I've occasionally been late to a party but never as late as this. I gave Widow's Bay a fairly wide berth when it landed earlier this year because it didn't seem like a comedy. But this week its star Matthew Rhys scooped an Emmy for Lead actor in a comedy series for his performance so I thought I'd better take a look. It was, after all, created by Katie Dippold, who was involved in the always magnificent Parks & Recreation. I still don't think it's a laughfest and at times it feels like one big post-modern joke to movie chillers, but it is a lot of fun. Definitely a case of much better late than never.

Rhys plays the well-meaning Mayor of Widow's Bay Tom Loftis, who thinks the small town could become a Martha's Vinetard-style New England tourist resort with the right PR push. He is hoping to get some positive press but the locals aren't so keen. Gnarly fishermen soon warn Tom not to be meddling. Jaws, had a killer whale,  in the opener Widow's Bay has a fog that keeps creeping in and giving everyone a bad vibe. Of course there was a great horror film called The Fog set on the coast which also spooked out the locals and anything in its path.

But Rhys is determined to fight the naysayers. In the second episode of ten, for example, he promises to spend a night in a local hotel that has a reputation for being haunted. Easy as shelling peas, surely, because there's no such thing as ghosts. But not so easy when you start hearing creaks and odd noises and have to crawl through a teeny tiny claustrophobia-inducing tunnel just to confirm there are no dead bodies buried there no siree. There's a touch of The Shining here, but the combination of sharp script and Rhys' tense, nervy performance sends things in a different direction.

I kept expecting to see Stephen King's name in the credits as there are numerous knowing nods here to his work. Throw in some cannibalism, zombies and sea hags as well as a bevy of colourfu if corny local eccentric characters and you've got a great, genre-busting production. Not a sitcom, but there are laughs, not a chiller but there are a few real jump scares. Widow's Bay starts out as horror homage but ends up by being something very special in its own right. 

Widow's Bay is streaming on Apple TV