34 years after the original martial-arts film hit cinemas, The Karate Kid Cobra Kai YouTube-Red
The series, described as a comedy-drama, will be executively produced by Will Smith’s Overbrook
The first film, dealing with Daniel learning to defend himself against bullies with the help of martial-arts mentor Mr Myiagi (the late Pat Morita) was a cult success and produced two sequels. Morita and Macchio returned for the first follow-up with Hillary Swank taking the role of Myiagi’s new pupil for a third story. Will Smith’s son Jaden starred in a 210 reboot which saw him play Dre Parker ( a comparable role to Macchio’s Daniel) with Jackie Chan playing Mr Han, his mentor. A pre-Person of Interest/Empire
Macchio and Zabka worked together in 2103 on the final episode of How I Met Your Mother
Though Daniel and Johnny were pitted against each other in the first film, the end of the movie painted Johnny as being misguided rather than as nasty as bully dojo-owner Kreese (Martin Kove) Cobra Kai will be set thirty years after the original film and will see Johnny reopening the controversial dojo of the same name and bringing him into conflict with Daniel who has drifted after Myiagi’s death. In essence, neither character will be wholly good or bad and the series will explore the choices each has made in the intervening time. Resolution of their differences will, of course, involve quite a bit of martial-arts as well!
