Movies & TV Widow’s Bay Widow’s Bay, Jaws, and the Terror of Municipal Monsters They’re here to serve their constituents at any cost By Matthew Byrd | Published on May 12, 2026 Credit: Apple TV Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: Apple TV In the second episode of Apple TV’s Widow’s Bay, Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) visits a coffee shop to try their new cappuccino machine. “That’s what Widow’s Bay should taste like,” he declares. The shop’s owner informs the mayor that he had to spend a lot of money on that new machine, and nobody is buying the coffee. Loftis reassures him that the tourists are coming and, when they get here, they’re going to want a cappuccino.  It’s a simple scene that probably doesn’t stand out among the episode’s other big moments (which include killer clowns, haunted hotels, and a terrifying fictional board game called “Daddy’s Home”). However, it tells us so much of what we need to know about Tom Loftis. He is the mayor of a small island town that is, at least according to many of its residents, deeply cursed. He is essentially in charge of a Stephen King story. And what is Mayor Loftis most concerned about? Asking the local café owner to buy a new coffee machine. Not for the locals, mind you, but for tourists who may come to this town for its antique charms. And not to bolster those antique charms but to offer tourists a cup of coffee they could get anywhere else. What Widow’s Bay “should” taste like. It’s that mentality that makes Mayor Loftis a true municipal monster: a public servant who harms their community not out of greed or hatred, but because they mistake personal ambitions and broad civic goals for the well-being of individuals. In fiction, the closest comparison to Mayor Loftis is Larry Vaughn, the mayor of Amity Island from Jaws. Jaws and its mayor were actually cited as major influences on Widow’s Bay. And as Jaws’ legacy has grown from “one of the first true modern blockbusters” to “one of the great American films,” Vaughn’s villain status has risen as well. Modern viewers are quick to point out that the film’s true villain is not a giant shark but this mayor who is determined to keep the beaches open no matter what even as the bodies pile up around him.  Credit: Universal Pictures More recently, Vaughn “enjoyed” a cultural resurgence when he became a reference for Americans’ growing frustration towards the Trump administration’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. As politicians raced to get businesses back open even as the death toll rose to historic levels, one couldn’t help but think about Mr. Vaughn in his cheap suits, insisting that everything was okay rather than risk losing a day of tourist dollars. “It’s a beautiful day, the beaches are open, and people are having a wonderful time.” But Trump and his ilk are not actually the closest comparisons to Mr. Vaughn. For that matter, neither are the countless evil corporate tycoons and billionaires in media (and in history) who are sometimes said to be cut from Vaughn’s cloth. Yes, everyone from Carter Burke in Aliens to John Hammond in Jurassic Park has demonstrated their willingness to put profits above people. However, that is far too simplistic of a characteristic to get to the heart of what makes the municipal monster an entirely different beast. Loftis and Vaughn are not C-suite executives being herded between galas and a penthouse. They are not faceless billionaires who long ago withdrew themselves from society. They are not even national political figures so far removed from the places that voted them into authority you begin to wonder whose interests they are representing.  No, these are two mayors who live in the communities they represent and are, at least sometimes, harming. They are entrenched in their towns in very public roles that prevent them from slipping by unnoticed. They theoretically had the choice between other career options that offered quicker paths to power, money, and the anonymity required to be driven by unchecked greed. Possible side hustles aside (Vaughn is definitely mixed up in real estate and has mob connections in Peter Benchley’s novel), they chose one of the humblest paths to influence: public service. With that choice came responsibilities and obligations. Yet, they not only do not shy away from those duties but sometimes seem genuinely interested in fulfilling them. And this is what separates the true municipal monsters from the rest of the villains. They leave us convinced that, in spite of everything, they are trying to do the right thing. Often, it’s because they are.  This isn’t a “the mayor from Jaws was right, actually” argument. However, we must acknowledge that Vaughn’s actions have a logic to them if to an extreme fault. Previously, one of his greatest responsibilities was undoubtedly keeping the tourist money rolling in. There’s a chance he was elected solely for that purpose. Yes, he should be more concerned with the people who are dying, but he has fallen deep down the rabbit hole of believing that treating a community as a whole, living thing and serving it is the same as serving the very real people who live there. When Mayor Vaughn is confronted with the undeniable consequences of his actions, he murmurs that he “was acting in the town’s best interests” and reminds Chief Brody that “my kids were on that beach too.” He cannot comprehend how far things have gone because he sincerely felt he was doing the right thing.  We already see a bit of that in Mayor Loftis. He is ultimately trying to get a little publicity for a town that lacks not just necessities but many modern conveniences. He is tired of living somewhere that has more urban legends than Wi-Fi hotspots. Yes, there is a strong argument to be made that he should not be the mayor of a town that he seems to resent. Yet, Loftis tells us that he also ran “unopposed” for the position. He alone assumed the thankless job of trying to get people to come to a town that many are desperate to leave because of a combination of curses, economics, and a simple lack of things to do after 7 p.m. It’s a job nobody wanted. To take it required a combination of hubris and ambition. A dangerous blend, maybe, but not an uncommon one. Many of our greatest civil servants believed they alone were capable of completing what many would consider to be a fool’s errand. You could argue that entering public service with the ambition to actually do your job fundamentally requires some version of that mentality. There is perhaps no better example of the potential and pitfalls of that mentality than one of history’s greatest municipal monsters: the urban planner Robert Moses. Strangely, you can draw some clean lines between fictional villains like Mayors Loftis and Vaughn and Robert Moses. Parks and Recreation was created by Michael Schur: a superfan of The Power Broker, the Pulitzer Prize-winning book that covered the life and works of Robert Moses. Schur actually saw Parks and Recreation protagonist Leslie Knope as a version of Robert Moses; he once cheekily described her as “Robert Moses, but good.” Widow’s Bay started as a spec script for Parks and Recreation written by Katie Dippold. Matthew Rhys was drawn to that project partially because of his love of Jaws and its mayor character and is also reportedly in talks to develop a Power Broker adaptation for Netflix. Trying to cover the extent of Moses’ influence here would be a futile effort. It is enough to say that Moses created many of the parks, roads, beaches, and institutions that make up modern New York City. He was behind Lincoln Center, the UN headquarters, Jones Beach, Shea Stadium, and helped organize two World’s Fairs. Few individuals in history have played more of a role in shaping something so substantial despite only holding civil service offices. In Moses’ case, he never even held a publicly elected position.  Today, though, Moses is more frequently spoken of as a kind of boogeyman. His urban renewal and slum clearance programs enforced or enacted generations of inequitable urban planning. His roads destroyed entire ways of life that have yet to return. His commitment to building around automobiles set public transportation back decades and, like many of his policies and projects, disproportionately affected lower-income citizens and minorities. Moses could certainly be unsentimental in his pursuit of a vision and the authority that came with completing it. He once said, “When you operate in an overbuilt metropolis, you have to hack your way with a meat axe.” The meat axe slasher sounds like the star of the cheapest direct-to-video horror movie you never saw rather than one of the most influential figures of the 20th century. But what makes Robert Moses and his ilk so compelling is that you cannot easily define him strictly by the good or bad. Why did a man with such a lust for power choose to dedicate his life to forms of civic duties? Were his accomplishments a simple means to an end during his rise to glory, or was there at least once a genuineness in the incredible effort he put into making the impossible a reality?  Most importantly, given that few built so many public works before Moses or since, how are we supposed to recognize “”Robert Moses, but good” when they come along when some of the things that seemingly make such people capable of greatness can also make them confuse what they want with what people really need? Municipal monsters live among us. They may yet do good through their positions, and they will never, ever see themselves as monsters. Put into their shoes, you too may have trouble figuring out where the progress begins and where the trampling ends. We will invite them into our homes again and again not just because we believe they will do good, but because they often are already our neighbors. Their proximity can make their actions so much more painful. But the fatal flaw of all municipal monsters is that they lose their ability to see a populace as a collection of people rather than as a canvas for their visions. That’s what journalist and activist Jane Jacobs (author of the revolutionary urban planning book The Death and Life of Great American Cities) accused Robert Moses of doing decades ago, and it remains the unifying principle of a very specific type of villain. Widow’s Bay does not need a cappuccino machine. At least not yet. It needs a mayor who will listen to the concerns of his constituents for longer than it takes to dismiss them, just as Amity Island needed a mayor who recognized that the broad, simplified needs of a town become irrelevant when its residents are terrified and dying. It needs a leader who recognizes that civil service is a lifetime pursuit and not a stepping stone, as Robert Moses sometimes seemingly believed. That town needs a man who understands that a community living in fear of what the night will bring cannot be quelled by the vague promise of a new day that is months or years away if it comes at all. The scary thing is that municipal monsters often look like such men. If not always through our eyes, then in what they see when they look into the mirror. When trying to prevent ourselves from continuing to be ruled over by them, we must accept the frightening possibility that one can become such a creature over time rather than being born as that. It’s frightening, but in the age of evil billionaires and tech bros who never had an ounce of humanity to betray, there is something so compelling about a villain who both genuinely seems to want a better world for us and yet somehow still sees us as hurdles between them and it. [end-mark] The post <i>Widow’s Bay</i>, <i>Jaws</i>, and the Terror of Municipal Monsters appeared first on Reactor.