{"id":488440,"date":"2026-06-21T12:56:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-21T12:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/488440\/"},"modified":"2026-06-21T12:56:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-21T12:56:13","slug":"review-widows-bay-is-a-boldly-original-take-on-comedic-horror","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/488440\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Widow’s Bay is a boldly original take on comedic horror"},"content":{"rendered":"


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\n Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) has big aspirations for Widow\u2019s Bay as a summer tourist destination.\n <\/p>\n

\n Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) has big aspirations for Widow\u2019s Bay as a summer tourist destination.\n <\/p>\n


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\n Tom\u2019s rebellious teenaged son, Evan (Kingston Rumi Southwick) has never left the island.\n <\/p>\n

\n Tom\u2019s rebellious teenaged son, Evan (Kingston Rumi Southwick) has never left the island.\n <\/p>\n


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\n <\/a><\/p>\n

\n Tom and Wyck (Stephen Root) eventually become allies as supernatural happenings hint at an awakening island curse.\n <\/p>\n

\n Tom and Wyck (Stephen Root) eventually become allies as supernatural happenings hint at an awakening island curse.\n <\/p>\n

\n Tom\u2019s rebellious teenaged son, Evan (Kingston Rumi Southwick) has never left the island.\n <\/p>\n

\n Tom and Wyck (Stephen Root) eventually become allies as supernatural happenings hint at an awakening island curse.\n <\/p>\n


\n \"\"
\n <\/a><\/p>\n

\n Tom\u2019s assistant, Patricia (Kate O\u2019Flynn) tries to throw a \u201csunset cocktails\u201d shindig to boost her social status.\n <\/p>\n


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\n <\/a><\/p>\n

\n Dale (Jeff Hiller) sits in as DJ\n <\/p>\n


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\n Local sheriff Bechir Clemmons (Kevin Carroll) is increasingly alarmed at the odd occurrences.\n <\/p>\n


\n \"\"
\n <\/a><\/p>\n

\n Rosemary (Dale Dickey) might hold some key information about the island.\n <\/p>\n


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\n Todd the Shaman (Chris Fleming), a town drug dealer, has a particular local hallucinogenic mushroom to offer.\n <\/p>\n


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\n A flashback to Widow\u2019s Bay founder Richard Warren\u2019s (Hamish Linklater) actions might be the source of all the mysterious happenings.\n <\/p>\n

Clearly millions of viewers share Dippold\u2019s strangeness. By the time the Patricia-centric fourth episode (\u201cBeach Reads\u201d) aired, viewership numbers had tripled<\/a> since the launch, and those numbers have kept growing as positive word of mouth rapidly spread.<\/p>\n

The most impressive aspect of the series is its mastery of tone: a perfect balance between quirky humor and spine-tingling horror that is incredibly difficult to consistently maintain. \u201cI used to get into all sorts of antics when I was young, me and my friends going to check out the abandoned house and then running off,\u201d said Dippold<\/a> of the tone she wanted for the show. \u201cIt was almost kind of a dangerous excitement. And I just love that feeling because you\u2019re so scared, but you\u2019re laughing so hard, and I just wanted to get that feeling on television.\u201d<\/p>\n

It also helps that Dippold has populated her fictional town with such well-drawn, unique characters; even one-off side characters, like Todd the Shaman (Chris Fleming) feel fleshed out and fully realized. That\u2019s thanks to the show\u2019s terrific cast, of course, but the actors are given a lot to work with in the smart, snappy scripts. And the series\u2019 structure is very well plotted: it\u2019s part monster of the week, part longer narrative arc. The show is warm and funny in the margins, and genuinely scary when the supernatural antics ramp up. There\u2019s not a single false note across all ten episodes.<\/p>\n

All episodes of the first season of Widow\u2019s Bay are now streaming on Apple TV. A second season is already in the works<\/a> so we\u2019ll be getting even more comically horrific adventures. Dippold wants the show to come back as soon as possible\u2014and so do we. She jokingly told Deadline that S2 will be \u201cabout how everything is great on the island and there\u2019s nothing to worry about.\u201d Don\u2019t you believe it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) has big aspirations for Widow\u2019s Bay as a summer tourist destination. Mayor Tom…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":488441,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[156,409,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-488440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=488440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488440\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/488441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}