Outer Banks: Netfilx’s Throwback Teen Drama Is Sun-Soaked Escapism
Photo Courtesy of Netflix
No one actually says “Welcome to the OBX, bitch!” but the sentiment is definitely there in Netflix’s new teen dream of a TV series. Created by Josh Pate, Jonas Pate, and Shannon Burke, Outer Banks explores the lives of the rich kids (called Kooks) and poor kids (Pogues) along North Carolina’s marshy coastal islands. Adults are scarce, school is out, shirts are practically sacrilege; it’s a high schooler’s fantasy.
Outer Banks is reminiscent of Friday Night Lights at times, if the show was focused just on the Riggins brothers, or The O.C. if we spent more time with Ryan in Riverside. The first of the series’ 10 episodes spends the opening five minutes naming and explaining every character and where they belong in the social pecking order, establishing what seems like a very paint-by-numbers teen drama whose players are almost indistinguishably attractive.
And yet, it didn’t take long before I was absolutely invested in the dramas befalling our Pogue heroes, led by sensitive lover-boy John B (Chase Stokes). He and his best friends—the damaged jerk with a heart of gold, JJ (Rudy Pankow), the anxious nerd hoping a scholarship buys his ticket out of OBX, Pope (Jonathan Daviss), and the level-headed hippie Kook slumming with them, Kiara (Madison Bailey)—are on the hunt for gold. As others have said, it’s pretty much Hot Goonies on the beach.
Instead of rote, though, Outer Banks’ setup mostly feels classic (helped in no small part by the fact that a storm knocks out all cell phone service). It’s a throwback, in some ways; the kids drink and hookup a little, but mostly the story revolves around the search for gold lost in an ancient shipwreck. That mystery is also tied to the recent disappearance of John B’s father, which puts DCS on his trail as a minor living alone. Meanwhile there is, of course, a girl he’s crushing hard for—Sarah (Madelyn Cline), the daughter of his supposedly benevolent employer, who also gets mixed up in the search for treasure. Sarah has a waste of an older brother who’s also best friends with her snob boyfriend Topper (Austin North), absolutely the most ridiculous name in a series whose lead is literally called John B (B is not the start of his last name, either).