Widow's Bay

Credit: Apple

To prove to his constituents that the town of Widow’s Bay, a sleepy seaside hamlet on a remote island off the New England coast, is not haunted, mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) agrees to a dare. He will spend the night, all alone, in the town’s haunted Breakwater Inn and record himself as he meets the various conditions of his stay.

These include going into a closet, closing the door and turning off the lights; staying the especially haunted Captain’s Suite; and going down into the basement crawlspace, a challenge he nopes out of . . . at first. Since there is no cell phone reception on the island, Tom brings a camcorder with him to record his long journey into night.

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What happens next is both hilarious and terrifying, though I won’t spoil it here. Suffice to say, there have been several times during this show’s first three episodes that I was actually stressed out by the scary stuff. I was not expecting to have my nerves wracked to this degree by a show billed as a comedy, but Apple TV’s new series, Widow’s Bay, is genuinely frightening at times.

It’s also quite funny. Tom is the classic straight man (in comedy terms). He doesn’t really believe all the hocus pocus surrounding the island’s history. He’s irritated by the outrageous Wyck (Stephen Root) who wants Tom to shut the town down to outsiders, sound the alarms and batten down the proverbial hatches. The island is waking up, Wyck warns Tom, but even when he sees evidence of the supernatural, Tom refuses to bend.

This is partly because Tom is on a mission. He wants to turn Widow’s Bay into a tourist attraction. To this end, he’s coaxed a New York Times travel writer to the island to write a feature, and he wants everything to go perfectly. Even when it doesn’t, the writer is taken in by the town’s charms and calls it “the next Martha’s Vineyard" in his article. Tom is getting exactly what he wants when a bevy of summer tourists arrive.

Other mysteries abound. Tom tells Reverend Bryce (Toby Huss) that he received noise complaints about the church bells ringing in the middle of the night, but when Bryce investigates his fears are confirmed: The bells have been out of commission for a long time. He finds a note from his predecessor, warning him what to do should such an occurrence take place.

Beneath all the supernatural events an even deeper, and perhaps darker, secret lurks, though at this stage we have only hints and clues at what might lay below the town’s idyllic surface.

The supporting cast is terrific as well. Kate O’Flynn (who played Queen Mary in Prime Video’s excellent My Lady Jane) plays Tom’s assistant, Patricia, who appears to have feelings for Tom. Dale Dickey plays Rosemary, another city employee who knows about as much as Wyck about the town’s horrific history. Kevin Carroll plays the town’s beleaguered sheriff who is as irritated with Tom’s neediness as he is with everything else in town, and is eyeing an escape.

Of course, escape is not always possible when it comes to Widow’s Bay. Legend has it, anyone born on the island can never leave. Those who do, quite quickly meet untimely ends. Certainly this will play a role in the story as we move forward. Tom wasn’t born here, you see, but his son, Evan (Kingston Rumi), was.

If you’re looking for something that’s both genuinely funny and edge-of-your-seat scary, look no further. The folk horror elements combined with the quirky townsfolk, not to mention Rhys’s incredibly funny performance, make for a very entertaining combination. This is the best thing on Apple TV at the moment and, so far at least, one of my favorite shows of 2026.

Widow’s Bay was created by former Parks & Recreation writer, Katie Dippold. Most of the season’s 10 episodes were directed by Japanese filmmaker, Hiro Murai, with other episodes directed by Sam Donovan, Andrew DeYoung and Ti West. The series currently holds a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, with 92% of viewers giving this a Fresh rating. New episodes drop on Tuesday evenings.

Have you watched Widow’s Bay? What do you think so far? Let me know on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook.