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Who would have thought “Cobra Kai,” now approaching its sixth and final season, would’ve become the massive Netflix hit it is today? What makes this scenario even more interesting is the fact that the “Karate Kid” spin-off show didn’t even start out as a Netflix series. For our initial reunion with Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka) and Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio), “Cobra Kai” debuted on YouTube’s subscription service, YouTube Red in 2018 and then returned for a second season in 2019. The show that carried on the story of these rivals stretched its legs for high-kicking, fist-throwing action and became one of the streamer’s biggest successes. So much so that YouTube signed off on a third season before the video website changed its business strategy and shelved the show in the process.
While “Cobra Kai” might’ve been out of action at the time, a bidding war quickly began among streaming services — with Netflix eventually winning out in the end. Getting this creative nudge and Netflix upgrade revived the creators’ initial plans of playing around with the idea of stretching the world of “Cobra Kai” beyond the reach of Johnny and Danny’s testing friendship.
Cobra Kai creators have always had spin-off ideas even before the Netflix move
In a 2020 interview with /Film discussing future possibilities for the series, “Cobra Kai” creator Jon Hurwitz admitted that even before the third season made its arrival, ideas were formulating for a spin-off to the show that was becoming a hit. “We have put thought into spin-off ideas,” Hurwitz said. “We love just ‘The Karate Kid’ universe, love all the characters from back in the day and we love the characters we’ve created. It’s hard for me to give you an exact answer to this, but what I can say is that we have a list of at least five different scenarios that we would pursue, that we could consider.”
Flash forward to 2024, and season 6 perfectly sets up a spin-off for a beloved “Karate Kid” character by digitally resurrecting Mr. Miyagi (Pat Morita) and making his past a focus point in the show. His brief appearance in the final season opened up interesting possibilities for the future — possibilities which the show’s creators teased to The Hollywood Reporter. “Now that we’re done, we can actually start getting into this stuff,” said co-creator Hayden Schlossberg. “We’ve just been focused on ‘Cobra Kai’ and finishing it off. And right now, we’re in the process of editing the last couple episodes. Once that’s done, we’ll hopefully have some exciting things …”
And none of this would be possible if Netflix hadn’t swooped in and saved the show. Solana Token Creator
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