Widow's Bay ending explained, plus the 10 greatest Easter eggs in the Apple TV show
Tom was on the receiving end of some devastating news in the finale, and what is going on with those ringing bells?
Widow's Bay is without doubt, one of the best shows ever to arrive on Apple TV. The comedy-horror landed quietly, but now has hordes of cult fans dissecting every scene, and has "awards" written all over it.
The series brings the right amount of horror to keep viewers gripped without needing therapy for nightmares, and has some perfectly timed comical moments. The balance of the the two is absolutely spot on.
My only gripe might be that the absolutely brilliant Betty Gilpin (Sarah Westcott Warren) should've had more air time. But hopefully we'll see more of her in season 2.
Now viewers have watched all of the 10 episodes available, there's a lot to unpack from the show. Join us while we break down the finale, and answer any burning questions you still have - we'll also look at the 10 greatest Easter eggs dropped throughout the episodes, in case you missed any.
Widow's Bay ending explained
Before we get to the finale, there's some important information to remember. During previous episodes, we found out that Widow's Bay founder, Richard Warren (Hamish Linklater), made a deal with a devil to protect the town, and the only way end the horrors raining down on the island was to wipe out his bloodline.
Digging up the immortal founder and finding a way to finally kill him off didn't work, and Tom (Matthew Rhys) got Rosemary (Dale Dickey) on the case to do a little genealogy and see what she could uncover.
Rosemary later informs Tom, Patricia (Kate O'Flynn) and Wyck (Stephen Root) that not all of Richard's children perished when Sarah was trying to get them off the island to safety. One daughter, Frances, survived the boat trip and washed back up in Widow's Bay.
Frances married and had a f child, and in the present day had one remaining descendant left on the island - their adorable elderly colleague, Ruth (K Callan). The finale then opens with Tom, Patricia and Wyck knowing they need to end the curse on the island by killing Ruth, but of course not wanting to carry out this most terrible deed.
While a huge storm is brewing and local residents are taking shelter in the town hall basement bunker, Tom heads to Ruth's house to kill her. While Wyck suggested a swift shot to the back of the head, Tom finds out Ruth isn't allowed to mix her medication. He opts to crush up her pills to hide in her tea, as a more humane way to see her off.
However, while everyone knew Ruth to be single and childless, she reveals a big secret to Tom - she once had a secret child with a married man, whom she gave to the man to raise with his wife and she didn't tell a soul about the child until now.
That child was none other than Lauren (Meredith Casey), Tom's dead wife, meaning there's another descendant of Frances Warren on the island - Tom's son, Evan (Kingston Rumi Southwick.)
If he wants the curse gone, Tom would have to kill his own son, which he is never going to be able to do. When Ruth makes her confession, Tom had already laced her tea with a concoction of drugs, and as they have yet to work and now knowing she isn't the last descendant after all, goes to find her a doctor.
He's too late, because a shot is fired while Tom attempts to move Ruth from her home, hitting her in the back of the head. While everyone is sure to believe this has been fired by Wyck, it's actually sheriff Bechir (Kevin Carrol) who'd taken aim.
With Bechir's wife about to give birth, Patricia had told him the truth about the curse. Knowing his child being born on the island would mean they would never leave, a desperate Bechir had decided to make sure Ruth was definitely gone and end the curse, as his wife was in labour in the bunker.
While this drama has been unfolding at Ruth's, far more sinister happenings were taking place beneath the town.
Dale (Jeff Hiller) went off to try and procure some games to entertain the agitated people of the bunker with. While on this mission, he came across some unsettling videos featuring a jolly presenter giving some history of Widow’s Bay.
The man in the informational video describes how the town needs to make sacrifices to an unknown entity, along with footage of frightened people in their underwear being led away somewhere.
The video describes how these underwear-clad people with their heads covered shouldn't be comforted or have their fears allayed, because whatever they're being sacrificed to needs to taste the fear to be satiated.
The monster they're given to is kept sealed in tunnels beneath the town. It lets the town know how many sacrifices are required by ringing the bells at the church - one toll means one human is needed to be given up.
While Dale is left petrified by what he finds, Evan and his friends, being teenagers, soon get bored of being holed up in the bunker during the storm, and escape to find adventures outside of it to entertain themselves.
This leads to the discovery that Widow's Bay is connected by a series of underground tunnels and bunkers. While exploring, the teens find a sinister room with an old electric chair in it.
Not that Evan joins the dots at this time, but viewers will probably remember that Tom is very precious about the basement at their home, and Evan isn't allowed down there - this is probably because it joins the network of tunnels and could lead anyone who ventures down there to the monster.
Handyman Kenny comes looking for the wayward teens and accidentally gets locked in one of the basement rooms after telling them to return to the main bunker.
Hearing Kenny scream, Evan tries to open the door but isn't able to - when he finally does, Kenny is nowhere to be seen, but there's some open doors in the room that were firmly closed earlier...
It appears Kenny became an inadvertent sacrifice for the monster. That is also what causes the storm to stop in it's tracks - the monster brought about the storm because it needed a sacrifice.
Some viewers were confused because they saw the storm stop abruptly when Ruth was shot, and didn't understand why it had stopped when Evan was still alive as a descendant of Frances.
However, the storm didn't retreat because the descendant's curse had lifted, it stopped because the monster had been fed. With the storm now over, the town residents can head back to their normal lives.
Tom is unable to do that, now carrying the huge burden of knowing Evan needs to die to save the town altogether. Stopping on his way home to throw Ruth’s pendant confirming her connection to Warren into the sea, Tom hears the bell toll eight times.
Just as the credits roll, he realises the monster is asking for eight more human sacrifices.
The 10 greatest Easter eggs in Widow's Bay
- Jaws: One of the show's creator, Katie Dippold's favourite films is Jaws. While the town of Widow's Bay has a very Amity-esque feel, Tom's house was created to deliberately nod to the police chief's house in Jaws. The set designers recreated the exact fabric from the policeman's kitchen curtains in the killer shark film to the ones seen in Tom's, as well as the light fixture in both men's kitchens also being an exact match to each other.
- Psycho: The exterior of the Breakwater Inn was designed to be an homage to the Bates' home in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Edward Hopper’s painting, House by the Railroad, which informed the original film's house. According to Sci-fi Vision, set designer on the show, Steve Arnold, wanted to recreate the strange cupola at the top of the Bates' home, but the Widow's Bay production team couldn't find a replica and added it in post production.
- The Shining: When Tom stays in the Captain's Suite at the Breakwater to prove it's safe to sleep in, he can hear a celebration through the radiator, despite being alone in the hotel. That is also a scene that happens to Jack Nicholson's character in the film. The blue Victorian damask wallpaper on the hotel walls was also designed to pay tribute to The Shining.
- IT: When a reluctant Tom finally makes his way into the hotel's crawlspace and is charged at by the killer clown he'd been warned about, this scene is a very clear not to Pennywise from IT.
- 1408. It's fair to say the episode with Tom staying at the Breakwater is probably one of the most littered with Easter eggs. There's a 1408 reference when hotel manager Kurt enters the Captain's Suite and is only in there for a matter of seconds. When he emerges, the messy room appears to have been occupied by Kurt for days.
- Carrie: There's very clear influences from Carrie during episode 4 where Patricia hosts her ill-fated party. The tiara she believes she's wearing is strikingly similar to the one Carrie wears as prom queen. The awful book club mean girls who appear throughout the episode and others, are reminiscent of those from the 1976 film.
- Wicker Man: As viewers find out, Patricia isn't wearing a tiara in episode 4 at all, but is actually sporting a crown of antlers that resembles the animal masks found in Wicker Man. The pyre lit during the episode also throws back to the one from the film that sees people burnt alive.
- Halloween: The resurrected Boogeyman seen and referenced throughout the show shares a definite resemblance to Michael Myers from the Halloween franchise. Returning to try and once again try and kill Patricia, she sets the Boogeyman on fire, which is also something that happens to Myers in Halloween II.
- Lost: Those sacrifice instructional videos Dale finds while hunting for games, are very similar to the ones for the Dharma Initiative in cult mystery thriller, Lost.
- A Clockwork Orange: The electric chair from the show's finale was inspired by A Clockwork Orange. Series producer and director Hiro Murai tells Rolling Stone about a detail relating to the chair, sharing, "Hanging off the top is the eye contraption from A Clockwork Orange so whatever there is coming out of that steel door they have to look at it."
