Cobra Kai season three is more a transitional season with plot and storylines created for the big karate tournament in season four.
Cobra Kai Season 3 dropped a week earlier than expected and of course I watched it immediately. My family members were ready to discuss the show in our family app right away! Yes, that’s how big a fans we are of the show.
The review is spoilerheavy so thread lightly!
The big Cobra Kai season 3 questions
Cobra Kai season three kicks off right after the second season. Miguel is in the hospital and the big question is if he will ever walk again. Robby Keene went missing after he kicked Miguel off the balcony and the big question in San Fernando Valley after the big fight is: Can we forbid Karate? And if we do then how do we do it?
Robbie and Miguel: Cobra Kai vs Miyagi Do philosophies at its’ finest
Robbie basically stole a van from the LaRusso cardealership and went off the grid. Afraid that he would go to jail if he got captured by the police for battering assault. And he is right: kicking your fellow schoolmate over the rails at your high school would be interpreted as attempted murder and that will cause you a few years in juvenile detention. Unfortunately, and I find this disappointing, we don’t get to see a whole lot of Robbie this season. The focus laid heavily on his story in the previous two seasons.
The relationship with his father, Johnny Lawrence and his surrogate dad, Daniel Larusso. He was essentially recruited for Larusso’s Miyagi Do but he still has a lot of his father’s character; the vileness in particular. And just that alone made me doubt if he would ever accept Miyagi’s teachings 100%. It seemed to work up until he kicked Miguel over the rails at the end of season 2. He essentially showed no mercy despite Miguel’s compassion. So you see his true colors: Robbie Keene is born and bred to be Cobra Kai ultimately. It is in his nature. While Miguel walks the reverse path, he was always more like Daniel was and he would become a full Miyagi Do student.
As much as I liked the character of Robbie, I do think it is a missed opportunity that he wasn’t featured as heavily in Cobra Kai season three as he was in the previous two seasons.
Hawk and Dimitri: Rivals who have a soft spot for each other
Meanwhile Hawk is living with the fact that everyone knows that his former bestie Dimitri kicked his ass by kicking him into the trophy case which knocked him out almost immediately. This causes him to force himself and try to prove that he is the most kick ass guy in the whole wide world. Not just to the world but mostly to himself. He does things that he normally wouldn’t do. Such as breaking Dimitri’s arm. Even though he felt mercy, he realized it would be weakness to his fellow brethren who are all Cobra Kai students. And at Cobra Kai, the first thing you learn is: No Mercy!
The thing is, if you looked closely, you see that Hawk actually has a softspot for his friend Dimitri. Dimitri never forgot about his friend while Hawk was trying to forget about Dimitri and the past where he got bullied a lot and where he got rejected by girls left and right. While he was initially succesful with his new act and matching tattoo, after he got his ass kicked, he doesn’t seem to be succesful anymore with the ladies and the company he keeps are nothing more than yay sayers who dare not to question him. Dimitri dares which makes him a true friend. But Hawk does not realize this until the final episode.
Throughout Cobra Kai season three you can see that Hawk is starting to have doubts about the Cobra Kai philosophy. The fact that Cobra Kai sensei John Kreese keeps putting him second place most of the time and after breaking Dimitri’s arm has shaken him up a little.
Samantha and Tori: the rich vs the poor
Then we have Samantha LaRusso who did not come out of the high school fight at the end of Cobra Kai season two unscathed. She is suffering from PTSD and does her best to hide it. On top of that she is also avoiding Tory Nichols, the girl who wounded her arm and was ready to kick her to death. At least it seemed so to me.
Samantha’s PTSD was very well portrayed during a fight in the bowling ally. While Dimitri fell into the hands of Hawk and broke his arm, Samantha’s PTSD got the best of her and couldn’t lift a finger. This is one of the best scenes of the entire season in my opinion. So props to Mary Mouser for portraying it so well.
Tory Nichols quit karate after the high school fight and is taking care of her mother who is very ill. She is sexually intimidated by her landlord after she can’t pay the rent for two consecutive months. John Kreese however comes to the ‘rescue’. He wins Tory over to come back to Cobra Kai and intimidates the landlord by threatening to cut off his finger. And thus Tory rejoins Cobra Kai with a vengeance. She still has a big score to settle with Samantha for stealing her boyfriend. But that never happened this season. Since the ending of the season said there would be a big karate tournament in season four I am guessing the score will be settled in the fourth season.
Daniel, Johnny vs Kreese
Kreese actually expands his power this entire Cobra Kai seasonthree. He gets his favorite students back and manages to recruit Robbie. But he manages to lose Hawk and Miguel however. So that is going to be interesting in season four.
Daniel manages to evade him and even be the bigger man when confronting Kreese early in the season but when he faces Kreese in the final episode of season three it looked like Daniel, with his new moves which he learned in Japan, was about to kill John Kreese and if Samantha hadn’t interfered, I am pretty sure he would have. And Daniel was winning big time, which showed that however invulnerable Kreese portrays himself all of that was gone when he laid on the ground and at Daniel’s mercy.
The big fight of honor and more will be fought in the fourth season during the big tournament.
The flashbacks of John Kreese were also much needed and it showed that Kreese has always had a hard time in life. He lost his mother to suicide and the love of his life in a car accident while he was serving in Vietnam. Vietnam is where Cobra Kai was born when John Kreese threw his captain in a pit full of Cobra’s in a fight of life and death while he was a prisoner of war.
The young Kreese may actually get his own show which means the Miyagiverse is expanding!
Honorable memorable mentions of Cobra Kai season three
So in Cobra Kai season three we finally get to see Aly come back to the show and we found out how it ended between Daniel and Aly. Apparently Aly was just in a conversation while Daniel thought she had a new lover. Aly mentions something important about Daniel’s character which is: Daniel jumps to conclusions which we can see all throughout the series so far. It is always Daniel who thinks the worst of Johnny while Johnny actually had no ill intentions.
The episodes that took place in Japan were so memorable. We got to see what happened to Kumiko, who apparently never got over Daniel. “I never found anyone who was willing to risk their life for me” she said. And thus she is still single. I loved it when she read Mr Miyagi’s letters and the peace it brought Daniel.
We also saw how Sato saved the entire village by taking the village by hand and turn it into a premier destination for tourism and retail. That’s one way to save the world!
Then the best parts came when Chozen entered the scene. Chozen turned from wild child into a very humble, albeit a bit bitter, man who was redeemed by his uncle Sato. I would love to see more of Chozen in the next seasons. Karate training by Chozen is not be taken lightly and it was hilarious to see how Daniel got his ass kicked by Chozen and what I predicted actually happened: There was no secret child of Miyagi like so many fan theorists advocated. There were secret scrolls just like I said!
Did you know that the actor who plays Chozen, Yuji Okumoto, is married in real life to the actress who plays Kumiko? Who knew that the Karate Kid also worked as a dating service? Here is a hilarious mini movie of a Chozen reenactment featuring the both of them.
Have you binged Cobra Kai season three? What did you think of it? Leave a comment and let us know!
