Looking for something set in a cozy, communal island town where everybody knows one another's name, along with something wicked this way coming through the dense fog. Local Mayor Tom (Emmy winner Matthew Rhys) is set on bringing fame to their small island to stir up tourism and keep the flailing island fiscally afloat. Tom's a widower raising a high school student on his own who stays out late getting high "cause there's nothing to do on the island." He's begrudgingly assisted in this venture by his motley staff of eccentric locals including his doddering, octogenarian secretary. As Tom tells the travel writer he's hoping to impress, the townsfolk "have a lot of color." Filmed on the bay and on the isolated town of Widow's Bay, you can almost smell the fishy dampness and feel the chill in the air. Soon you'll be feeling a chill down your spine in this smartly written, well cast series that blends the Mayor's blustering frustrations with his pothead son, Evan (Kingston Southwick, "Presumed Innocent") and the sordid locals who maintain the evil curse on the island has arisen, again. The various A-List of veteran character actors who sprinkle in comic relief and fortitude to their jobs include Dale Dickey, Kate O'Flynn and Kevin Carrol. Tom's biggest foe is the elder local Wyck (Stephen Root, TV Series "Barry"). Wyck is granted 5 minutes to explain to Tom why he maintains evil is imminent on island. Tom is scornful until his own harrowing encounters with a local fisherman found in coma as forewarned by Wyck. Tom becomes faced with the dilemma whether he must warn the community to barricade themselves as precaution, or continue the now forgone charade of WIDOW'S BAY as an innocuous, welcoming tourist town. The scene in the town's best restaurant where Tom had hope to impress turns eerie and intense as Tom struggles to maintain his composure in front of the reporter. The writer just confided he "Loves WIDOW'S BAY. It could be bigger than Martha's Vineyard." WIDOW'S BAY is much more than a suspense, horror, idiosyncratic psychological thriller. It is all that and more. I can't wait to watch what's in store. Don't miss it!
