Except you’ve been underneath a rock, you recognize that Outer Banks delivered one hell of a cliffhanger by the top of Outer Banks Season 4, and to say individuals aren’t happy could be an understatement.
No, we’re nonetheless not over the choice to write down out JJ Maybank, the Pogue Prince, if you’ll, and we by no means shall be.
And the best way they opted to take action has been so asinine that it’s left many people questioning if we even want a fifth and closing season of considered one of our favourite collection.
Right here’s the factor: there’s a purpose why Outer Banks catapulted to acclaim because it did, regardless of serving as some random teen collection with just about unknown expertise that appealed to individuals of all ages and walks of life.
Outer Banks had the fortune of premiering on the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Your complete world appeared to close down in an unprecedented method, like one thing from a horror film or post-apocalyptic collection.
The US shut all the pieces down on March 15, 2020, and roughly one month later, this delightfully beachy escapist collection premiered on April 15.
One month in, we had been all trapped in the home, a few of us climbing up the partitions, bingeing by way of all the pieces that each streamer needed to provide, eager for any sense of escapism or connection.
And we discovered it on this little collection that featured a various group of youngsters from the Outer Banks neighborhood the place variations had been stark however friendship, freaking friendship overcame all the pieces.
With its Dusky orange and yellow filtered pictures, we might escape to the seaside and lose ourselves within the setting of heat sand, cool waters, and what appeared to have been the best of weed.
We received’t decide you to your leisure vices, particularly throughout that exact time.
We all the time talk about escapist tv and the eager for it a lot that it hurts.
For the previous decade and a half, far too many collection and simply tv as a medium shifted away from the kind of lighter fare and thrilling, enjoyable tales in favor of darkness, grit, and morally ambiguous or wicked characters and storytelling.
To say that Outer Banks was a contemporary air could be the understatement of the century.
It was fairly actually like a breath of contemporary air, our connection to the world that we as soon as knew, entry to the kind of way of life and journey that we aspired and longed for from the confinement of our rooms, or worn in couches.
We didn’t need to tune into each press convention or day by day replace concerning the state of a lethal virus sweeping throughout the globe, nor did we’ve got to scroll on our telephones to see worn-out first responders crying or an countless listing of names belonging to those that had succumb to one thing we nonetheless didn’t absolutely perceive.
As a substitute, we had John B narrating what felt like an exceptionally simplistic life together with his shut associates and the guarantees of an journey.
As some mysterious virus ravaged its approach by way of the globe, it was one of many few instances once we felt just like the underdogs.
In any case, it didn’t discriminate nor distinguish between race, gender, age, nationality, or socioeconomic standing.
So when Netflix dangled a lifeline to viewers within the type of impossibly fairly youngsters searching for journey whereas concurrently bucking in opposition to a system, socioeconomic construction, and sophistication construction that saved them down, it didn’t matter who you had been or the place you got here from—we had been all Pogues.
Outer Banks was surprisingly hopeful regardless of depicting one of many few constant explorations of energy, caste, and sophistication disenfranchisement we’ve seen on tv shortly.
We’ve already delved into the shortage of Working-Class Heroes on tv and the way an obsession with household dynasties like Succession‘s Roys and Yellowstone‘s Duttons has dominated and surpassed the usual upper-middle-class suburban standing of practically each “regular” character on tv.
One way or the other, Outer Banks balanced this deal with the perpetually poor and disenfranchised by highlighting the “in opposition to all odds” spirit of its major characters.
Yeah, Pope, John B, and JJ continuously had run-ins with the douchey Kooks, leading to bodily altercations and baby’s play foolery. Nonetheless, the Pogues all the time persevered in spirit by way of the facility of discovered household, optimism, and profound love.
Outer Banks’ friendship and the Pogues’ incapacity to remain down and out for lengthy propelled the collection ahead and contributed to its recognition and attraction to the viewers at giant.
We saved coming again as a result of no matter how absurd the plot factors and simply how usually the Pogues would come near profitable all of it just for treasures, safety, and no matter else to slide by way of their fingertips, the Pogues’ indefatigable spirit was inspiring and that friendship was all the pieces.
The “realism” of Outer Banks stopped on the class divide as a jumping-off level for thus many plots.
We had poor youngsters globe-trotting in the hunt for treasure with out even two nickels to rub collectively, not to mention passports.
They’ve every defied demise a half-dozen instances, and we went together with that as a result of the Pogues are distinctly human and compelling characters, however this merely by no means was the kind of present wherein the Pogues died.
We had been okay with that—this unstated settlement.
It didn’t matter that they routinely cheated demise; this was merely a byproduct of a foolish little treasure-hunting present that by no means pretended to be a prestigious piece the place all of the plots made sense.
Most of Outer Banks’ plots are ridiculous, however that’s a part of the present’s attraction.
It’s what it promised to be when it crashed into our lives like the right surf swell in the course of a pandemic, working on pure vibes and solid chemistry.
With its on the spot success, it was abundantly clear what labored concerning the collection, why the viewers responded so properly, and the pathway towards appeasement.
It’s the unstated contract, if you’ll, between viewers and creators, a part of the copacetic relationship that makes your entire course of work.
Outer Banks was by no means devoid of darkness: it has so many murders that it might compete together with your common procedural.
John B’s displacement as an unhoused orphan on the unsuitable facet of the tracks might get extremely bleak, proper alongside together with his varied near-death experiences.
JJ’s backstory, each the unique and regardless of the hell this revamped one is, was tragic but in addition so actual.
JJ Maybanks joins the ranks of coveted teen heartthrob characters from poor backgrounds who thrive in opposition to all odds and supply hope.
Consider the Shawn Hunters, Pacey Witters, Tim Riggins, and Ryan Atwoods.
For many people Millennials, our teen-based tales had been riddled with them, and we cherished every one.
They’d common attraction, notably as a result of, amongst a sea of characters who in all probability got here from secure means, these characters resonated essentially the most throughout the board, no matter one’s stroll in life.
Pope Heyward is completely consultant of the nice hope character on whom everybody pins their hopes and desires—the one with an actual shot of breaking by way of the boundaries and really ascending within the “pull yourselves up by your bootstraps” American dream historical past has offered us on for hundreds of years.
These had been all characters who really embodied the “underdog” standing, and thus, each win was our personal, and each loss sliced by way of us as in the event that they had been our personal family members.
Regardless of the tumultuous instances with all of them, they had been all the time enjoyable to observe as a result of there was a consolation in these characters daring to dream, being daring, taking dangers, and being themselves unapologetically whereas navigating a world hellbent on beating them down.
That’s why Outer Banks was all the time innately comforting and hopeful, even when storylines and plots turned darkish.
However then the collection overlooked that.
By no means truly giving the Pogues a win till the top of Outer Banks Season 3 was significantly exhausting to course of.
Perhaps it was life like that life continuously dealt the Pogues shitty playing cards, and irrespective of how exhausting they tried, they may by no means discover their footing or a second’s peace.
Sooner or later, the relentless beating down of the characters confirmed that the collection overlooked its premise and optimistic messaging.
By season three, trauma dumping on every character virtually turned an Olympic sport.
John B wrongfully going to jail and standing trial turned discovering out his father was truly alive and comparatively crappy earlier than dying.
Sarah’s “unsuitable facet of the tracks” love story with John B finally turns into a horrific home of horrors scenario pulled from a V.C. Andrews novel.
The boys in her life heap unspeakable traumas upon her that she merely takes and carries unresolved.
Pope’s aspirations go up in smoke again and again as his profession needs slip between his fingers proper alongside together with his household’s legacy treasure in a world the place rich, White elites steal and revenue off the ache of the disenfranchised.
We noticed a spirited Kiara solid away to a newsworthy and horrifying reform college; you recognize, the sort full documentaries are made about due to the longstanding abuse of youngsters and teenagers deemed an issue.
And issues had been no higher when her dad and mom disowned her.
Then there’s JJ, who had so many atrocities stacked in opposition to him; it’s why his eventual destiny nonetheless reverberates throughout the web as followers of all ask the identical query time and again: Why?
Think about for a second if Boy Meets World killed Shawn Hunter.
I’m not essentially the most tapped into all issues Gen Z, however I do know that dropping JJ is the equal of that.
And whereas there’s loads of beef for a way showrunners dealt with Shawn Hunter throughout two collection (together with a mishandled ship, the Shawngela to Jiara pipeline is actual), at the very least there was sufficient cognizance of the viewers to know that wouldn’t fly.
There’s a purpose why JJ Maybank was the center of Outer Banks.
The collection understood this sufficient even to reference him because the Poguest Pogue.
He represented the rose that grew from the concrete, an irrepressible spirit who might by no means get counted down or out.
JJ is emblematic of the hope that one’s circumstances or how a lot life might be stacked in opposition to them didn’t matter; life was nonetheless price dwelling.
Even because the partitions had been closing in, the world might nonetheless be his oyster, and there was a silver lining: one might overcome one’s circumstance, discover love, friendship, and happiness, and nonetheless thrive.
With JJ, there was an indication that one nonetheless has a shot when all the pieces round them appears bleak or tragic.
It embodies the message Outer Banks offered us on when it turned a consolation present amid a pandemic and created consolation characters just like the Pogues who resonated and impressed.
After which they went again on it for what? Kicks, shocks, thrills?
Was it some misguided try to be one thing aside from what it was, screwing up factor reasonably than sticking to what works?
We’ve seen dwell and in dwelling colour that the JJs of the world, as a rule, find yourself in a jail cell, a grave, or trapped in a cycle of poverty and generational trauma.
What does it say that even on a collection that presents Outer Banks as “paradise on Earth,” the JJs meet the identical destiny in fiction, too?
Have issues turn out to be so dire that we will’t hope or escape anymore?
Contemplating how difficult Outer Banks Season 4 was properly earlier than that tragic cliffhanger ending, is it protected to say that they need to’ve left issues at with Outer Banks Season 3’s finale?
We had a time soar, the Pogues lastly getting a treasure (a meager quantity undisclosed), friendship, happiness, love for all, and the promise of extra journey.
If we’d reasonably they suspended the Pogues in time at that second as an alternative of establishing a fifth and closing season of vengeance, trauma, and grief, then Outer Banks’ closing season has its work minimize out for it.
We bought a fifth and closing season to say goodbye to the rest of those characters and this consolation present.
Sadly, it comes at a value the viewers by no means wished to pay, and the collection merely can’t deal with.
Over to you, OBX Fanatics.
How do you are feeling about Outer Banks now?
Will you be returning for the fifth and closing season?
Do you suppose Outer Banks overlooked its premise?
Hold forth under and let’s talk about all of it.