This is one of my favorite shows ever made and when it came out on YouTube in 2018, I subscribed to YouTube Premium for it, being the only time I subscribed to something for one show.
This season is why I love the show and really is why such a weird pitch became so popular.
First up, the cons without any spoilers.
YouTube leaks
Sort of a complaint here, but the show had a premiere and wasn’t clear on rules, so several people recorded and leaked a lot of stuff on YouTube.
Made it so whenever I went on YouTube, I’d scroll through stuff and just the titles were spoilers.
There’s a pro and con to this. The pro is they made a show worth spoiling. Con is Netflix internally couldn’t stop this.
Lack of breathing room
The third season ends on a big cliff hanger and a very central mission to the story.
It’s a really good story, but where the other seasons had some more casual episodes, this didn’t have that as much.
One new old character
There’s a new character brought back from one of the original movies, who was a little too eccentric and lead to bad reviews.
He has his moments and looks like they have a plan for him with season 5, but a lot of the time in season 4, it feels like he’s taking up space.
Plus, having some eccentric long haired guy who likes to talk on screen is a little surreal for me.
Pros
The characters
The show already had a big cast ending season 3, but took a risk expanding it.
They added one new character which was a totally new storyline that could have been a waste of space. Hell, the second episode didn’t have some core characters to focus on this one. It worked extremely well, got the perfect amount of screen time and made sense.
Besides that, I can’t say I saw one character or storyline that didn’t get the perfect amount of time.
Intensity over little things
This isn’t a story where the world ends or there’s any ridiculous consequences.
It’s simpler and that’s why I think this show always works so well, because they can make smaller issues feel intense very easily.
General story
While a lot is going on and it takes some of the relax time shows should have, the second half of the season perfectly nails this thing and gets every character perfect screen time.
It builds this cool atmosphere which has heart, humor, fun and just works really well for a beginning that has a lot of questions and gives good answers.
Final thoughts
I had a meeting once with the series co-creator Jon Hurwitz once not related to the show.
Naturally I got my 20 minutes to fan boy, because Cobra Kai was still a point to the conversation.
Mentioned that I feel he captured something so perfectly, if Disney approached the Star Wars sequels or Warner did the Harry Potter prequels like he handled Karate Kid, they’d both have had more success.
Knows how to praise what was loved.
Knows how to introduce amazing new characters.
Knows how to create a familiar, but not identical story.
Knows how to make fun of itself and recognize the campiness of the original.
Knows Cobra Kai
Season 5 is already finished and renewed for season 6.
Not sure how long they can really keep this going on, but they are 4 for 4 now.