Cobra Kai: the Karate Kids are back!

Steph Deschamps / September 7, 2020

Almost forty years after the release of the first "Karate Kid", Ralph Macchio and William Zabka find their characters of Daniel LaRusso and Johnny Lawrence in the "Cobra Kai" series! Launched in 2018 on YouTube Red, the latter has recently resurfaced in the Netflix catalog, where it trustees from the top of the ranking of the ten programs currently the most watched in Belgium.

We find there the two enemies with stubborn grudges, in their fifties and in the midst of an existential crisis. Daniel has become a car salesman, while Johnny has just lost his job. In an attempt to recover, the latter decides to reopen the Cobra Kai martial arts club... and in the process rekindle his rivalry with the former protege of the facetious Mr. Miyagi. "The interest in the 'Karate Kid' saga is timeless, and 'Cobra Kai' picks up right where it left off, without missing a beat," said Brian Wright, vice-present of Original Content at Netflix. Two seasons (twenty episodes) are already available.

And after ?

In view of the success of both critical and public this relaunch (more than 20 million views less than a week after its launch on YouTube), “Cobra Kai” will indeed be entitled to a season 3. Commissioned by the platform of video sharing even before the repurchase of the broadcasting rights of the series by Netflix, this new salvo is expected for 2021. No date has yet been specified, but we know that the episodes were shot before the explosion of Covid-19.

In the meantime, we are already talking about a spin-off. “We have a list of at least five different storylines that we could pursue, that we could consider,” co-creator Jon Hurwitz told slashfilm.com. “Some of them are not very traditional. Some would even be very different from any spin-off we've seen so far. Every time we write the episodes, we fall in love with the characters we create. In the world of 'Cobra Kai' there are some things that can be explored that don't fit into a box, but there may be opportunities in the future to get to know these characters better and explore their lives. « 

And that's not all: a game for PS4, X Box One and Nintendo Switch has also just been announced for October 27! Even the two main actors lend their voices to their fictional double.

Clearly, the franchise is far from being buried!