Before Billy Zabka was all about Karate in Cobra Kai, he played baseball and watched his mom clean the bathroom with Tilex. How cute was the 18-year-old in that 1984 commercial?
Back in 1984, we fell in love with The Karate Kid. Danny LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) became an instant sensation with a crane kick. While things turned out great for him, for Johnny Lawrence, the guy who he kicked in the face during that All Valley Karate competition, it was the complete opposite.
Something we find out in the sequel Cobra Kai that is now available to binge on YouTube Red. Lawrence is a down-on-his-luck sort of guy, who lives in a small apartment and works as a handyman. Life sucks for him, and it is going to get even worse. He loses his job, he gets arrested for getting into a fight with some teens who are beating up his next-door neighbor, his stepdad wants to kick him out of his place and some teens smash up his car.
Don’t think it can get any worse for him? It does! His car is towed to LaRusso’s. Danny LaRusso is now a big shot who owns several car dealerships in Los Angeles. He is a huge success with the perfect wife, the perfect son and daughter, and the perfect house. He has everything Johnny does not have. That is why Johnny wants to get his car out of his auto shop before he sees Danny. Since Johnny’s last few days have been really sh!tty, of course, he runs into his old rival.
Just when Johnny does not think that anything good can happen to him, something good actually does happen to him. He decides to bring back Cobra Kai and teach his neighbor how to defend himself with Karate. The student is now the Sensei.
Once Danny hears about that, he will do everything he can to shut it down. Proving old rivalries never die.
Another thing we learned, is you can go back to greatness. When I first heard that the show was from Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg, the EPs who gave us the Harold & Kumar franchise, I did not know what to expect. I knew I was going to love it, but I thought maybe it would be a comedy. It has it jokes like Danny gives every customer a Bonsai tree, but it is also pretty series.
We see how Johnny, who had it all in high school, has nothing in his 40’s. While Danny who had nothing is a huge success. All because of one match that changed their lives forever.
For years, we focused on Danny, but now it is time to focus on Johnny. Because this time around he is the underdog you are rooting for. If that is not a brilliant switch up, then I do not know what is.
Plus, it is so well done, everyone is going to fall in love with this show. Just like we did, all those years ago, when we saw The Karate Kid for the first time.
I know Pat Morita is looking down from heaven thinking what a great job they did for his legacy.
On that note, we will see old footage of him and the rest of the movie in this show. It will be used as flashbacks to remind us what happened in the original series. They did a really good job editing the old and new stuff together.
Actually, I love everything about Cobra Kai and cannot stop praising it. Make sure to set some time aside to watch all 10 episode. It is a quick, enjoyable binge.
https://youtu.be/jrHWQ_0uKI8?t=2236
Before Billy Zabka was the cool kid in The Karate Kid, he was a science geek in The Greatest American Hero. How much do you love seeing the 17-year-old as a nerd back in 1983?
Tomorrow on YouTube Red, The Karate Kid gets the sequel you never knew you needed and wanted. It has been almost 34 years since Johnny Lawrence (Billy Zabka) got his face kicked with an illegal kick (LBH we all know it was illegal) by Danny LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) and now we are going to see how that moment changed both of their lives forever.
Since I have always liked both actors, it is nice to finally see Lawrence’s side of what happened. By doing so, the executive producers, Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg, of Cobra Kai, needed to change up some of the scenes from the original for the series. They did so, by asking someone from Sony to go deep into the archival cave and find the raw video from the film. What they came back with was several seconds of never-before-seen footage from that fight scene and spliced it together for the show. According to them, not only did they use old shots, they added some new ones. Which, I am sure was easy for them to do because neither actor has aged a day since then. I wonder what they wax on, wax off on their faces to achieve the fountain of youth.
Anyways, I have seen the first two episodes and what I really enjoy is the way they incorporated moments from the feature into the webseries. It gives you flashbacks to their teen years without having to watch the movies all over again. Not that we don’t want to, we just cannot wait to watch these 10 episodes already. Which thankfully will all be coming out tomorrow. Guess what I will be doing all day? Cobra Kai truly took my breath away like a crane kick to the nose.
Remember in The Karate Kid how Danny (Ralph Macchio) was the good guy and Johnny (Billy Zabka) was the bad boy. Looks like Barney Stinson was right on How I Met Your Mother when he said that Zabka was the hero. At least according to the first full trailer of YouTube Red’s Cobra Kai that is how it appears to be.
Not only did we get a fuller look at the series today, we also know when we need to press play on our computers. Write on your calendars for May 2nd because that is when it is going to debut and you don’t want write this off. Plus, this is a must not miss for fans of the original and only Karate Kid.
Especially since neither actor has aged a day in 34 years. How is that even possible? I guess it was all of that Karate!
