See The New Sensei For Cobra Kai Season 5
Cobra Kai season 5 continues the hugely successful revival of The Karate Kid by introducing a mysterious new martial arts master.
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Cobra Kai season 5 is beginning to get into shape, much like Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio)having to complete a montage of various activities in order to defeat his nemesis of the specific moment. The YouTube Red original series turned Netflix darling has had a shockingly good run so far for the revival of a franchise that sputtered out in 1994 with Hilary Swank’s The Next Karate Kid. Even as each season brings back characters from the original movies, new characters are being introduced and it looks like we have another potentially evil sensei to deal with. According to Deadline, Australian actor Alicia Hannah-Kim has been cast in Cobra Kai season 5 as Kim Da-Eun, a South Korean martial arts instructor in league with the protagonists’ enemies. Check out her moves:
As of the conclusion of Cobra Kai’s fourth season, Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith) betrayed his former Vietnam War comrade John Kreese (Martin Rove) and had him framed for the savage beating of a former Cobra Kai member (Paul Walter Hauser). This allowed Silver to take over the Cobra Kai dojo and proceed with his plans to franchise it as an organization for evil; over the course of The Karate Kid franchise, Cobra Kai has swung wildly back and forth as being either unbeatable or a shell of itself, potentially good or definitely bad, so we will have to see where it goes in Cobra Kai season 5.
Terry Silver was first introduced in The Karate Kid Part III as a devious businessman and martial artist who was secretly in league with Kreese to turn Daniel Russo into a bad guy. It appears that Cobra Kai season 5 will turn him into the current central villain and that Alicia Hannah-Kim’s Kim Da-Eun is part of some master plan. It also seems like we may see the return of fellow Karate Kid Part III antagonist Mike Barnes (Sean Kanen), given that Silver hinted at digging up “an old friend or two” to run Cobra Kai in the season 4 finale.
Cobra Kai season 5 will also be promoting Dallas Dupree Young to a series regular. He was introduced as Kenny Payne in season four, a classmate of Daniel’s son Anthony (Griffin Santopietro). After spending the season being bullied by Anthony, Kenny was trained by Johnny Lawrence’s (William Zabka) son Kenny (Tanner Buchanan) in karate, which he eventually uses to turn evil and embrace the Cobra Kai mantra of “no mercy.” Much as in the original movie, Cobra Kai has some way-too-intense teenagers.
Currently, Cobra Kai holds an excellent 93% Critics rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The series has done shockingly well for a revival of a series that was popular in the 1980s but never particularly critically well regarded. It feels like Cobra Kai season 5 will keep the streak going, as long as they have mysterious new martial artists to introduce and complex, multi-generational high school relationships to keep examining. Cobra Kai season 5 is scheduled to premiere on Netflix on September 9.
