If you’re out there hopefully still saying safe and living somewhat of a quarantine life Cobra Kai is an excellent binge to help cure your quarantine blues. A true update and sequel to the Karate Kid, the show does an excellent job of honoring the original while offering up plenty of juicy storylines (there’s some major interconnected family drama that ala Shakespeare). This younger generation is not all TikTok and influencing but more into finding a sensei and earning a black belt. Not only that, the motto of the dojo is one to live by: “strike first, strike hard, no mercy,” that is, if you are going to use your karate powers for good. Here are 5 takeaways from the binge-worthy series that will absolutely make you want to get yourself to a dojo ASAP.
1. A Show About Fighting Calls for Great Fight Scenes: Any fan of the martial arts film will eat up the old-school fight sequences of Cobra Kai. No tricky camera work, no special effects, just great fight choreography. Of course, a great fight sequence does not work without emotional resonance behind it, and the writers have done great work in creating rivalries to build excitement around the biggest fight scenes in the series, especially with a love triangle building at the core of Season 2.
2. A Good Sensei Can Never Be Replaced: Of course the original Karate Kid was not complete without the late Pat Morita. Mr. Miyagi could stop a fight with his stare, offer the best advice at the worst moments, and made Danny LaRusso (the world’s biggest nerd) a great champion. Cobra Kai does an excellent job of honoring Mr. Miyagi. Danny names his new dojo after him and much of his arc deals with his grief of living in his shadow and missing him with all his heart.
3. Two Sides of A Coin: While the original Karate Kid thrived on making Johnny Lawrence a one-dimensional bad guy super good at his job, Cobra Kai deals with two wounded men struggling to see the good and the bad in most situations. The more nuanced take on violence, being a father to your own child, and the children of others, and finding love when not enough love has been shown to you before are all themes worth exploring in a world where toxic masculinity serves no one. Every man contains good and evil. Every man has two sides. And every man who loves the morals of karate has the proclivity for growth.
4. Strong Female Leads: Cobra Kai also acknowledges that karate is not just a man’s game. In fact, in Season 2, it’s a young woman who shakes up the dojos the most. Men do not have the exclusive on untamed rage and desire to win. Plus, when focusing a season on pre-teens and teens you can’t avoid teen angst struggling with parental relationships, and the delicate balance between father and daughter in fragile years. Cobra Kai hits on all of this thanks to its strong up and comers with Courtney Henggeler as Amanda LaRusso and Peyton List as Tory.
Final Takeaway: It’s no easy task honoring one of the highest grossing film franchises of 1980s while creating a world of your own for a streaming universe of fickle viewers but Cobra Kai has risen above many other new shows this year to become one of the most-watched on Netflix, and for good reason. The franchise was ripe for updating as teen rivalries never get old, neither do wounds never healed, or the desire to find your inner strength that is sometimes best honed by a great sensei and a quality dojo. If you like nostalgia, Shakespearean level drama and karate chop that lands hard, Cobra Kai is worth your time.