My Thoughts on Cobra Kai Seasons 1-2

 Intro and Strengths:

I recently finished the first two seasons of Cobra Kai, a show that literally everyone except for me has not only heard of but, well, actually seen. Full disclosure, I had no idea what the hype was and I only saw the first Karate Kid movie a single time—even then, it was the Jaiden Smith remake, and I was probably about 10. I had no interest in the franchise because I had never seen the original works that formed the bulk of said franchise, and I simply couldn’t conceive of it being anything more than a couple of movies. 

I was genuinely pleased to find that I really, really liked Cobra Kai. Even so, I believe that Cobra Kai has several major criticisms that I would like to highlight in this essay. Before I do so, I want to make it clear I honestly did enjoy what I was watching on a moment-to-moment basis, and so even though this essay primarily focuses on what I consider to be missed opportunities and unused potential, in the interest of fairness, I want to first focus on some strengths of the narrative. I believe there are a few things that make Cobra Kai an immediately appealing show to get into, hence why someone like me with no vested interest in the franchise could find it so captivating. 

• Obviously, the show is absolutely hilarious. I think this is by far and away the biggest strength of the entire series. Johnny Lawrence is absolutely hilarious, and having his character be the focal point of the early episodes was a great idea. The fact that an entire episode focuses on him spray-painting a penis on Daniel’s billboard is…just golden. It’s the sort of thing I would hate in any other series, because to reiterate, the fallout of this lasts an entire episode; but I just adore that sort of stupidity in Cobra Kai. 

• Building on that, the entire universe of The Karate Kid and Cobra Kai seems to revolve around martial arts in the same way that Yu-Gi-Oh revolves around a trading card game, and honestly? I’m living for it. This shit’s hilarious. Everyone seems to consider karate to be Serious Business, and since everyone treats it as such, the show treats it as such, so it just becomes an unspoken part of every storyline. It’s especially great when the show throws curveballs like Amanda, who has no goddamn idea why everyone in this town is losing their mind over her husband’s karate tournament from 33 years ago. 

• Cobra Kai, at its best, is also a story with really good drama with solid storytelling fundamentals. Like any good drama, Cobra Kai thrives off irony (particularly of the dramatic variety), interconnectivity, competition and secrecy. Character relationships are constantly changing, everyone has some secret goal that puts them in competition with several other characters, most characters have some kind of checkered past or character flaw they’re trying to hide, and only the audience is aware of the larger story at play. 

• The fight scenes are kick-ass in every way: fast, energetic, creative but still grounded in reality. The cinematography and choreography are quite impressive during almost every fight scene, especially considering this started off as a YouTube web series with a tiny budget. The school fight at the end of Season 2 stands out as a particularly impressive cinematic achievement for the crew of Cobra Kai. 

• I think it’s especially impressive how camera work highlights differences in choreography that highlight every character’s personality, giving a clear visual indication of their growth as people. Hawk tends to use a lot of fast, hard jabs at the head and neck, showing that he fights to vent his anger. Tory focuses on weakening her opponents and breaking bones, showing how she’s trying to inflict maximum pain. In contrast, even as Miguel gets more aggressive during Season 2, his style is always very pragmatic: he never gets greedy, he uses the most efficient strategies every time, and he tries to end fights as fast as possible. Robby’s style is much more defensive but still hyper-focused, reflecting a disciplined, calmer approach to life. However, Robby gets more erratic and goes on the offensive during the school fight, whereas Miguel starts very offensive and gradually lets Robby come to him. 

• The show makes constant use of dualism as a theme, with the actions of one faction having a ripple effect on the other. Everything—from the lighting to the costume design—reinforces this theme, and it permeates throughout the entire viewing experience. 

• The show makes use of role reversal and irony as narrative devices. Johnny, the spoiled rich kid rival of the first film, is living a shitty life as a friendless alcoholic on the poverty line, unable to move on from the first film. Daniel, the poor new kid in town, now has a wealthy, luxurious lifestyle due to his successful automobile business. He’s also fixated on the past, but in a different way; as conversations with his wife and kids demonstrate, he still views himself as an underdog for the bullying he faced in high school, despite his financial success in the present. This role reversal shows up in several other characters, like Sam and Aisha, Miguel and Robby, Demitri and Eli, etc. 

• I feel like it’s somewhat “common knowledge” among people (both those who watch and don’t watch the show alike) that Cobra Kai is a story that reframes Johnny as the hero and Daniel as the villain. That’s all I heard for a long time, and it sounded awful, which really turned me off watching the show for a long time. But I have to say, the direction of Johnny and Daniel’s characters in the early episodes is really, really fucking good because they are both protagonists, but neither is a clear hero or villain. 

• Johnny is still the same jackass he was in the 80s, now with comical political incorrectness dripping from most of his dialogue, but he’s also just a genuinely good guy. He never really had good resources or role models throughout his life, so he just cannot move on from his loss because he never learned how to move on from loss. The show constantly makes him sympathetic and explains why he does what he does without absolving him of his behavior. 

• At the same time, Daniel is a fundamentally good man making mistakes constantly; he doesn’t know how to parent his kids on certain issues, and his hot-headedness strains his relationship with his wife. This hot-headedness is not new, it’s the same thing that led to him fighting with Johnny back in high school, and Cobra Kai never treats it as anything but a character flaw. 

Parallels and Role Reversal Criticism:

I would say my strongest criticism of the show comes down to how it uses role reversal as a narrative device in-tandem with the dualistic storytelling. Nearly all other criticisms I have of this show tie into that central idea, to the point that I sometimes find it hard to consider the current storyline of Cobra Kai because I’m a little fixated on the plotlines they set up but either never elaborated on or elaborated on in very strange ways. 

I mentioned dualism and role reversal as strengths of the show, and that is still true, but I think the way this theme is applied could have been handled better in regards to the teenage cast. 

Let me walk you through my thought process. Within the first couple of episodes, we are introduced to four new characters (and plot threads) simultaneously:

1. After Johnny witnesses Miguel, a poor transfer student, getting bullied by a couple of other rich assholes led by Kyler, Johnny chases them off and reluctantly agrees to train Miguel—the entire situation is a clear parallel to Daniel’s own plight in the first film. 

2. At the same time, to bond better with his daughter, Daniel invites Kyler over for dinner. Kyler confesses that he was attacked by Johnny but reframes himself as the victim, leading Daniel to threaten Johnny. 

3. Whereas Daniel was merely a hothead, Samantha comes across as more mean-spirited, bratty and disrespectful in these early episodes. She puts down her friend Aisha to fit in with the popular girls at school, who hit Johnny’s car, which she tries to hide from her parents, and she throws a pool party while her parents are gone, with her only reasoning being that she didn’t think they were going to come home so soon. 

4. And finally, Johnny’s son Robby is a delinquent living with his mother in poverty. Robby openly disrespects his father, showing clear contempt for being absent his entire life. Despite Johnny trying to make amends, Robby doesn’t want to hear it. 

By framing certain scenes with storytelling cues taken from The Karate Kid, the audience is quickly clued in on two different sets of foils that spin out of the larger Daniel-Johnny relationship, but each one is altered such that it creates an ironic reminder of the past for Daniel and Johnny. 

• Miguel and Kyler are set up as foils, with Miguel being a poor, quiet bullied kid and Kyler being his snobbish tormentor. Ironically, Johnny mentors Miguel, whereas Daniel mentors Kyler, or at least tries to. 

• Samantha and Robby are set up as foils. Robby is an angry, hotheaded kid with a good heart living with a single mother and struggling to make ends meet. Samantha comes from a loving nuclear family, but is sheltered, vain and snobbish, having a strained relationship with her father figure. Ironically, Robby acts more like Daniel despite being Johnny’s son as a result of his upbringing, and Samantha acts more like Johnny did despite being Daniel’s daughter due to her own upbringing. 

The show is clearly setting up a situation where Daniel and Johnny are stretched to the limit as both parents and teachers. The obvious outcome is that both men will be mentoring a new generation of martial artists and parenting teenagers simultaneously, but with the roles reversed. In the beginning, while Miguel is clearly set up as the biggest protagonist of the new generation, it feels like the show could go any way. Even though this is a conceptually brilliant setup, and quite the flexible one at that, the show never goes through with it, and my four main problems step from this. 

Problem #1: Kyler’s Exit from Season 1:

My first problem with the show is how it creates an immediate sense of tension between Daniel and Kyler, and then never overcomes this. In the end, Daniel blows up at Kyler and further strains his relationship with Sam in Episode 3. From this point onwards, the show makes Kyler almost completely irredeemable; he only wants Sam to have sex with her and he severely beats Miguel, but Miguel beats up Kyler in Episode 5 and their feud comes to a swift end. 

Kyler was clearly set up as the Johnny to Miguel’s Daniel, and this was a storytelling avenue ripe with dramatic irony. If I could, I would rewrite the show to have Miguel and Kyler’s cafeteria brawl still occur, but afterwards, Daniel mentors Kyler in karate so he could defend himself. As expected, Kyler instead just uses this to torment Miguel further. Daniel is initially oblivious to the harm he is causing, but even when he finds out, he constantly justifies his decision to enable Kyler and lies to himself because he just can’t stand to think that Johnny was right about anything. In the process, Daniel would become a morally nuanced Kreese analogue, just as Johnny is a morally nuanced take on Miyagi. 

The best way to go about this would be to slowly explain and redeem Kyler from his behavior in the beginning of the show. Perhaps have him be genuinely apologetic towards Miguel and trying to make amends, or even get humbled after being bullied himself. In the process, we could get insight into Kyler’s family and friends, and see how Kyler’s home environment enables this kind of behavior. 

It seems bizarre to me that Johnny is repeatedly made a sympathetic character in the show, yet the same treatment is not given to Kyler, who is clearly set up as the Johnny of this generation. Kyler is established in the show as a one-dimensional, pathetic bully, and all scenes that could potentially demonstrate otherwise are instead undercut to make him as unlikable as possible—for instance, he gives Sam a necklace at the dance, only to reveal in the same episode it was just so he could sleep with her. 

I think the show would be better if it would just completely remove this and him harassing her at the movie theater. It would be interesting to watch how someone like Kyler could be both a sweet, doting boyfriend and also a ruthless bully, and it would be fascinating to watch the LaRusso family’s reactions as they slowly uncover this fact. 

Problem #2: Sam’s Redemption:

My second problem with Season 1 was how Sam became much kinder around the time Kyler exits the narrative, essentially doing an entire 180. This leads into Season 2, where Sam is clearly established as her father’s best pupil and a master of Miyagi-Do, lacking many of the character flaws that make the rest of the cast interesting. 

Again, I consider this a huge missed opportunity. The beginning of the show characterizes Sam as vain, obsessed with popularity and hesitant to take responsibility for her mistakes. However, she does have genuine kindness to her, as evidenced by the pity she feels for Aisha, and she often acts as the more thoughtful, responsible counterpart to Yasmine and Moon, as evidenced by how she wanted to talk to her parents about the car crash but felt like she couldn’t. The juxtaposition of those two things made some of her scenes quite interesting. (I say “some” scenes because Cobra Kai has a really weird way of writing high schoolers, and honestly, Sam’s friends are such morons that they tend to be grating, but Sam herself was always someone I wanted to learn more about.)

Sam also has a potentially interesting relationship with martial arts that the show’s first season never touches on. Pictures around the house show that Sam used to be a prodigy martial artist when she was in middle school, but she’s since abandoned it, seemingly to fit in with the new clique at school. I think this would have served as an interesting contrast to some of the other main characters—whereas Miguel, Robby and even Daniel are focused but require constant training to hone their skills, Sam is naturally talented but unmotivated and lazy. 

I think it would have been extremely interesting if Sam ended up joining Cobra Kai—this would require rewriting the pilot episode to have Sam not present when Johnny’s car was wrecked, but I think that’s a small price to pay. Robby joining LaRusso Automotive to get back at his dad was one of the best parts of Season 1, and it was genuinely heartwarming how Daniel became a father figure to Robby like how Miyagi was for him. 

I desperately wished that the narrative would do this same trick again, but reversed. In a mimicry of Robby’s actions, Sam is so angry at her dad for spending more time with Robby than her that she ends up joining Cobra Kai and training with Johnny after school, bonding with Miguel through this shared interest as a result. Much like how Robby sees Daniel as a parental substitute, it would be cool if Sam saw Johnny as a parental substitute. 

Problem #3: The Love Triangle:

My third problem with the canon series is the emergence of a love triangle with Sam stuck between Robby and Miguel. This is one of the show's biggest criticisms, particularly in how it affects the later seasons. 

Starting with Episode 6, a long string of events is set in motion that radically alter the tone of the show, making it much more melodramatic. Sam ends up dating Miguel, but Johnny warns Miguel about her family. Around the same time, Robby becomes Daniel’s student. Robby is smitten with Sam but she is unaware; she doesn’t tell her family about Miguel, which makes him insecure. When he goes to visit her, he sees Robby having dinner with the family, furthering his insecurities. That night, Robby and Sam go to Cobra Kai’s party; Miguel gets drunk and accidentally punches Sam in the face when trying to pick a fight with Robby. Robby is still clearly smitten with Sam, but nothing happens between the two of them until Season 2. The entire incident serves as a way for Miyagi-Do to demonize Cobra Kai in Season 2, convincing Sam to stay in her dad’s dojo. 

To her credit, Mary Mouser (Sam) has really good chemistry with both Xolo Mariduena (Miguel) and Tanner Buchanan (Robby), which certainly stops this plotline from being worse than it could’ve been. I don’t care for most love triangles, particularly in YA movies and TV geared towards adolescents, but in retrospect, I think a lot of that stems from this lack of chemistry. That’s difficult, because it’s not something that can be forced one way or another, and it often leads to non-canon ships feeling more believable than canon romances. (Look to Harry Potter and the massive amount of movie-watching Harry/Hermoine or Harry/Luna fans as an example.)

I also think the circumstances in which Sam befriends both of them feels believable and charming. Miguel and Sam’s date is a great scene and I’m glad it goes on to influence both of their arcs heavily in Season 2. Anytime they remember that date in Season 2, it always delivers either the exact emotional impact the writers clearly intended, or it gets within spitting distance. On the flip-side, Robby’s instant crush with Sam was honestly adorable to watch unfold on screen, thanks in part to Tanner Buchanan’s excellent command of facial expression and body language (something he also uses to great effect anytime Robby and Johnny speak in these early seasons, particularly Season 3). The scene with him sneaking her out of the house did a good job of establishing how Robby is still a bit of a rebel while also being a genuinely nice person, and I loved how he did this for someone he barely even knew. It shows that Robby has a genuinely good heart and a capacity to do benevolent things, like his father, but he’s also very self-motivated and more willing to do those things for someone he’s trying to get close to. 

Even so, I don’t like this love triangle for a lot of the same reasons I just mentioned earlier. Having Sam be a love interest for Miguel and Robby ended up minimizing her role—it was like a nonlethal version of fridging, basically. After I watched it with my fiance, we agreed that it was odd to set up Daniel’s daughter as a martial arts prodigy in Season 1, but then never have her compete in the tournament so we can focus on two teenage boys (who have exchanged all of ten words with each other) fighting for her affection instead. 

I think Sam’s relationship with Miguel is adorable, and Robby’s crush on her is honestly pretty sweet, but I don’t want it to extend further than that. In accordance with what I said earlier about the possibility of Sam joining Cobra Kai, I think the show could’ve been more compelling if the show used Cobra Kai training sessions as a way for Sam and Miguel to bond. Much like how Miguel took the “Strike First, Strike Hard, No Mercy” approach to karate and applied it to the rest of his life, it would be interesting to see how Sam applied those same lessons to her own life, particularly because unlike Miguel, Sam doesn’t have to defend herself from anyone. Had Sam joined Cobra Kai, would she have used “Strike First” as a justification to get close to Aisha again? Would “Strike Hard” have been her justification for living authentically and being more honest with her emotions? Cobra Kai makes a point that the titular dojo’s teachings are, on a surface level, damaging and toxic, but that the proactive energy of those teachings can have transformative effects on someone’s life, including their relationships with others. 

Problem #4: Miguel vs Robby:

My fourth problem with Cobra Kai is how, with Kyler out of the picture and Sam as a love interest for both of them, Miguel and Robby become the series’ main rivals. (Jesus, this girl is just getting passed around like a romantic hot potato, huh?) 

Now, to be clear, this decision does have some narrative highlights. The battles at the All Valley Tournament are awesome, and the choreographers go all-out with Robby and Miguel in the final matchup. Season 2 does a really good job of building up to a rematch, and I enjoy how both men scare the shit out of and infuriate one-another. The scene where Daniel is trying to heal Robby’s arm before the final round stands out to me as one of my favorites from Tanner Buchanan: Daniel reminds Robby that he doesn’t have to fight, but Robby just shakes his head and mutters, “I have to face him eventually,” with an expression close to tears. 

However, I’m not a huge fan of this direction for either of them, or Sam for that matter. It often bored me because it never felt as narratively satisfying or entertaining as it could have been. 

If you haven’t noticed, what I enjoyed most about Cobra Kai are themes of yin and yang, duality, and contrast. Nobody is simple, and most of the main cast has some sort of central contradiction that forms the basis of their characterization—specifically, there is friction between a character’s core personality and the role they played in the story’s conflict. 

They say that friction is a fundamental part of writing, and I can see that in many protagonists. Harry Potter is a Chosen One, yet he lives in a closet. Luke Skywalker is the son of a famous senator and war general, yet he lives on a moisture farm with his elderly aunt and uncle. Shirou Emiya longs for heroism, yet has no idea how to achieve it. This approach to character writing summarizes Cobra Kai’s cast to a T. 

To use some examples in the show: 

1. Daniel was a truly good man who now uses his influence to hound Johnny and screw over local businesses. 

2. Johnny was a former bully who opened a karate school teaching kids how to stand up to bullies. 

3. Miguel is a sweet kid but his sensei is an absolute dick. 

4. Robby was a delinquent, but it is clear that he was starved of good role models, and he was a genuinely thoughtful, sweet kid searching for affection and filling the void left by his parents. 

That idea of friction and contrast is also why I suggested that Kyler be a genuinely nice boyfriend, as it contrasts with his vicious bullying; and why I suggested that Sam join Cobra Kai, as it contrasts with her upbringing and her family’s values. 

Despite using a lot of imagery from The Karate Kid, having Miguel and Robby fight over Sam doesn’t feel nearly as climactic as it could’ve been because the two characters aren’t really opposites in a meaningful way. They’re actually quite similar. Miguel and Robby are both lonely kids struggling with anger issues who come from low-income backgrounds; they were both raised by single mothers, and they use karate as a way to find peace, security and a sense of achievement. Even then, Cobra Kai doesn’t focus on those similarities as a way to advance the narrative, and that makes sense, because those similarities are rather surface-level and it could have made for a very surface-level comparison. This fight isn’t all that interesting because of Miguel and Robby, but more so because of what it represents for Daniel and Johnny—failure and repetition of the past. 

Keeping in-line with the changes I’ve been proposing up until this point, I would rewrite this scene to have (a much more sympathetic and less vicious) Kyler and Robby competing against Sam and Miguel in the quarter finals, taking Hawk out of the picture completely but still having him attack Robby in the semi-quarter finals. At that point, nearly any combination of matches can happen and it would be interesting:

1. If Sam and Robby fight, we get to live out their father’s rivalries, but representing the opposite factions. 

2. If Kyler and Miguel fight, we get to recreate their cafeteria showdown. Perhaps Kyler is genuinely apologetic, but Miguel doesn’t believe him and is still (understandably) angry over what happened at the dance (if that scene was even retained), leading Miguel to viciously hurt Kyler. This would allow for a genuinely fantastic flip to the narrative, and we could see the dark side of both Daniel and Johnny’s teachings. Johnny’s teachings, while proactive, emphasize using emotions as fuel to accomplish your goals, which means that Cobra Kai walks the razor’s edge of alternating between bully and bully victim. Meanwhile, Daniel’s teachings inadvertently give tools for bullies to successfully defend themselves from retaliation. 

3. If Miguel and Robby fight, we get an interesting exploration of their psychologies and how two similar kids from similar backgrounds can cope with circumstances beyond their control by embodying completely opposing ideologies. 

4. Likewise, if Sam and Kyler fight, we get an interesting battle between two rich kids (and former lovers) who ended up on opposite sides of a 30-year old feud.