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A intense discussion lately went viral on social media, after a user posed the question to women: which would you prefer be lost in a forest with a man or with a bear? Similar to the most engaging hypothetical scenarios, it exposed wildly different worldviews and experiences, illuminated chasms between the sexes, and was likely to induce an existential crisis if you thought about it for too long. Additionally, there came the almost inevitable coda in which men of a certain stripe came online to inform women how stupid they had been for choosing the bear and went on to describe the consequences they merited for that choice. This at least allowed the women who were uncertain about their decision to decide with renewed assurance.

Dramatising the Setup

The Bear-Cooking Tale skillfully dramatises this nifty little setup. The six-part drama is based on Scandinavian writer the novelist’s 2018 book with the identical title (rendered in 2020 for an English audience). It traces the tribulations of a pastor (the lead actor) and his household when they arrive to begin a new ministry within Kengis, an isolated village in Sweden’s north, in 1852. Within a community lacking many joys, none of the locals especially warm to his puritanical stance on alcohol and dancing, but it is his defense of impoverished people – especially the indigenous Sami, from among whom comes the pastor’s foster child Jussi (the young actor) – and his belief in societal fairness and equality that places him in direct opposition with the Kengis local authorities.

The Opposing Forces

Quickly collaborating against him include the lawman the sheriff Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating mill owner the matron Sjödahl (Pernilla August), observed initially firing a recently mangled laborer 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 provided by the unsettling shopkeeper the merchant Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). However, in fairness, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when itinerant painter the artist Beronius arrives on the scene (the performer, delivering a performance of exceptional unsettling intensity). While they remain – like the pastor himself – only a little more than caricatures, they still serve as effective ones.

Plot Progression

Once the foundations of conflict planted, it is time to get down to narrative business. The servant from the doctor’s house, the character Hilda (Eleonoora Kauhanen), duly goes missing in the forest. Signs of her flight and animal scratches upon a trunk are found yet she remains completely absent. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear prowling the woods spread, yet the clergyman has another theory that he and Jussi set out to prove.

A Strange Creation

This Bear Drama is a somewhat peculiar show. It conjures a strong impression of the desolation that allows distrust and bias and dark myths thrive from the native legend that animals might be dominated or possessed by the souls of humans. And it doesn’t romanticise the tough existence led by the residents, in which violence, be it from the wild or mankind, always looms on the edges, poised to explode. Yet the personas rarely become beyond symbols – or maybe, as the struggles amid fairness and revenge, rationality and religion, virtue and wickedness intensify, representative characters within a moral tale – which stops the whole thing fully coming to life.

Tonal Inconsistencies

And then, exist numerous stylistically clashing instances in which the pastor’s ability in finding evidence and discern the maid’s destiny turns almost risible. He stands observing shattered containers and strands of fur within storage sheds like a combined the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – alongside Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (neither of whom were required to taste a blend of blood droplets and saliva from his superior to confirm that indeed, it was definitely dried blood on the site), prior to declaring his latest deduction and extracting a corpse from a bog.

Opposing Goals

The local leaders are bent on proving that the maid was killed by a bear, maybe to protect the peace, or possibly to protect a fellow elite. The pastor is bent on proving otherwise, and the proof so quickly accumulates in his favour that again the show’s credibility and audience tolerance get strained. In its finest moments, the series is reminiscent of the adaptation a few years ago of the author’s The Essex Serpent, through its portrayal of the opposing attractions and terrors presented by science and belief. At its worst, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Still, it appears to provide the answer to that debated question: “Females, choose the animal.”

• The series is on Disney+ now.