- Network: Apple TV
- Series Premiere Date: Apr 29, 2026
Critic Reviews
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Widow’s Peak is rich and wonderful. Grownup, funny, scary, true – Mare of Easttown meets Schitt’s Creek, but with something else that makes it singular.
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With its diverse elements coming together like lightning in a bottle, Widow’s Bay is a destination well worth visiting.
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Widow’s Bay plays like a mixtape of the Master of the Macabre’s work, compiling stock horror archetypes and scenarios before running them through a mondo bizarro filter.
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It is truly unlike anything else on TV, a wild swing of tonal shifts that works because it commits so fully to both halves of the equation.
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Another distinctive addition to Apple TV’s impressive library that delivered several agonizing jump scares, loads of laughs, and intrigued until the last second of the 10 episode season.
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That awkward, comedic, and suspenseful tension may be a lot to get through, but it's designed to ensure we get the most we can from the horror genre. At this point, it can hardly be denied that Apple TV has mastered a rare sort of art.
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A charmingly ghoulish saga about a locale beset by the sins of the past. It’s also, to date, the best new show of the year.
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Dippold and lead director Hiro Murai unleash the comedy version of Rhys in many wonderful ways. Tom is so obviously in over his head, and so easily panicked, that it's hard to hate him even as he keeps putting other people at risk.
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As soon as the series confirms the haunt is real (and spook-tacular), it kicks off a stellar run of episodes that expand the town lore and sharpen its characters in rapid, imaginative succession.
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And, though they're not without laughs, it's easy to miss the more leisurely, comedy-forward tone of the early episodes once the plot fully kicks in and the perils mount. But that likely won't bother those who showed up for the horror in the first place or those won over by Widow's Bay's compelling eccentric characters and even more eccentric setting.
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It’s twice as long as it should be, but this spooky Apple series about a curse bedeviling a small New England island town sure knows how to combine mirth and menace. Sending chef’s kiss to Matthew Rhys who is sinfully perfect
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Apr 30, 2026This darkly amusing mystery is a freaky, funny watch.
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This is a comedy that would sink or swim based on its lead performances. And it’s owing to Rhys that this ends up being such a buoyant show.
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It’s funny and it’s scary, but it’s never simply either, or even simply both. Even when “Widow’s Bay” cheekily remixes horror tropes, it feels like its own thing. It’s hard to classify, which is about the nicest thing I can say about a new series.
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Such tonal shifts make Katie Dippold’s show one peculiar barrel of fish, much in the way that Atlanta or Barry were uncategorisable (Hiro Murai, this show’s director, also worked on those). Which means, I suspect, just as many will find it frustrating as will applaud it for being like nothing else around.
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It doesn’t aim for the grandiose allegory or psychological character development that defines so much “elevated horror,” nor does it chasten its sense of humor to appeal to a wide-ranging audience. Instead, like any good vacation spot, it focuses on simply giving its guests a good time.
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Even with my minor complaints, I found myself reluctant to abandon this isle entirely. As that travel writer also comments to Tom, the real secret sauce of Widow’s Bay is the people.
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“Widow’s Bay” reaches deep into that bag of tropes, but it’s all part of the game; familiarity breeds anticipation, which breeds fear. .... Many of its characters are exaggerated in a way that can pass for comical, until the horror just elbows them out of the way in its very effective, storm-tossed final acts.
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Overall, it feels as though less is more as it found its perfect niche in the opening episodes before changing course. Nevertheless, the first season was promising and has the potential to capture the imagination of horror-loving audiences and there could be potential for future stories to be told on Widow’s Bay.
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At first, you might not be so sure that you've chosen the right travel destination, but Widow's Bay becomes a haunting, deeply rewarding, and oddly charming series if you stick with it.
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Another example of those semi-generic, too-teased-out streaming mysteries that have become plentiful.
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While never as scary nor funny as it could be, "Widow's Bay" is still an enjoyable place to visit, with enough Stephen King-ish shenanigans going on to keep horror fans interested, even if they've encountered a lot of what's being offered here before.
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Where other actors might play the part of a straight man surrounded by hysterical weirdos, well, straight, Rhys is always dropping hints that Tom’s sanity is more fragile than it looks. Yet the show is more a jumble of stylish allusions and skillful performances than it is a transformative work unto itself.
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The failure to flesh out the population of Widow’s Bay beyond a handful of characters doesn’t just undermine its sense of place. It deprives the show of something every good horror story needs: victims. Although the season grows eerier as Tom discovers more of the island’s dreadful backstory, it’s rare that anything terrible happens to anyone we truly care about.