The Karate Kid...lets discuss the greatness.

there is a Cobra Kai show?

Just renewed for a third season, even! It's on YouTube Red, though (their streaming service, which features one original program as far as I can tell). Definitely worth checking out if you're a fan of the movie, and I think I'd mildly recommend it even if you weren't.

Xolo Maridueña aka the boy in 1956 in twin peaks the return part 8!

I saw the first couple of eps of this - cute but not high on my list of things to come back to

Wow, did not even realize he was the kid in The Return!

The show is heavily reliant on reference to the films in the early episodes and the first season in general, but it's starting to find its own voice in the second season. I figured they'd be working around Zabka's limitations to an excessive degree but he's really been bringing it. They've even hit some legitimately affecting emotional beats (although I'm old and well up at the violin-scored drop of a hat so my perspective may be suspect).

Yeah Cobra Kai is pretty great & has a good sense of humor -def worth checking out

One of the most disturbing things Morita did shortly after KK came out was appear in Night Patrol, the world's worst attempt at a Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker film knockoff ever, as a pre-teen female rape victim (this was done by having him just appear as himself, but with a dubbed-in squeaky voice...and this was meant to be a COMEDY).

― Ned Raggett (Ned)

I mean

watched this for the first time since i was my kid's age. it seemed like a really violent and frightening movie when i was young and it still kind of is, objectively speaking. actual psycho bullies, they could have been recruited easily by Night Slasher into New World membership. i really still question Daniel's decision to drench Johnny in water and then run away into the unsafe darkness with all of the meatheads in hot pursuit. I'm all about strategy though.

Macchio is great of course, and Morita too. the drunk scene is kinda made a bit more intense by the fact that Morita was an alcoholic IRL. Martin Kove chews the scenery in the best way, just absolutely ridiculous stuff, i love it.

Elisabeth Shue does her usual really good work with the role, which is to say she probably deserved to be an actual megastar and not a minor star. It's amazing how many female actors got sidelined back then, she gave such a great performance in Adventures in Babysitting and then her next thing was basically to be Marty McFly's replacement girlfriend in Back to the Future 2, and just really never broke through until Leaving Las Vegas, and she was predictably incredible.

gonna be skipping the sequels, though i have fond memories of seeing KK2 in the theater. never saw KK3, and maybe the Swank one is better than its rep idk? Also she's not a horseface, Shakey. might give Cobra Kai a try down the road.

Alcoholism? No idea. I'm reading about it now.

Cobra Kai is fun & worth tr time imo

It can get as confusing as any soaper (who's changed sides now, etc.), but if you accept it as a soap version of what happens when you get your favorite characters from the films together, it's fine.

I never thought I'd say that William Zabka is a better actor than Ralph Macchio.

the friends Daniel made in the first ten minutes of the film kinda wound up being absolute lamestains huh. i was thinking it'd be awkward to live in the same apartment complex as the dude who abandoned him facedown in the sand, all the way over the hill from Reseda. wonder how he got home.

for years I thought the scene at the dance/Daniel getting beat up while trying to escape was towards the beginning of the movie. years later I learned it was because mom/dad started the tape much too late when recording it off of TV. I'd never even seen the Elizabeth Shue scene on the beach until I was 30.

still no better moment for my money than Daniel winning and Miyagi smiling like a proud father seconds after. even though doing the crane IRL would have resulted in Johnny side-stepping and Daniel falling on his ass

"no can defense the move that is telegraphed for about ten seconds before you execute it"

regarding Cobra Kai, the last two seasons were disappointing to me. they always had a soap opera feel, but they've at times felt like wheel spinning. there's only so many seasons of "we have to take down XXX, leader of Cobra Kai" I can take. I'm a much bigger fan of the more interpersonal stuff, like Johnny's relationship with his kid, Tory's rough life, etc.

I do appreciate that the series ultimately uses a HK cinema approach in where reality is eschewed and people take off fighting at a moment's notice to defend honor, get vengeance, or protect their families.

still lol at the advanced skills the kids all learn in like 3 months. I did Tae Kwon do for three years and all I learned were forms and the sparring was always shitty

I still need to get around to season 5 of Cobra Kai ... the momentum seemed to wane during season 4

the martial arts scenes in this franchise have never been very good, even by US movie standards, but realism would contradict the musical-comedy rules of a universe where teenagers spontaneously start brawling instead of singing and dancing

the funniest and most realistic aspect of the show is the older guys who are super serious about karate trying to deal with the incomprehension and impatience of family and friends

hah yes!

that one post-hospital scene where Daniel talked about "Cobra Kai can't get away with this" and Amanda said OMG WILL YOU STFU ABOUT KARATE RIGHT NOW, i wanted to stand and applaud

My first Cobra Kai episode was the country club party where Daniel, Daniel's wife, Johnny, and Alli kick it over vodka martinis.

loved taht one. but I'm a huge Shue fan

yeah loved that one

Zabka is reliably dirtbag comedy gold all the way through, I love how much he leans into the dumbness

I guess playing Johnny's terrible stepdad wasn't his last onscreen role, but it was nice to give Ed Asner a sendoff in something I was actually watching not just to see him.

yeah agreed!

tbc I love how Daniel, Daniel's wife, Johnny, and Alli kick it over vodka martinis despite drinking martinis with vodka in them.

lol

Elizabeth Shue being 60 (soon) trips me out.

Maybe not as much as Ralph Macchio being 22 years old when the movie was filmed, and Randee Heller (who played his mom) being 36.

There was only a 3 year gap between Karate Kid III and My Cousin Vinny, but I remember when the latter came out thinking "Ralph went away and got old!"

I enjoy the weird out-of-time quality of the original Karate Kid... maybe it's remembered as classic 80s film now, but it feels like it could have been set anywhere from like 1946 to 1996, some smeared out American adolescence from the end of WWII to the World Wide Web

the end of Karate Kid III, with the little hand drums? unforgettable. no quality judgment one way or the other, i'm just never going to forget it.

i think the hand drums was Karate Kid 2

that sounds right though i haven't seen it since i watched in the theater back in '86. pretty memorable.

i do love how Kreese was apparently teleported in from another movie, probably rated-R, where he was playing an evil henchman. Absolutely one of the most absurd characters to ever appear on screen, contextually speaking. but...

https://c.tenor.com/2NwXxMMYhXYAAAAd/tenor.gif

The first movie has many merits, but it's hard not to laugh at how out of shape and awkward both Macchio and Morita look throughout. Daniel's training between the start of the movie and the tournament appears to result in zero improvement in his fitness, and Morita looks soft and cuddly in every scene except for the 20 seconds or so where he's doubled by Fumio Demura.

Another gripe: we're told that Miyagi has been living in California for more than 40 years, but his Yoda-like pidgin English is supposed to be both plausible and hilarious ... this aspect of Morita's schtick wasn't funny then and hasn't aged well.

I'll admit to having a little personal animus toward the film because it marked a transition in how people in the US perceived teaching and learning martial arts. The kids in The Karate Kid are 20-somethings playing high school students, but the target audience was younger, and after the movie's success there was a big expansion in the number of commercial martial arts schools aimed at children, along with a corresponding decline in the interest and participation of adults. The martial arts world has changed a lot since 1984, but if you say "karate" to most people in the US today, their immediate association is with the place Mom takes Mason on the afternoons he doesn't have soccer practice.

I enjoy the way Cobra Kai leans into that absurdity, but it would be funnier if all the karate students were played by under-12 child actors.

Another gripe: we're told that Miyagi has been living in California for more than 40 years, but his Yoda-like pidgin English is supposed to be both plausible and hilarious ... this aspect of Morita's schtick wasn't funny then and hasn't aged well.

*cues Japanese flute*

the bonzai techniques in this film can also be applied to manscaping