In the second half of season four of Netflix’s Outer Banks, the Pogues are fighting city hall, competing against rival treasure hunters, and poor JJ is grappling with some seriously heavy new information about his bloodline. The final five episodes deliver tons of action, but they might also leave you devastated.
OUTER BANKS (SEASON 4 PART 2): STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: The second half of Outer Banks Season 4 picks up right where the first half left off, with JJ (Rudy Pankow) learning his origin story.
The Gist: JJ has always been the emotional core of Outer Banks, and that’s something that sometimes works to an advantage (his loyalty to his friends is unmatched) but his emotions are also volatile, a liability. This season largely belongs to him because we’re finally getting to know and understand the real JJ, and it turns out that everything he thought he knew about himself was a lie, and that sets him up for disaster in so many ways.
As JJ learns that Chandler Groff (J. Anthony Crane) is his real father, he learns why his adoptive father Luke (Gary Weeks) came to care for him after Chandler staged JJ’s death as an infant when his mother, Larissa Genrette, also died in a boating accident. When JJ learns that he’s a Groff and a Genrette, he refuses to believe it. He can’t handle the thought that he might actually be a Kook, so he assumes Luke is trying to pull some scheme.
The Pogues’ utopian vision for Poguelandia is also under threat when the Kildare city council announces plans to rezone the piece of land where they live, which would forcefully remove them from their home and their business and turn it into a country club. At a city council meeting, the Pogues (our core group as well as dozens of other island residents who support them) show up to fight the ordinance while the Kooks and their supporters look on with sneers. But it turns out, the land they’ve been living on, which was previously owned by Luke, was actually never supposed to be auctioned by the bank. Luke himself shows up to the city council meeting to confirm this, essentially leaving JJ and the rest of the Pogues homeless. Thanks, Dad.
As Kooks and Pogues argue, JJ has a total meltdown, first throwing a chair through a window, then brawling with cops. He manages to escape them, but he doesn’t stop there. After stealing a baseball bat, he heads into town to smash as many windows as he can – cars, businesses, you name it – before heading to the real estate developer Dale Zeasy’s office to smash it up. The cops apprehend JJ there but once again he escapes, but Pope (Jonathan Daviss) is arrested for assaulting an officer when he tries to create a diversion so JJ can escape.
As JJ continues to run from the law, he decides to go to the one man who might be able to shed some light on the truth – Charles Genrette, his bio-dad. JJ takes the boat over to Groff’s island home to confront him, and on his way there, he passes Sarah’s (Madelyn Cline) brother Rafe who’s boating back to Kildare after meeting with Groff himself. Because those two men are now partners in a shady real estate deal, but now JJ is onto them…
Our Take: The final five episodes of the season belong in many ways to JJ, the character seems to run on pure adrenaline, and it’s palpable when you watch. The first episode of the season sets up more of what’s to come with his character, focusing on the fact that while his outward appearance is that of an angry young man, at his core, he’s hurt, confused, and just wants to be loved by someone.
Like every good soap opera, the show delivers character twists, surprising alliances, and major surprises throughout, and while sometimes you want to shake sense into the Pogues, the show makes a great case for standing loyal to them no matter what. The season isn’t just JJ’s journey, although his is probably the heaviest, most emotional arc, there’s also quite a bit going on with Sarah and John B, a mysterious investment plot between Rafe and Groff, and major tension between Groff, the Pogues, and the rival treasure hunters led by Lightner (Rigo Sanchez), which leads them on a treasure hunt for the Blue Crown with major consequences for JJ and everyone else. The final episode is practically feature-length at 85 minutes and shot almost entirely in Morocco, and though the cast kind of all look like extras from Dune throughout, it’s a cinematic experience that serves as a viscerally emotional cap to a tense season, thanks to the shocking death at the end, and it will have you screaming.
Sex and Skin: Not much so far.
Parting Shot: JJ, having outrun the police, takes his boat out to the island where Chandler Groff lives. He pounds on the door screaming for Groff who seems terrified inside. “Who is it?” he calls. Knock knock, IT’S YOUR SON!
Performance Worth Watching: In my review of Part 1 of this season, I praised Rudy Pankow’s portrayal of JJ as equal parts volatile and lovable. In these final episodes, I’ll add that he’s also vulnerable and fueled more than ever by a burning desire for both justice and the truth. It’s what motivates everything he does up until the last episode.
Memorable Dialogue: “I’m done kissing the feet of people who have taken from me my entire life,” JJ tells the police when they try to arrest him.
Our Call: STREAM IT! There’s an awful lot packed into these final five episodes, from JJ’s personal arc to the Pogues’ fight against city hall to a quick jaunt to Morocco, but the show never pauses, keeping the action moving at a breathless pace. It’s got humor, it’s got tragedy, and it’s a tense, wild ride that doesn’t disappoint.
Liz Kocan is a pop culture writer living in Massachusetts. Her biggest claim to fame is the time she won on the game show Chain Reaction.
The post Stream It Or Skip It: Netflix’s ‘Outer Banks’ Season 4 Part 2, Filled With More Treasure-Hunting Adventure … But The End Just Might Devastate You appeared first on Decider.
