Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Outer Banks’ on Netflix, a Lively Teen Drama Bolstered By Action and Adventure

Netflix is surely hoping Outer Banks is its next quarantine-era hit. The 10-episode series assembles an attractive young cast in a sun-dappled setting for a neo-Scooby gang mystery that feels familiar on several levels, but might trigger your binge sensors anyway. So is it merely addictive, or does it give us something fresh and new too?

OUTER BANKS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

Opening Shot: A close-up of John B (Chase Stokes), the series’ hunky protagonist.

The Gist: Meet John B, a teenage PBR swiller and serial class-skipper who wants nothin’ but a good time. He’s on his own, living in perennial partydom and delinquent squalor — his dad has been “missing at sea” for nine months, and the uncle who’s supposed to be his legal guardian is out of the picture. His crew consists of rich girl Kiara (Madison Bailey), smart guy Pope (Jonathan Daviss) and loose cannon JJ (Rudy Pankow); they boat around the island and pound brewskis and stir up some trouble, e.g., taunting the Paul Blarts guarding the construction site of a seaside mini-manse.

Island? Mini-manse? Right: This is the Outer Banks, a string of islands along the North Carolina coast, where “you either have two jobs or two houses,” John B says in voiceover. He and his pals call themselves the Pogues, the working-class types who charter boats and make low country boil for the Kooks, the richie-riches who have to order their staff to fish their modern-art sculptures out of their swimming pools after a hurricane whams into the coast. Consider the setting set.

While surfing some SICK-BRO waves during the hurricane, John B and Pope spot a boat struggling in the water. Once the storm passes, the Pogue foursome find the same craft at the bottom of a nearby marsh; John B dives down and finds a motel key, which might open the door to some summertime mischief. But: A body washed up. The motel room is home to a gun and wads of cash, succulent trouble bait for the klepto JJ. The cops — some of whom are just fine with skimming a little something for themselves from the evidence — sniff around, as are two greasy black-denimed heavies with a thirty-aught-six. The kids have really stirred up some crap this time, and Pope has visions of his merit scholarship going up in flames.

As teens with cash stuffed in their bathing suit liners tend to do, our protags throw a kegger, and John B gets in a fight with Topper (Austin North), the sneering Kook boyfriend of Sarah (Madelyn Cline), the daughter of John B’s employer. We learn that John B’s dad said he “might have to vanish for a bit” right before he vanished and was officially declared kaputskies. The plot then stirs up a couple of whoppers: One, there’s a legend of a lost ship carrying $400 million in gold — THINKY-GUY EMOJI. And two, the kids find an old compass on the sunken boat, an artifact that belonged to John B’s dad — DOUBLE THINKY-GUY EMOJIS!

Our Take: You’ll see a lot of CW Network/YA/National Treasure comparisons out there, but to my rapidly aging Gen-X sensibilities, Outer Banks is a classic S.E. Hinton Socs-vs.-Greasers class-divide wayward-youth saga dropped into a balmier clime. John B is Ponyboy Curtis with a deep tan, a live-for-now ruffian with a good heart, sense of loyalty and a penchant for getting into scrapes. And Stokes plays him with an appealing go-with-it Young McConaughey vibe.

Of course, Hinton didn’t toss maritime legends and antique-gewgaw MacGuffins into her plots, so any thoughts of the series being a pragmatic juxtaposition of sociopolitical disparity through the eyes of frontline youth is all soaped up with the promise of juicy adventure. The former stuff is the baseline for the usual haves-vs.-have-nots fodder. The latter stuff, though, is nicely executed — the pilot alone boasts four pretty suspenseful sequences laced with some taut action. It’s briskly paced and sets up the key characters and situations with an engaging tone and crisp writing. Let the autoplay do its thing!

Sex and Skin: Just some rampant treen shirtlessness from the Outer Banks cast.

Parting Shot: In a bookend closeup mirroring the opening shot, John B’s swollen and battered face brightens with hope: Is his father still alive?

Sleeper Star: Veteran TV role player Adina Porter plays Sheriff Peterkin, who hopes John B can help her with the missing-boat case in exchange for keeping him out of foster care. Porter plays her cards close to the vest; at first glance the character appears to be a straighter shooter than the other cops, but can we be certain she’s on the up-and-up?

Most Pilot-y Line: John B declares in voiceover, “We’re the Pogues, and our mission this summer is to have a good time, all the time.” Dude. You spoke too soon.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Slick and smartly crafted, the first episode of Outer Banks is likely to hook a lot of viewers. The next nine will determine if it’s going to be a prize marlin or just another cod on the line for Netflix.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com or follow him on Twitter: @johnserba.

Stream Outer Banks on Netflix