It's not all fist pumps and Ron Ron juice anymore.
With Jersey Shore Family Vacation back for its first new batch of episodes in 2019—marking a continuation of season two rather than a third season of the revived reality hit, according to MTV—the series will see its core cast of guidos and guidettes with hearts of gold not only embark on yet another vacation, but face down some of the most intense, life-altering situations (no pun intended) to come their way yet.
We've already watched as Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino was sentenced for tax fraud in federal court—a prison sentence he's currently serving—and as Jenni "JWoww" Farley spoke of the problems in her marriage to now ex-husband Roger Mathews that would eventually lead to her filing for divorce in last night's two-part premiere. And it's only going to get more intense from there.
"I mean, you guys got to see us grow up and be a bunch of drunk 20-year-olds fighting and fist-pumping and all that. And 10 years later, we're still fighting and fist-pumping, but at the same time, people are getting married, people are getting divorced," Vinny Guadagnino told E! News about these new episodes. "Who's having their first kid? Their third kid? Who's going to jail. It's all these real-life experiences of those 20-year-old kids that you grew up watching."
As Ronnie Ortiz-Magro, who's seen his fair share of intense moments play out in front of the cameras during the initial seasons of the hit revival, explained, these intense real-life experiences are exactly what have endeared him and his co-stars to fans even further this time around. "And I feel like that's why the fanbase likes us more now," he told us. "Because now it's like they can really relate to us."
The truth is that, since cameras were last rolling on the group—which also includes Pauly D, Nicole "Snooki" Polizzi, Deena Cortese, and Angelina Pivarnick—they've all faced down some major life changes. Here's what we can look forward to playing out this season.
They've all faced quite a lot. Luckily, they've got each other to lean on.
"We are like each other's family," Vinny explained. "I used to film and leave my friends and family to be with these guys, and they were like my work friends and then I would leave. Now, there's no more friends in real life. It's just these guys. They're like my friends and family. So we're always just there for each other. I've gone through more stuff with them than I have with anyone else on this earth."
Jersey Shore Family Vacation airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on MTV.