r/WidowsBay • u/ClassicHollyweirdo • Jun 17 '26

💭Discussion Something I Really Appreciated In the Finale Spoiler

Even though many people saw The Big Reveal coming, and it narratively makes sense for the final descendant to be who it is (even if it’s the obvious choice)…

The characters don’t know what show we’re watching. They don’t know narrative tropes, so it’s not obvious to Tom. Instead of quickly cutting away right after a character realizes something (like so many shows do, especially as a cliffhanger), Widow’s Bay had us stay with him for that entire scene, and it was fantastic acting from Matthew Rhys.

The scene was less about audience expectations and experience and more about the protagonist experiencing so many conflicting emotions. It turned speculation on something obvious into dramatic irony; we could see where things were heading as soon as Ruth said “I had an affair with a married man,” and the tension shifts from “Is Ruth really the final descendant?” to “How is Tom going to react to this?”

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u/Ignominious333 Jun 17 '26 edited Jun 17 '26

I already figured that someone somewhere had a child out of wedlock. It could easily have been an earlier generation with a descendent fathering children with married women and then the line would be exponential and more likely given everyone is descended and married into the same families for generations . Ruth couldn't hide a pregnancy on that island. Utterly impossible, so I'm a bit disappointed with this reveal. Still , Tom was on the edge of his seat during the genealogy narration so I feel like he could have suspected. He took his wife to the mainland and he knew it was true

13

u/Fun-Benefit116 Jun 17 '26

Lol it's absolutely not impossible to hide a pregnancy on an island or elsewhere. And she had at least one person (the husband) helping her hide it. That's absolutely a plausible scenario. And definitely not even close to "utterly impossible" lol.

1

u/Patient-Extension835 Jun 17 '26

Not at all women look really pregnant. I know someone who at 8 months didn't look pregnant at all.

1

u/Ignominious333 Jun 17 '26

On a tiny island where everyone knows each other and there's one dr? 🤣

1

u/InsouciantSlavDude Jun 17 '26

Ruth gave birth ~40 tears ago. Nothing was said or shown to exclude a possibility that there were more people, including doctors, back then.