so rapidly stacks up supporting his view that once more the show’s credibility and the viewer’s patience get strained. At its best, the series is reminiscent of the adaptation some years back of the author’s the serpent tale, through its portrayal of the competing allures and terrors presented by rational thought and religion. At its worst, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to offer the response to that debated question: “Females, choose the animal.”

• To Cook a Bear is on Disney+ now.