There is a very particular kind of sadness that comes with finishing a show you have basically grown up with, and it is not just a sadness of not having the episodes anymore; it is the sudden realisation that fictional people who have been part of your life for years are not going to be waiting for you anymore. There would be no more new adventures, no new disasters and no more questionable decisions.
Outer Banks Season 5 Finale: The Goodbye Hits Hard
As Season 5 arrives as the show’s final chapter, X (formerly Twitter) is already full of people trying to process the fact that the Pogues are going on their last ride. The final goodbye seems to be a difficult one for the fans.
The one word that keeps coming back in these reactions is surprisingly simple: “family”
The Family They Grew Up With
For the fans who started Outer Banks back in 2020, this is not really a six-year television commitment anymore but a chunk of their actual lives.
An X user @YELENAB3L0VA gives words to the feelings, saying that no words are enough to express how much the show and the Pogues have meant to them over the past six years. They say that they spent almost all of their teenage years growing with them.
That pretty much explains why this particular ending feels different. You can finish a show they loved and move on, but when you have watched something during your teenage years, when you return to the same characters year after year, the characters become attached to memories that have nothing to do with the plot, really.
Suddenly watching Pogues say goodbye feels a little bit like saying goodbye to that version of yourself too.
Another user @matteoswift13 captures this exact phenomenon, admitting that while the final season has arrived, they are still stuck in 2020.
Somewhere in the fandom’s collective brain, Outer Banks will probably always belong to that first-watch era.
The Pogues Were Never Just Friends
The fans do not see the group as a friend group but as a family. X user @Lolasbushnell describes watching Season 5 as “one last time with the family”.
Another X user, @madelynssgf took the emotional damage up by several levels, writing, “I ACTUALLY FEEL SICK TO MY STOMACH THIS IS MY FAMILY.”
The whole appeal of the group was that they were each other’s people and they could fight, mess things up, make terrible decisions and occasionally drive the audience insane but when it really mattered, they showed up.
That is what the fans are really sad about; not just the show, the little family inside it.
Fans Would Miss Outer Banks
There is also a huge wave of love for where it all started. User @bellysinfinite went all the way back to Season 1, writing that with Outer Banks ending, the first season “will ALWAYS be loved.”
Before everything became bigger, there was something almost uncomplicated about discovering the Pogues, their friendships and the summer atmosphere and the feeling that you were being dropped into this little world and were going to spend time figuring it out with them.
Another user, @the_PrinXe03, reflected on how difficult it is to say goodbye to a show that has become part of your memories. The user wrote about living with Outer Banks for years, becoming attached to its characters and experiencing their adventures almost as if they were a part of them.
One Last Ride
Fans understand the weight of the phrase “one final ride”. A user on X, @TrendBuzz__ writes, “John B, Sarah, JJ, Kiara, Pope, Cleo and the Pogues are back for one final ride.”
Endings are weird: you spend years asking what happens next and then suddenly there is no “next” anymore. They are just ending. For Outer Banks, that means leaving behind a group of characters who became much bigger than the chaos of their story: they became comfort, teenage memory, a little found family that fans could return to whenever they felt like.
The Pogues Were The Point All Along
The people never really stayed for the treasures but for the Pogues. It was for John, Sarah, JJ, Kiara, Pope, and Cleo. It was the group sitting together, fighting, laughing and making a complete mess of things together.
The treasure was eventually to be found, and the adventure was to eventually end, but the family held the fans back. As Outer Banks comes to its final chapter, that is exactly what X is sad about; not simply a Netflix series but their family.
Six years with the Pogues is a pretty long time to say goodbye to people who grew with them and subconsciously became a part of their family.
Watch Outer Banks Season 5 on Netflix.
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