Enjoy your stay. Pay no attention to the curse.
Dear Watchers,In the second episode of “Widow’s Bay,” Tom Loftis, the mayor of the small New England island of the title, must stay overnight in an inn that many locals believe is haunted. While in the parlor, Tom looks through the hotel’s collection of board games and finds one called simply “Teeth.” He lifts off the lid and finds the only thing inside is a pair of pliers. If this made you chuckle sardonically, then plan to watch “Widow’s Bay,” an off-kilter horror-comedy created by Katie Dippold (“Parks and Recreation”), premiering Wednesday on Apple TV. The series fits within the small-town eccentrics genre — more “Twin Peaks” than “Parks and Rec” — but it is also its own, idiosyncratic entity. Featuring a terrific Matthew Rhys as the perpetually flummoxed mayor and reliably wonderful supporting players like Stephen Root, Kate O’Flynn and Jeff Hiller, this darkly amusing mystery is a freaky, funny watch. Located 40 miles off the mainland, the ominously named Widow’s Bay barely has cellphone reception — the townspeople use mostly landlines, walkie-talkies and occasionally overhead projectors. But Mayor Loftis thinks this quaint seaside village can be a hot spot for tourists, which starts to happen after a New York Times travel writer comes to visit. The only problem: Widow’s Bay might be cursed. Over the years it has seen mysterious murders, plagues, seaside accidents and other nasty events. (“Priest Eaten by Whale” reads the headline on an old framed newspaper.) When Tom asks his elderly assistant, a Widow’s Bay native named Ruth (K Callan), if she is familiar with the ethics thought experiment known as the trolley problem, she replies: “You mean back in ’42, when we tried to build one and all the workers disappeared?” Tom finds the local legends ridiculous until strange things start happening to him — some obvious riffs on horror movies like “Jaws,” “The Blair Witch Project” and “Halloween.” (The show’s directors include Hiro Murai, who is also an executive producer, and Ti West of the “X” trilogy.) But “Widow’s Bay” is more a puzzle-box show like “Lost” or “Severance” than a work of pure terror. As the writers slowly reveal information about the island’s history, the details seem designed to be dissected on Reddit At the same time, the series is slyly funny, and Rhys is hilarious as he summons the same intensity he brought to dramas like “The Americans” and “The Beast in Me.” Late in the season, Tom attempts to rip a painting off a wall in a fit of frustration and becomes overwhelmed by its weight, crumpling beneath it in a Chaplin-esque piece of physical comedy. He desperately needs a vacation from the tourist destination he created. Most viewers, on the other hand, will enjoy staying for a spell. Also this week
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