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A heated discussion recently went viral across online platforms, after someone posed the question to women: would you rather find yourself stranded in a forest with a man or with a bear? Like all the best thought experiments, it exposed vastly opposing perspectives and life encounters, highlighted chasms among genders, and was likely to induce a deep personal dilemma if you thought about it extensively. There was also the almost inevitable coda in which men of a certain stripe took to the internet to tell females how foolish they had been for choosing the animal and went on to describe the consequences they merited for that choice. This at least enabled those females who were uncertain over their choice to decide with renewed assurance.

Portraying the Setup

To Cook a Bear skillfully dramatises this clever little setup. The six-part drama is based from Swedish author the novelist’s 2018 novel with the identical title (rendered two years later for English readers). It traces the tribulations of a pastor (the lead actor) and his family as they come to begin a fresh religious post within Kengis, an isolated village in Sweden’s north, in 1852. In a place lacking many joys, not one of the locals particularly appreciate his strict stance on alcohol and dancing, but it is his defense of impoverished people – particularly the native Sami population, from among whom comes the preacher’s foster child the youth Jussi (the young actor) – and his conviction in societal fairness and equality that sets him in direct opposition against the Kengis local authorities.

The Opposing Forces

Quickly collaborating against him include the lawman Brahe (Magnus Krepper), the intimidating factory proprietor the matron Sjödahl (Pernilla August), observed early on dismissing a recently mangled laborer with minimal compensation as he remains babbling upon seeing of his pulped hand, and all others who profit from a populace who can be bought for a few bottles of the whisky sold by the unsettling store owner the merchant Lindmark (Jonas Karlsson). Although, to be fair, Lindmark’s eeriness diminishes when itinerant painter the artist Beronius appears on the scene (Simon J Berger, delivering a performance of exceptional discomfiting power). While they remain – similar to the clergyman – only a little more being stereotypes, they are at least effective ones.

Narrative Development

With the seeds of conflict sown, the moment arrives to get down to narrative business. The servant employed by the doctor, Hilda (the actress), duly vanishes in the forest. Indications of her escape and animal scratches upon a trunk are found yet she remains completely absent. Gossip and fears of a man/maid-eating bear roaming the woodland circulate, but the pastor has another theory that he and Jussi set out to verify.

An Odd Beast

To Cook a Bear is a somewhat odd beast. It creates a strong impression of the bleakness that lets distrust and prejudice and dark myths thrive based on local folklore that bears might be dominated or inhabited by the spirits of men. And it doesn’t romanticise the hardscrabble life led by the residents, where brutality, whether that of nature or mankind, always looms at the periphery, poised to explode. But the characters seldom evolve more than ciphers – or maybe, while the conflicts between justice and vengeance, logic and faith, virtue and wickedness escalate, representative characters in a fable – preventing the entire production truly coming to life.

Tonal Inconsistencies

Additionally, exist numerous stylistically clashing moments where the clergyman’s skill to discover clues and determine Hilda’s fate turns almost risible. He positions himself looking at shattered containers and strands of fur within storage sheds as a fusion of the Belgian detective and Sherlock Holmes – with Jussi a particularly unfortunate Hastings-cum-Watson (none of whom were required to taste a blend of blood droplets and the boss’s spit to agree that indeed, it was definitely dried blood on the site), prior to declaring his newest conclusion and pulling a body from a bog.

Opposing Goals

The local leaders are bent on proving that Hilda was killed by an animal, maybe to preserve the peace, or possibly to protect one of their own. The clergyman is bent on establishing otherwise, and the proof so rapidly 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 adaptation some years back of Sarah Perry’s the serpent tale, with its evocation of the competing attractions and terrors offered by science and belief. At its worst, it resembles Law & Order: Special Ursine Unit. Nevertheless, it does seem to provide the response to that debated question: “Ladies, take the bear.”

• The series is on Disney+ now.