After Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) takes the psychedelic trip of a lifetime in Widow’s Bay episode 5, we’re going all the way back to the beginning of the Widow’s Bay community for episode 6.
The episode begins on Sept. 16, 1702, and Sarah Westcott, played by Betty Gilpin, arrives by ship to marry Richard Warren, the founder of Widow’s Bay. Remember, the diary entry Wyck (Stephen Root) found in Reverend Bryce’s office? Well, this is her!
Betty Gilpin and Hamish Linklater guest star as Sarah and Richard Warren
When she arrives in Widow’s Bay, she finds it a strange place. There seems to be a sickness spreading on the island, but no one really fills her in on what’s going on. Richard is also a strange-ish man, but no one talks much about him either.
Sarah first meets her new husband during the wedding ceremony. In this brief dip back in time, Richard Warren is played by the great Hamish Linklater, and he’s excellent in this role.
Shortly after the wedding, Sarah meets Richard’s kids, and she gives the youngest, Frances, a broach, one that we’ve seen before in Widow’s Bay.
When the church bell tolls, Richard leaves in a rush on their wedding night, which upsets Sarah. She sees the kids to bed and then writes another journal entry. In the night, she hears something in the house and tries to find out what it is.
She finds Richard comatose with a bloody palm, a wound made by the chain he wears around his neck.
The next morning, Sarah sees another body being disposed of in town, and she is confronted by one of the townsfolk. She informs Sarah that there is a plague among those in Widow’s Bay that sends people into a craze.
Sarah witnesses Richard murder a local man who accuses him of worshipping the devil
Sarah overhears a man, Ezra, talking to Richard about the fog and how three men who were out in the fog became infected. He describes a story about a man who became infected and later killed his wife. Ezra begs Richard to do something, but Richard sends Sarah away before the man accuses Richard of worshiping the devil and makes a comment about that being the reason they survived the first winter in Widow’s Bay.
Richard loses his cool and beats Ezra to death with a cane. Sarah flees to bed and pretends to be asleep the whole time.
In the morning, Sarah wakes, and it appears that she may have dreamed the encounter, but then she finds the stick in the cellar beneath their home, and she knows that her husband murdered Ezra.
Sarah runs to the pastor, and the pastor reveals that everyone thinks that Richard consorts with the devil and kills people, including his first wife. The pastor tries to help Sarah. He asks Sarah to leave the front door unlatched that night.
At dinner, Richard rambles about the burdens of leadership, and Sarah just tells him that the people of the town are worried about the plague and disappearances. Richard becomes enraged at that accusation. On her way to bed, though, Sarah unlatches the door just as the pastor suggested.
Richard Warren can't be killed
That night, Sarah can’t sleep. Finally, someone sneaks in to kill Richard, but they almost kill Sarah by mistake. The attacker then stabs Richard many, many times, but he doesn’t die. Instead, Richard kills the man! He promises to protect Sarah from those who wish them harm, and he tells Sarah to go to her room to pray.
The next morning, Sarah finds herself locked in the house with no way out. With Richard gone, Sarah begins to explore the secret room under the house where Richard stashed the cane. She finds a series of tunnels that lead away from the house. She follows them and finds blood and hair on the walls near an ominous door. Of course, she opens it. In it, she finds the chair from earlier in the series with blood nearby. There’s also another cellar door of sorts.
Eventually, Sarah finds a way out through a well. She runs to the pastor who is conspiring with others in town to stop Richard. They ask them to pour a liquid that will knock him out into his drink, so they can do what needs to be done. They also inform her that, if she does that, they have booked her and the children passage on a merchant vessel leaving the port. All she has to do tonight is poison her husband and get out of there via boat.
It sounds simple enough, right?
Richard Warren is buried alive as Sarah escapes
When we catch up with Sarah again that day, she’s writing the diary entry that Wyck found in Bryce’s office, the one that speaks of death coming to them all. She ends it with, “of course, he’s here with me, so I say all of this in jest.” Richard asks to read her diary, and while she tries to stop him from reading it, he does so anyway.
Later, she brings his nightly brandy, but he isn’t interested. She tries to seduce him instead, but it doesn’t end so well when Richard forces her to drink the brandy, too. She spits it out, and he knows she’s in league with the deserters. He tries to strangle her, but one of his sons knocks Richard out.
Sarah leads them all to the docks, where they find the ship has left, but they know they can catch it if they row fast.
Just as they are trying to leave, Abigail, the wife of the doctor from earlier, attacks Sarah. She’s possessed and covered in blood. She wants to leave with Sarah, but Sarah won’t let her. Sarah knocks her out with an oar before fleeing in the boats.
Back in town, Richard is tied up surrounded by the pastor and villagers. They plan to bury Richard alive, but he panics. He starts saying, “The pact must be honored” and “The pact which spared us in that first winter.”
It seems Richard has made a deal with devil or some sort of demon to keep the townspeople safe. He’s carried the burden alone, as he makes clear, and he’s happy to keep doing it for them, but they don’t listen.
He warns them one last time that the pact must be fulfilled. He explains that the voice spoke to him in the mushrooms, and they must continue the sacrifices or the terrors “will not cease. They will only deepen.”
He begs that the children must not pay for his mistake. The pastor tells him that the children are already on a boat away from the island, and Richard freaks out and starts screaming, “You’ll kill them all!” He also mentions that the island won’t let them leave.
Finally, we’re back in the present. Wyck is at the Widow’s Bay cemetery. He digs up Richard Warren’s grave in the middle of the night. Tom and Patricia join him, and the episode ends with the trio looking into Richard Warren’s grave.
The Widow's Bay episode 6 ending explains (almost) everything
Honestly, everything makes sense now in Widow’s Bay. Sure, there’s more to the mystery. We’re only a little over halfway through, but here’s what we know right now.
Richard Warren found those black mushrooms, the same one Tom took, in the frozen earth a long time ago during Widow’s Bay’s first winter as a colony when they were struggling to survive. Well, it appears a demon or the devil connected with Richard, and it promised to keep them safe from “the terrors” and allow them to survive in exchange for human sacrifices. Richard, then, has likely been popping mushrooms and sacrificing some people in town to keep the beast happy.
There’s also some sort of curse on the town, which we know is real, because none of the original islanders are allowed to leave the island. We’ve already seen what happened when Tom’s wife tried to leave.
In all these years, the island appears to be waking up and demanding a sacrifice until it’s satiated. Then, time goes by before it all happens again.
What an incredible episode! I can’t wait to see what happens next.
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