EXCLUSIVE: Behind the globe-trotting adventures and the treasure hunts, Netflix’s Outer Banks is a story of haves and have-nots: the working-class locals, Pogues, and the wealthy seasonal residents, the Kooks, who live in The Cut and Figure Eight neighborhoods, respectively, of Outer Banks‘ fictional Kildare Island.
Outer Banks creators Josh Pate, Jonas Pate and Shannon Burke have set out to explore the origins of Kildare’s deep social divide in a prequel series set 20 years before the events in the popular YA series.
The prequel, often referred to as Kildare, is based on a concept the trio had been noodling with for a couple of years; Jonas Pate had mentioned it in 2023 and 2024 interviews with Wilmington’s Port City Daily.
While the germ of an idea had been lingering around for awhile, the prequel only recently came together and entered formal development at Netflix where it has been gaining momentum, I hear. The trio had been able to focus on the proposed offshoot with the mothership series ending its five-season run.
Watch on Deadline
“We’re working on the script,” Josh Pate said about the prequel in a Deadline interview tied to Outer Banks‘ Aug. 20 Season 5 release. “We’re working hard on it with our awesome partners from Netflix, and we’re just trying to get all of it as good as it can be.”
Outer Banks started off by following a group of Pogue teenagers as they clashed with their entitled Kook counterparts. A Romeo and Juliet Season 1 storyline centered on the budding romance between the Pogues’ ringleader John B (Chase Stokes) and Kook princess Sarah (Madelyn Cline). John B’s initial group also included Pope (Jonathan Daviss), JJ (Rudy Pankow) as well as Kiara (Madison Bailey) who is technically a Kook but had been hanging out with the Pogues. Their Kook enemies included Sarah’s brother Rafe (Drew Starkey) and Sarah’s then-boyfriend Topper (Austin North).
Josh Pate spoke of the prequel’s premise and its timeliness.
“It really is the story of how the island split — and it’s particularly relevant in our country right now — how it split into the haves and have-nots, how the Kooks and the Pogues started,” he said. “How did this rift start?”
Added Burke, “And seen through the stories of some of the characters you know and some new characters. But they’re 20 years before, so it’s the parents’ generation.”
Outer Banks has featured John B and JJ’s dads, as well as Sarah and Rafe’s dad who grew up in The Cut before amassing wealth to join the Kooks’ ranks with a mansion in Figure Eight, Pope’s and Kiara’s parents and Topper’s mother and grandfather.
Then there are JJ’s birth parents, revealed in Season 4, including his late mother who belonged to a wealthy local family that went back centuries.
A rep for Netflix declined comment.
The Outer Banks prequel is one of several projects Josh Pate, Jonas Pate and Shannon Burke have in the works as they ramp up development under their Netflix overall deal.
Netflix has been very deliberate about expanding hit series. Of the various Stranger Things spinoffs explored, only an animated offshoot came to fruition. The Uncle Fester spinoff of Wednesday has been in the works for about three years, with its script said to be have been well received, but Netflix is yet to pull the trigger on it.
The streamer, meanwhile, opted not to go forward with its proposed Virgin River prequel.
Arguably the most successful Netflix series franchise expansion to date is Bridgerton spawning a well received prequel in Queen Charlotte, with other prequels, including one about Violet, also being talked about on and off.
The fifth and final season of Outer Banks premieres at midnight tonight, Aug. 20. Check back on Deadline for a postmortem interview with Josh Pate, Jonas Pate and Shannon Burke about how they brought it home with the series’ ending.
