“Poguelandia: An External banks Experience” made its return to Los Angeles on Saturday before the premiere of the second part of the show's fourth season, where fans, artists and the show's cast came together in an immersive pop-up.
The pop-up included all the things External banks — the character's surf shop, food inspired by the series and a concert to close the event with performances by Jungle, Remi Wolf and Glorilla. The second annual event is modeled after the Netflix hit, focusing on the haves (Kooks) and have-nots (Pogues), who navigate adolescence while on an island solving murders and mysteries.
Chase Stokes, who plays John B and experiences a lot of loss on the show, shared with him The Hollywood journalist how he channeled his character's need for survival this season, saying, “I think as artists we always go inward for things like that.”
“I'm not someone lucky enough to not have trauma in my life, so I think it was really a deep dive and revisiting some experiences from my past that I really brought to John B this season,” the star added . .
From the first season to the first part of the fourth – released October 10 – the characters' growing pains included dealing with unhealthy family dynamics, friendship complications and treasure hunts.
“I saw my character grow to become more and more stressed that his friends were no longer going to be there,” Rudy Paktow said. “I think he really wants to try to keep them under wraps. And when Pope had the idea to have Poguelandia 2.0 as a property that created its own world, I feel like that was exactly what he wanted.”
Madelyn Cline added, “I think we're on this healing journey now. But how much healing are we actually doing when we run?
Other cast members, including Carlacia Grant and Jonathan “JD” Daviss, whose characters are typically the voice of reason within the crew, spoke with THR about what will happen this season for their characters.
“[Cleo’s] He's going to see red,” Grant said. “He's going to go through every stage of grief and anger is one of them.” As for Davis, who plays Pope, he explained, “In the end, they're all really going to break down.”
While the on-screen conclusion for season four has yet to be seen, in real life the crew has formed a close bond over the past five years working on the show.
“There's a level of trust that you have with the people around you to know that they're going to show up and do their job, too,” Stokes said. “We've been like this for the last five years and it's never changed.”
“It's all the little moments that I think add up that are really my favorite parts,” Daviss added. “Whatever group of friends has their own jokes, we could go and talk entirely in our own little joke for the entire conversation so no one would know what we're talking about. So it was a blessing to have a group of people who made this happen in this way.”
Following the main event, held at Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, the venue opened to fans for a DJ set, interactions with the cast and live musical performances including Glorilla performing her hits “Tomorrow” and “Wanna Well.”
Second part of External banks the fourth season premieres Thursday. Check out the preview images and THRThere's coverage of part one here.