So I was trying to figure out just why the hell i thought this season was so good and why I enjoy talking about it so damn much compared to other shows. I think I’ve found a good way to illustrate it by using both a bad and a good example of the story they’re trying to tell.

Warning: this post is long as hell and will hopefully be my last text wall on the matter...I started with the bad example first and not being particularly excited about rehashing it, the more coherent thoughts focus on the good example halfway through (message boards are after all meant for discussion and entertainment)

Season 2 is very similar to The Last Jedi except it nails all of the characters instead of having them do absurd crap that makes no sense. If Johnny and Daniel were doing crazy things like say Daniel trying to beat up his prize pupil because he’s going to potentially join Cobra Kai, people would be like WTF, this is dumb.

The Last Jedi is ESB except flipped. Cobra Kai is the exact same way, except flipped. There’s almost literally a polar opposite for everything that happened originally if one looks for it. Cobra Kai does something that very few reboots and adaptations do...tell a good, coherent, FRESH story while staying true to the characters. See, the Last Jedi isn’t a stupid idea, and it was almost fairly innovative really, but it’s execution was so...freaking...bad... It literally had moments that were so jarring it took you out of the movie completely. Luke’s initial throwing of the lightsaber over his head was an eye roll. Leia’s force flying around in actual outer space was absurd. Luke freaking Skywalker TRYING TO KILL HIS NEPHEW IN HIS SLEEP? F*** you SW I don’t care anymore. There’s obviously so much more wrong but those man, ugh.

Last Jedi seems to do the opposite of ESB to no purpose. What would happen if the rebels lost the whole movie but won a minor battle in the end vs the rebels winning the whole movie only to lose in the end? I surely don’t know cause nothing really happened to demonstrate the impact of those changes. All of the rebels are flying away and they’re probably down a major player (Luke in TLJ vs Han in ESB). We didn’t go anywhere.

I was looking at the cast and crew page outside of the actors/actresses. Almost everyone has very little previous filmography. It seems like Cobra Kai dared to do something very few projects get to...they hired very intelligent people who were heavily invested in the source material and didn’t micromanage them.

What makes Cobra Kai’s story so superior is their focus on telling a story with that “parallel opposite” idea. Their focus is to show the good and bad in most people with most wanting to not be bad while some are just past the point of saving (Kreese), have human flaws (Demetri), have never known anything other than the negative (Tory), or have problems that society itself corners them with (Hawk). In fact, most people aren’t perfect and are going to have some very murky good and bad ideas which result in varying consequences that are entirely random in magnitude. Something as simple as trying to teach your student restraint, honor, and mercy can land someone in a serious situation. Those seem like obvious virtues to live life by, but even virtues don’t come without consequences. Something as small as not hammering home those virtues even though you lead by example in that person’s presence can result in serious consequences. The whole thing is very detail oriented. The part that I think has me so emotionally invested in this particular story is how logical and well thought out it is while using a very popular and emotionally investing source material to STRENGTHEN the story. It’s quite remarkable, and the fact that a kid could watch this show and actually learn something from it only makes it all the more endearing. It somehow manages to both be new and stay old.

This show seems to be based on showing you a different narrative while holding to the basic premise of Newton’s Third Law:

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

This basic premise makes the show easily debatable. You can see reactions that each particular action or inaction causes, exposing such ideas as character motivations and character flaws/assets very openly. There is no chaos. Everything is happening because of the choices the individuals in the show make.

To cover so much ground with such simplicity in so little time is a pretty remarkable feat. To do it using The Karate Kid on a platform that is not known for quality original content is honestly downright friggin shocking. Good things can come from the most unlikely or misjudged places. The show itself preaches to the viewers what it preaches within its creative world by telling such a concise story.

This post was edited on 4/27/19 at 1:44 am