Why the Curse Isn't Over After 'Widow's Bay' Season 1 Finale

Widow’s Bay, the horror comedy series created by Katie Dippold for Apple TV+, wrapped its 10-episode first season June 17, and left more than a few threads unresolved.

Apple TV+ had already renewed the show for a second season ahead of the finale, and Dippold has signed a multi-year overall deal with the streamer.

The series stars Matthew Rhys as Tom Loftis, the mayor of a fictional New England island town afflicted by a centuries-old curse. Rhys also serves as an executive producer on the show. The Season 1 finale episode resolved several of the mysteries the series had built toward, while simultaneously setting up the central conflict for Season 2.

Spoiler alert: The following contains plot details from the 'Widow's Bay' Season 1 finale.

The finale's most immediate revelation involves the state of the curse following Kenny's (Michael Malvesti) sacrifice. While the island appeared to accept Kenny's death, the finale makes clear the curse is not fully resolved, only temporarily satiated.

The show uses the church bell as a measure of the curse's demands. At the start of the series, the bell rang nine times, signaling the number of victims required. By the finale, it rings eight times, indicating one sacrifice has been made, but eight more remain.

That math sets up a significant problem heading into Season 2. The curse is not gone, and more victims will be claimed, either intentionally by islanders who learned about the rituals while sheltering from the storm, or accidentally, as was the case with Kenny.

The finale's most consequential reveal concerns Tom's son Evan (Kingston Rumi Southwick) and the island's founding family, the Warrens. Throughout the season, Tom believed that eliminating the last of the Warren bloodline would break the curse. His target was Ruth Livingston (K Callan), the last known Warren descendant. He moved to poison her.

What Tom did not know, and learned only after acting, is that Ruth is Evan's maternal grandmother, making Evan himself a Warren descendant through his mother, Lauren. The child Tom was trying to protect is the very person the curse's logic demands be sacrificed.

The dilemma this creates for Season 2 is layered. Earlier in the season, Tom faced what the show frames as a clear-cut choice: kill the last Warren to save the island. That calculation assumed Evan was outside the equation.

Now Tom is the one being asked, implicitly, to make the same choice he was willing to impose on Ruth, except the target is his own son.

Rhys told Variety he has been pressing Dippold for answers about where Season 2 goes. "I keep going to Dippold like, 'WHAT'S GONNA HAPPEN?!?!'" he said. "She's like, 'I'm not gonna tell an actor.'"

Tom also has to decide whether to conceal Evan's heritage from the rest of the islanders, who, once they learn the truth, may reach their own conclusions about what the curse demands.

Having attempted to kill Ruth himself, Tom would be in a difficult position to object if someone else drew the same conclusion about Evan.

Dippold offered a characteristically deadpan tease of what Season 2 holds. "Season 2 is about how everything is great on the island and there's nothing to worry about," she said in the renewal announcement.