Widow’s Bay Season 1 Episode 5 Review: What to Expect On Your Trip

Critic’s Rating: 4.5 / 5.0

4.5

Before we get this party started, I have to ask: Have you noticed how many people are talking about Widow’s Bay?

It’s everywhere! My sister called me to ask about it because someone she heard on a podcast was singing its praises. A DJ on SiriusXM called it the best show she’s seen in ages.

How thrilling to know that we are all in this together, exploring the curious town of Widow’s Bay. Let’s pat ourselves on the back!

Because sheesh, these townsfolk could use the encouragement.

The people of Widow’s Bay are reeling in the wake of Reverend Bryce’s death.

With so many unexpected things happening in this small seaside town, it’s not exactly comforting to discover someone you trust took the fast way out.

“My eye is open” was carved on Bryce’s desk twice. No, that’s not creepy at all. All we needed was to find out it was carved with his fingernail to make it even creepier.

Thankfully, we didn’t have confirmation of any such thing, but the next best thing happened anyway.

Mayor Tom was wandering around town looking like the last remnant of Night of the Living Dead. And unless I missed it, pretty much nobody even batted an eyelash. 

These folks are calloused from the oddness that’s going on around them, and as far as I knew, supernatural activity had been relatively rare for the last couple of hundred years or so.

So how the hell did Tom become zombified? 

They found some magic mushrooms while searching Bryce’s office, the kind that likely led to his mysterious open eye. Whatever he saw was incredibly unpleasant given his current state, but it didn’t stop Tom, Patricia, and Wyck from finding out more about them.

Todd O’Connor considers himself somewhat of a mystic, although he’s certainly more talk than anything else.

But at least he knew that if Bryce was using the ‘shrooms, he was looking for answers. His friend used them and encountered something that changed his life forever. Or so Todd thinks. 

I don’t see how the “vaguely religious iconography” he sees is anything other than his pal tracing his hand like kids do for Thanksgiving turkeys. Todd is blind to the island’s realities like everyone else. To him, playing mystic is more of a game.

It all went south when Wyck offered to take the ‘shroom journey himself. Before he even got the chance, an apparently thirsty Tom had downed the concoction. 

Uh, let the fun begin!

I have always been a fan of Matthew Rhys, but when Tom realized he had downed the whole thing without realizing it, Rhys nailed his reaction. I was both scared for Tom and laughing out loud at his panic.

I mean, they put their trust in a guy who thinks a dirty, uncovered mattress with a 49-year-old iguana companion is the equivalent of a “peace center.”

All the terror in the world couldn’t erase the irony of Todd telling Tom not to look at mirrors, only to slam the door, leaving Tom face-to-face with himself in the mirror hanging on the back of the peace center’s door.

These little touches are so brilliant. Widow’s Bay isn’t what you’d consider traditional comedy, but instead allows life to happen with all the nuances that leave most of us giggling through our own lives.

Yet as worrisome as it was for Tom, he was never in any real trouble — at least not that we could tell.

And God bless him for never letting himself forget that Evan was out there, totally unaware of just how crazy their world has become. Even at his worst, Tom is a great dad.

He was right to be concerned, since Evan did the exact opposite of what Patricia recommended. Kids will be kids, and since they have no “third spaces” (yeah, I learned a little lingo over the last week) in Widow’s Bay, they create their own fun, just as generations of kids before them always did.

But most of us didn’t grow up somewhere that had genuine terrors hiding behind every door. Opening the wrong one can have grave consequences in Widow’s Bay.

Yet even adults need something to do to pass the time. Have you noticed how much Wyck has changed now that he and Tom are on the same page? He’s a good man. Maybe he just needed a friend.

The page found in Bryce’s rectory discussed a curse, and I can confirm that there is a lot more about that curse coming as Widow’s Bay Season 1 continues.

The woman writing it had sussed out something dangerous on the island, and she was clearly afraid of her husband. It’s funny that our first instinct when someone sneaks up behind us is to try to “ha ha ha” our way out of it with something like, “I say this all in jest.” 

Gerrie, the local historian, found where the missing page belonged. It had been ripped out of a journal written by Sarah Westcott Warren, who had married the Widow’s Bay Founding Father, Richard Warren, in 1702.

That year brought a great plague to the town, and if there was a capsule holding a beating heart that Warren wore around his neck, it might have been buried with him. 

You just know that Wyck is going to dig up the guy if he can. Every episode sets the stage for what is to come, and it’s a good bet that Wyck will make a beeline to the local graveyard. After all, Widow’s Bay Season 1 Episode 6 is titled, “Our History.” What better time to explore it?

Through all of this, Tom was meandering around in his zombie-like state. He had periods of memory loss, so the fact that he managed to hold a town meeting and move a car is quite shocking.

I actually asked in my review of Your Friends & Neighbors Season 2 Episode 7 why you wouldn’t be afraid to get wasted in front of people when you could very well spill secrets you absolutely should not.

We have no idea what Tom said to the townspeople when they were demanding answers, but since they left him alone and there wasn’t all-out panic, he might have given me an answer to my question. 

Sometimes, you’re so wasted that people don’t even bother considering what you’re saying has any merit. Although, in this case, they probably should believe whatever Tom says, wasted or not.

Rosemary didn’t seem at all concerned with Tom’s odd behavior, and since she was the only one who could see what Patricia was doing on Widow’s Bay Season 1 Episode 4, she probably has more answers than she’s sharing.

The biggest development on Widow’s Bay Season 1 Episode 5 had nothing to do with Tom’s altered state or anything else. It was when Evan asked why they never leave the island. Once he starts questioning, he won’t stop until he has answered. His own mind has been opened.

I’m not even sure what Tom could say to make things easier on his son. He could tell the truth, but without facts, kids would have a hard time believing it. 

How can he say that he’s stuck on the island because to leave it means death without proof? It sounds ridiculous.

And yet, Tom and Lauren were trying to have their child off the island. The farther she got from it, though, the worse she got. She went blind. The baby was born, and afterward, she looked like a zombie, but not the drug-addled kind.

It was such a somber note to end the otherwise amusing episode on. Tom bent over the porcelain God, begging the actual God to please protect his son, while a dark entity spoke with him directly. What it said? No idea.

As much as Tom tried to believe that what this island stood for wasn’t anything more than myths and folklore, he’s discovering that there was a reason behind it all. 

Yet, Tom knew more than he thought he did. After all, he didn’t take Evan off the island. He didn’t even try. In the back of his mind, the day Evan was born and what happened to Lauren have been with him all this time.

I think we can rest assured this is the last time Tom will quench his thirst without verifying what’s in it with his host. One unexpected trip is probably enough!

We’re officially halfway through the first season. Are we having fun yet? I know you don’t regret jumping on that ferry with me. 

If you’ve made it all the way down here, why not say something in the comments below? I’d love to hear what you think of the show so far and if you have any theories about what it all means.