Cobra Kai (Season 5)

Creators: Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg
Starring: Ralph Macchio, William Zabka, Courtney Henggeler, Xolo Maridueña, Tanner Buchanan, Mary Mouser, Jacob Bertrand, Peyton List, Dallas Dupree Young, Vanessa Rubio, Thomas Ian Griffith, Martin Kove, Yuji Okumoto, Alicia Hannah-Kim, Oona O'Brien, Joe Seo, Griffin Santopietro, Paul Walter Hauser, Sean Kanan, Robyn Lively, Luis Roberto Guzmán
Original Airdate: 2022 

**The Following Review Contains Plot Spoilers For The Fifth Season Of Cobra Kai **

★★★ ½ (out of ★★★★)

Having now wrapped its fifth season, Netflix's Cobra Kai still shows absolutely no signs of slowing down. While it's already common knowledge just how good this Karate Kid continuation is, showrunners Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg are constantly readjusting and evolving the story to keep it fresh. So even if the series already has an established creative voice and tone we're accustomed to, they're still finding new ways to continually top themselves. This latest batch of episodes are no exception, as the writers turn obstacles into opportunity, navigating their way around potential issues many assumed could become major pitfalls the longer this went. Inevitably facing some criticism from diehards insisting it's veered too far into comedy or devolved into a typical "teen show," they've wisely stayed the course, delivering the same high quality entertainment.  

Whereas last season seemed to take the characters in different directions that came together in a really clever cliffhanger, these episodes have a more singular focus that serves the storytelling and performances equally well. Nearly everything revolves around the sinister, looming presence of the show's main antagonist and he doesn't disappoint, taking center stage like a scheming Bond villain with his evil expansion plan. It isn't an easy line to walk, but a big part of the show's success has been taking itself just seriously enough, while still retaining a playful tongue-in-cheek tone. And now they've done it again, delivering a new batch of episodes capped with a bold exclamation point that leaves us wondering what's next.

Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith) is flying high after Cobra Kai's tainted tournament victory at the end of last season vanquished Daniel LaRusso's (Ralph Macchio) Miyagi-Do from the Valley, And after framing John Kreese (Martin Kove) for his own drunken beatdown of Stingray (Paul Walter Hauser), Silver's grabbed full control of Cobra Kai, aggressively attempting to expand the franchise while his old Vietnam buddy rots in jail. But Daniel's not quite out of the picture yet, enlisting former Okinawa rival Chozen Toguchi (Yuji Okumoto) to help take Silver down for good. Meanwhile Johnny's (William Zabka) traveling with son Robby (Tanner Buchanan) to retrieve Miguel (Xolo Maridueña), who fled the tournament for Mexico in search of his biological father. 

With Robby contemplating the negative influence Cobra Kai's having on his former protege, Kenny (Dallas Dupree Young), reigning women's champion Tory (Peyton List) is still wracked with guilt over witnessing Silver pay off the tournament ref following her finals win over Sam LaRusso (Mary Mouser). As Silver's strategy to eat up the competition and take the dojo national picks up steam, he recruits a skilled group of South Korean senseis led by the ruthless Kim Da-Eun (Alicia Hannah-Kim), whose grandfather's teachings espoused a cutthroat "no honor, no mercy" philosophy. Now with a cutting edge, state of the art training facility and enough capital to take Cobra Kai's vicious methodology global, a rattled Daniel will need to call on some connections of his own to cut off the head of the snake.

Silver's sole control over Cobra Kai ups the stakes for the entire season, especially given who he eliminated from the equation to attain it. While last season's power struggle with Kreese ended in Silver having him wrongly incarcerated, it was rash to assume the betrayed sensei could ever be "softened" by jail or even want to help Daniel and Johnny if he's released.

Kreese is still the devil we know, and as these episodes dive deeper into exploring the reasons why, Silver is still far worse, driven exclusively by his insatiable appetite for money, power and greed. The season's heavily anchored by Thomas Ian Griffith's performance, with the actor again given an opportunity to shift gears and play the maniacal Silver more cerebrally than he did in The Karate Kid Part III. 

While Griffith was by far the best thing in the franchise's underwhelming second sequel, he's now bolstered by a better character arc and story, allowing him to further build on the added dimensions he brought to the role last season. A master of mind games, the wealthy business mogul completely throws Daniel off his game, slithering into every facet of his life, jeopardizing the LaRussos standing in the community and even causing cracks in he and Amanda's (Courtney Henggeler) marriage. It even gets so bad between them that she has to retreat back home to Ohio to seek advice from her cousin, and another familiar returning face, Jessica Andrews (Robyn Lively). Most of this rift is due to Daniel being unable to just sit back and watch this twisted sensei psychologically torment a whole new generation of karate students. 

To thwart Silver, Daniel not only enlists the help of Chozen, but tracks down former nemesis and Silver pupil, Mike Barnes (Sean Kanan), the latest legacy character to be creatively resuscitated by the series. Fans will be surprised to see what he's been up to, his reaction to Daniel and how he really feels about both now in middle age. The part isn't huge, but Kanan's effective in it, and par the course for most of these returns, his presence fits into the story's larger context. 

Chozen emerges as a major player after his memorable min-arc in the third season, now living with Daniel and Amanda while attempting gain Silver's trust and infiltrate the dojo. Some purists may complain the character's being reduced to a foil or sidekick, but with his timing, facial expressions and deadpan delivery, Okumoto's such a natural in the role that it's hard to see this as anything but a positive. It's also easy to forget these are Chozen's first interactions with both Silver and Johnny, opening up all sorts of possibilities that the writers take full advantage of, especially when it comes the combustible dynamic between Chozen and Silver. 

It's become a series-long joke that whenever Johnny googles something, hilarity ensues from his inability to move past the 1980's and socially adapt to modern day norms. Since Zabka is such a riot doing this, it never seems to get old, but the ongoing struggle from the series' inception has always revolved around Johnny's potential growth, or more specifically, how much and at what pace. It's a balancing act since you don't want to strip away what's made him who he is, especially considering how that's driven so much of the show's success. 

Making Johnny less of a jerk is one thing, but you don't want a sappy, overnight change that takes away all his bite. It's a credit to the writing and Zabka's performance that it took five seasons for us to revisit this conversation, indicating just how careful they've been about this. Now the trigger's been pulled, with him not only reconciling with Robby, but even taking Daniel's advice to get him and Miguel to bury the hatchet. And after Miguel's encounter with his slimy, criminally connected birth father, Hector (Luis Roberto Guzmán) in Mexico ends in disaster, you could argue that it just reinforces for all three what a real family actually is.

Johnny's relationship with Miguel's mom, Carmen (Vanessa Rubio) is still probably the flimsiest, most overly convenient subplot of the series, but the best news is that they've somehow managed to make him an expectant father without heavily sacrificing the character's rougher edges. His attempts to find new employment and personally recalibrate in the wake of this shocking news comically shifts Johnny's focus in a direction it hasn't gone since the series started. 

Maybe for the first time since the original films, Johnny takes a backseat to Daniel, if only because his beef with Silver doesn't run as deeply personal. It's undeniably Daniel's battle, but that doesn't mean he won't still need help fighting it. This is an improvement over last season when Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang attempted to co-exist in the midst of Daniel and Johnny's predictable bickering. Having them go in different directions for most of these episodes before eventually joining forces again was probably a smart move.                     

Tory's allegiances are torn being forced to carry a secret that could destroy Silver's plan to have Cobra Kai take over the karate world through their potential participation in the famed international Sekai Taikai tournament. She could really be considered the show's true protagonist, as the guilt of knowing how he bought the win eats her alive, eliminating whatever satisfaction she could have gotten from defeating Sam to win that trophy. 

As Cobra's Kai's fastest rising star, Tory faces a choice. Much like karate came between Sam and Miguel, staying on this dark path would further decimate Tory's already shaky relationship with Robby, who already saw the light. The long troubled Tory is wrestling her own conscience and Peyton List knocks this out of park, subtly conveying the self-loathing and indignation Tory faces each time she steps inside that dojo. 

One of the most affecting aspects of Tory's arc is how she takes ex-Eagle Fang up-and-comer, Devon Lee (Oona O'Brien) under her wing like a sister, seemingly not wanting to see this girl go down a similar road. After briefly impressing as a new addition last season, O'Brien shines in a much larger role, with Devon contemplating if she still wants to be a Cobra in spite of the morally duplicitous qualities senseis Silver and Kim are promoting.

Miyagi-Do doesn't yet know how badly they need Tory on their side, but Daniel definitely needs Stingray, who's also battling his guilt over the Silver's payout to frame Kreese. Now driving Johnny's Dodge Challenger as a full fledged, card-carrying member of Cobra Kai, he's gotten everything he wants, provided he keeps his mouth shut. 

With Silver delivering on his word and welcoming Stingray back with open arms, there's little incentive for him to squeal, especially considering the potentially dangerous consequences if he does. But as badly as Daniel, Johnny and Chozen want him to flip, their biggest asset in destroying Silver is currently behind bars. 

Early signs point to a potentially rehabilitated Kreese being in a reflective, contemplative state of mind, attempting to stay out of trouble in hopes of an earning parole. And this prison stint gives the writers another chance to delve even further into the character's turbulent past and possible motivations. Kove plays it cool much of the way through, as we eagerly anticipate the moment Kreese decides to have his way with the fellow inmates. 

Kreese also has a great scene with the prison counselor where he emotionally cracks coming face-to-face with the ghosts of his past (including a digitally de-aged Johnny). But like everything involving him, you never stop wondering whether he's playing an angle. In the season's final minutes we discover he most definitely is. Part Halloween, part The Silence of the Lambs, his latest con job will probably earn a few laughs for its audacity, but that's Kreese in a nutshell, so it's perfect. Of course, if he held off a little longer he'd have been released instead of a fugitive, but timing wasn't always his strong suit.

The explosive, twist-laden finale ranks amongst the series' strongest, with Silver struggling to maintain a stranglehold over Cobra Kai as all his criminal deeds and dirty laundry float to the surface. Another action-packed, season-ending showdown takes place between Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do that seriously tests allegiances and loyalty, but it's Silver and Chozen's one-on-one encounter that leaves the more lasting impression after slowly simmering throughout the ten episodes. Johnny also takes the worst beating he's ever gotten on way toward Daniel finally settling his score with Silver in a very public forum, with Cobra Kai's future on the line.

If there's a criticism you could level against this season (albeit an extremely minor one) it's that the bench of characters is so deep it starts becoming impossible for all of them to get a focus, forcing the writers to pick their spots. They've done it well, but it's hard not to notice the somewhat reduced role of All-Valley champ, Hawk (Jacob Bertrand), which may be less a reflection of his importance than the necessary drawback of being part of such a huge ensemble. And aside from a couple of brief scenes of him enduring Kenny's bullying, you may forget Anthony LaRusso's (Griffin Santopietro) even there, while wondering if he's interested in karate at all. 

The show's always excelled at depicting the characters' constantly evolving interpersonal relationships, so it's likely all of these aforementioned moves are purposeful and temporary, with the writers prioritizing which stories to put the heat on at any given moment. If the challenge comes in integrating the stories of the original legacy characters with compelling newer ones, that's where Cobra Kai finds the key to attracting viewers of all ages to a franchise over three decades old.

There's definitely a formula at play here, but it works, proving the series to be far more than just a nostalgic one-trick pony. The returns, reversals and surprises just keep coming, with the show constantly managing to reset itself on an episode-to-episode basis. And it all always comes back to the two middle-aged men who still can't let go of the 1984 All-Valley Karate Tournament final, passing their complicated high school legacies on to the kids, both for better and worse. Daniel and Johnny may be fighting on the same side now, but it hasn't dulled the series one bit.