Apple TV’s new “Widow’s Bay” series is set in a quaint island town 40 miles off the coast of New England. But something lurks beneath the surface. Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) is desperate to revive his struggling community. There’s no Wi-Fi, spotty cellular reception and he must contend with superstitious locals who believe their island is cursed. He wants these people to respect him. They don’t. They think he is soft and cowardly. And he is. But Loftis is determined to build a better future for his teenage son and turn the island into a tourist destination. Miraculously, he succeeds: tourists are finally coming. Unfortunately, the locals were right. After decades of calm, the old stories that seemed too ludicrous to be true, start happening again. “Widow’s Bay” blends genuine horror with character-driven comedy.
Though the plot has an overarching story, there’s an almost anthological feel to “Widow’s Bay,” which riffs on a different sub-branch of horror with each subsequent half-hour. There’s a slasher riff, á la “Halloween”; a haunted hotel, á la “The Shining”; even a flashback to the settlement’s Puritan-era origins, á la “The Witch.” That last one is helmed by “X” director Ti West, who joins “Severance” director Sam Donovan and “Friendship” auteur Andrew DeYoung in a stacked behind-the-camera lineup led by executive producer Hiro Murai, late of “Atlanta” and “Barry.” It takes a group of such experience to handle the series’ delicate balancing act, which sustains both heart-pounding suspense and wry humor for impressively long stretches of time…
In lieu of a detailed mythology or elaborately constructed mystery box, the scares on “Widow’s Bay” are grounded in the characters’ different anxieties: Tom’s desire to control the risks facing his increasingly independent son; Patricia’s loneliness and need to fit in; Wick’s regret over past sins and paths not taken; Evan wanting to impress a girl. (The teens in “Widow’s Bay” are oblivious enough to do their genre forebears proud.) When I contemplate a clearly forecast Season 2, it’s not the quest to end the curse that interests me — it’s the prospect of spotlights on smaller players like salty old-timer Rosemary (Dale Dickey) or Tom’s sweet deputy Dale (Jeff Hiller). Widow’s Bay may not make the best tourist destination, but I’d happily make a return trip.
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