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Speaker 4: Hey, movie lovers, I'm Pete Wright and I'm Andy Nelson.
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Speaker 6: Hello and welcome to this episode of the Superhero Ethics Podcast. Today,
Speaker 6: myself and co host from Back in the Day special
Speaker 6: guest extraordinary mister Paul Hoppey, are here to talk about
Speaker 6: Cobra Kai Season six, Part two, the show that keeps
Speaker 6: jumping the shark and finding new sharks to jump, and
Speaker 6: every time we think it's gone truly ridiculous, it says,
Speaker 6: hold my beer.
Speaker 7: What do you think?
Speaker 6: I let me just start by saying, we're just gonna
Speaker 6: jump right in. We're gonna have lots of spoilers. As
Speaker 6: far as I can tell, a lot of people really
Speaker 6: love this section of the show, this part two of
Speaker 6: a season.
Speaker 7: I enjoyed a lot of it.
Speaker 6: Okay, okay, okay, sure, sure, but not in quite the
Speaker 6: same like, oh this is quality television way that I
Speaker 6: might have enjoyed season one. We've not talked, we've actually
Speaker 6: shared much of our opinions about this. I think though
Speaker 6: we're gonna be most on the same page. But let
Speaker 6: me just say, Paul, so full spoilers, Paul, what's your
Speaker 6: kind of overall thought?
Speaker 7: And for those who haven't seen it.
Speaker 6: Don't worry, we'll give you kind of a summary, but
Speaker 6: just Paul, part two of a sure.
Speaker 2: So, first of all, it's master Paul Hoppy. I don't
Speaker 2: like the word mister in general. And we're talking about
Speaker 2: martial arts. So you know, we're just gonna We're just
Speaker 2: gonna start there because half of what I have to
Speaker 2: say is like as a martial artist, very mixed feelings
Speaker 2: here because there were some spectacular displays of athleticism and technique.
Speaker 2: Most of it wasn't karate, and I'm pretty sure it
Speaker 2: is actually a karate tournament or kr they but like,
Speaker 2: you know, you've got a Brazilian team doing kapowera, You've
Speaker 2: got just just peep there, everyone's just doing. Most of
Speaker 2: them are doing taekwondo, Like, let's face it, as a
Speaker 2: as a taekwondo practitioner, like I know a bunch of them,
Speaker 2: like they trained in taekwondo. You know, I don't mean
Speaker 2: I know them. I just mean, like, so on the
Speaker 2: martial arts front, super not faithful to like what I
Speaker 2: would want to see out of a show about martial arts.
Speaker 2: But in terms of the actual choreography and stunts, some
Speaker 2: of it was awesome for sure.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I will say they to add to the cast,
Speaker 6: they got a couple of very well known martial artists,
Speaker 6: some of who have been already been trying to like
Speaker 6: develop acting careers. Others were just well known martial artists.
Speaker 6: They forgot to give them characters with any development besides
Speaker 6: two two diventions. But you know, there were some great
Speaker 6: martial arts scenes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So as a writer, I felt that, you know,
Speaker 2: like brand is it Brandon h Lee? I think, right, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm just I know he has a middle initial. Okay,
Speaker 2: it's h Brandon h Lee. And what's your name? Reina Valandingham?
Speaker 7: I think I tried to listen to a couple of times.
Speaker 2: If I haven't heard any interviews or anything, but are
Speaker 2: both outstanding martial artists and totally bring it on the mat.
Speaker 2: As far as acting chops, I don't even know, Like
Speaker 2: just the writing did not give them really anything to
Speaker 2: work with. And for other characters, seeing you know, characters
Speaker 2: who I've seen be well acted at points, I just
Speaker 2: felt like the writing was like, you know, you talked
Speaker 2: about jumping the shark. I feel like I always felt
Speaker 2: like the series was kind of there, but I do
Speaker 2: think it was kind of They jumped to the balcony
Speaker 2: railing at the end of season two, but here I
Speaker 2: think they jarked. They jumped the shark Nado like.
Speaker 7: See I actually am gonna say something else.
Speaker 6: I think jump the shark is something that occurred because
Speaker 6: in an episode of like late seasons of Happy Days,
Speaker 6: the character of Fonzie was skiing and jumped over a shark,
Speaker 6: and that people like this show has just gone and
Speaker 6: so for decades now, the term jumping the shark has
Speaker 6: been used from when the show has just gone far
Speaker 6: beyond any ability to call it realistic in any or anything.
Speaker 6: I think it's time to retire the term jump in
Speaker 6: I'm with you, I don't think. I don't think shows
Speaker 6: jump the shark anymore. I think they fall on their
Speaker 6: own knife. Because a character at the end of this
Speaker 6: in one of the most ridiculously convoluted, idiotic chains of events,
Speaker 6: presumably dies or possibly just massively by attempting a running
Speaker 6: jumping attack while holding a knife, misses and falls on
Speaker 6: his own knife. So that's my new term. The show
Speaker 6: didn't jump the shark. This has not only dumped the shark,
Speaker 6: this has created a new term.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and because it's it's self inflicted, like the injuries
Speaker 2: that this show does to itself. I felt when when
Speaker 2: the whole tournament, like I guess we're starting with the end, right.
Speaker 7: Well, what why don't I actually give a plot?
Speaker 2: Sure, yeah, so go for it.
Speaker 7: Try try.
Speaker 6: So we are at the Setai Tai Kai, which is
Speaker 6: I believe we're supposed to think in this part the
Speaker 6: greatest karate tournament in the world. It was referred to
Speaker 6: at times in Part one, I believe as a fighting tournament,
Speaker 6: so some of the like everyone fighting more in line
Speaker 6: with their national fighting style, although the Irish team didn't
Speaker 6: break beer pints and fight with those, so it's not
Speaker 6: quite that. But now it's described as a tournament, and
Speaker 6: we learned that all of our heroes are on Miagi Doo,
Speaker 6: Danny and Johnny are leading the team together, but Torri
Speaker 6: has betrayed the team and shown up with Cobra Kai,
Speaker 6: and Cobra Kai is now being led by John Crease
Speaker 6: as always. And also the Dragon Lady forgive me. I
Speaker 6: mean her character does have a name, if a very
Speaker 6: one dimensional characterization.
Speaker 2: The term dragon lady kind of offensive, and I know
Speaker 2: it's intended to refer to a role type that is offensive,
Speaker 2: but I actually think it's I think it's time to
Speaker 2: retire the term. The way I think Mary Sue is
Speaker 2: not really a constructive thing. But I know, the point
Speaker 2: being that the character doesn't really get a ton of depth.
Speaker 2: But I do actually feel like there's a little bit
Speaker 2: more there here.
Speaker 7: There's much more than some other characters.
Speaker 6: Yeah, what I meant is that like she falls into
Speaker 6: a lot of the stereotype of the sexy, villainous Asian woman,
Speaker 6: uh and how she's presented.
Speaker 7: But yeah, I agree that probably a poor term use
Speaker 7: of my my part.
Speaker 6: My apologies there, but so so, and we're trying to
Speaker 6: figure out why Torri is doing this, and everyone's upset.
Speaker 6: No one's acknowledging what we talked about h in terms
Speaker 6: of the last part where we thought that maybe actually
Speaker 6: she should have been allowed to decide how she wants
Speaker 6: to deal with the grief of the death of her mother.
Speaker 6: No one's taking accountability for that. We're just mad at her.
Speaker 6: And we're starting this great fighting tournament with tea from
Speaker 6: teams from all over the world, primarily Europe, which we
Speaker 6: see which we all know is a hotbed of karate
Speaker 6: and martial arts, although there are there is the team
Speaker 6: from mostly Korea. There's I had not realized this until recently,
Speaker 6: but the Iron Dragons, which the team that becomes important
Speaker 6: is from Hong Kong, even though I don't think either
Speaker 6: of the main stars of it are Chinese themselves, but
Speaker 6: we have fights, and some of the fights, right lewis Tan, right,
Speaker 6: we have some really interesting fights. A lot of them
Speaker 6: are these kind of group fighting challenges that are designed
Speaker 6: where it's like two on two or it's like a
Speaker 6: tag in tag out thing, or it's like knock people
Speaker 6: off of these kind of high rise things.
Speaker 2: American gladiators.
Speaker 7: It's basically American ladiers with karate.
Speaker 6: It does allow for cross gender fighting, which we kind
Speaker 6: of talked before about like kind of you know, it
Speaker 6: being interesting how it was divided, So it was kind
Speaker 6: of fun that that was allowed. And it turns out
Speaker 6: that one of the teams that everyone's really threatened by
Speaker 6: is the Iron Dragons, which is this team that I
Speaker 6: risually thought was from Barcelona themselves, which is where it's
Speaker 6: all taking place. Apparently the Barcelona Tourist Board I think
Speaker 6: like paid them to come because they're just lots of
Speaker 6: shots that remind you that Barcelona is a really great city.
Speaker 6: The training montage involves them going to all of these
Speaker 6: wonderful tourists spots. Ye that I was just tourist. Bud
Speaker 6: got the money's worth. But anyway, so fight fight fight.
Speaker 6: Iron Dragons are now a threat. Cobra cause the threat.
Speaker 6: Danny LaRusso gets kidnapped and locked in a cage.
Speaker 2: What are we doing? What are we doing?
Speaker 6: Because he's chasing down the legacy of Miyagi. He assumes
Speaker 6: that Chris is doing this, but it turns out it's
Speaker 6: not Crease.
Speaker 7: It's our old friend.
Speaker 6: Because no one stays dead, no one stays in jail,
Speaker 6: no one ever stays off the board.
Speaker 2: For long John, Long John Silver, it's just Silver. I don't,
Speaker 2: I don't, I don't, I don't even care. I don't
Speaker 2: even want to remember his name.
Speaker 7: It's just Silver. He's back.
Speaker 6: There's apparently like an Asian guy who is working as
Speaker 6: kind of like a henchman for Cobra Kai in the
Speaker 6: second or third movie and Danny Russo beats him up.
Speaker 7: He's back as as a thug for Silver.
Speaker 2: Terry Silver, Silver.
Speaker 7: Terry Silver, that's it, Terry Silver, Thank you chosen his back?
Speaker 6: The guy who uh Janny fall in season two and
Speaker 6: sorry in the second Karate Kid movie. Like lots of
Speaker 6: people are back Shenanigan's happen. Teenagers try to date each other,
Speaker 6: try to keep their.
Speaker 2: Relationships, arguably sexually assault one another.
Speaker 6: Arguably sexually assault one another. The questions of who is
Speaker 6: drunk and who is not, and who can give consent
Speaker 6: is raised, but the show doesn't seem to understand that
Speaker 6: it's raising them in a way that's kind of problematic.
Speaker 2: The show doesn't seem very interested in it.
Speaker 6: No, none at all, although I think we'll talk about that.
Speaker 2: Could come back. We'll see, I guess.
Speaker 6: And just get introduced to a lot of these characters
Speaker 6: who are very one dimensional. So one of those characters
Speaker 6: is Zara played by Raina Valringham. I think incredible martial artist,
Speaker 6: and she might be a very good actress. I have
Speaker 6: no idea, because her character is a mean girl, like,
Speaker 6: not a well developed character like Regina George, just a
Speaker 6: straight up mean girl who's also an influencer who spends
Speaker 6: all of her time when she's not fighting, being very
Speaker 6: flirty and being on Instagram or some Instagram like thing.
Speaker 6: Because she's an influencer talking down everyone around her.
Speaker 2: Which the actress actually is as well. Apparently she has
Speaker 2: like five million followers right like TikTok and Instagram or what.
Speaker 6: Right, But I don't think most of her content revolves
Speaker 6: around like can she steal the boyfriend of this guy
Speaker 6: from this?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I hope not. I think it's I think it's
Speaker 2: martial arts related, you know.
Speaker 6: I think she knows the modeling and stuff and that
Speaker 6: looks very good at it. So but yeah, so there's
Speaker 6: a whole plot line there, and Robbie uh drinks the
Speaker 6: first time and gets very drunk and then wakes up
Speaker 6: in her room and kind of she kisses him on
Speaker 6: the way out, and he kind of kisses her back,
Speaker 6: but it's kind of just out of it.
Speaker 2: He literally says, I don't remember what happened last night?
Speaker 7: Right right?
Speaker 6: In terms of that, I mean, I'm saying when he
Speaker 6: kisses her, she he doesn't like push her away or that,
Speaker 6: but he definitely seems kind of like very confused about things,
Speaker 6: which again the kind of like did she take advantage
Speaker 6: him while drunk? That certainly seems the implification here, and
Speaker 6: I hope that that's brought in some way, but not sure.
Speaker 6: But of course, with perfect timing, Tori sees that happen
Speaker 6: Torri had broken up with him, but sort of but
Speaker 6: not really but yes, but no, but she's upset about
Speaker 6: it because they're only taking a break. It all sounds
Speaker 6: ridiculous and convoluted. Yes, that's the point. Meanwhile, also, the
Speaker 6: character played by Brandon initial league aish Lee, thank you.
Speaker 6: He's the one who plays the guy from Korea, right,
Speaker 6: Hongkan fist.
Speaker 2: I don't know whether it literally means fist in that
Speaker 2: particular instance of it, if that's the idea, but yeah.
Speaker 6: I think And again, if the writers to decide how
Speaker 6: to write Zara, just watch the movie Mean Girls a
Speaker 6: lot to write his character. I think they just watched
Speaker 6: like nineteen eighties high school movies and high school bullies
Speaker 6: a lot because he's basically playing Johnny.
Speaker 2: So they watched the Karate Kid.
Speaker 7: Yeah. All he does is be like, oh, I am
Speaker 7: better than you. I will bet my hotel room against yours.
Speaker 2: I don't yeah, I don't know why that's what you
Speaker 2: would go to wager, Like what, There's so many other
Speaker 2: things to bet.
Speaker 6: He flirts with Tory, and he mocks the people who
Speaker 6: he beats by being an incredible martial artist. And meanwhile,
Speaker 6: the other guy from the Iron Dragons team kind of
Speaker 6: has a crush on Sammy, but Sammy of course has
Speaker 6: a boyfriend, and then he gets really mad at the
Speaker 6: boyfriend because apparently teenagers aren't capable of having.
Speaker 7: Any kind of rational emotions in these TV shows.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, in fairness, Yeah, I.
Speaker 7: Think there's a little bit more rationality possible, but.
Speaker 2: It's it's just not always there.
Speaker 6: It makes again, the show just feel incredibly unbalanced because
Speaker 6: half the show is, oh my gosh, can we win
Speaker 6: this high school tournament?
Speaker 7: Who do we like? Who do we want to date?
Speaker 6: And the other half is mister Miyagi killed someone right
Speaker 6: in the tournament way back in the day, and of
Speaker 6: the is getting kidnapped and Crease wants to kill Silver
Speaker 6: with a knife and then said knife exactly.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 6: So so there's a couple other plot twists there's uh So,
Speaker 6: it just felt incredibly lazy writing throughout the entire thing,
Speaker 6: like every bad stereotype you could go through all the
Speaker 6: way too. There's a Russian team that because Cobra Kai
Speaker 6: originally gets eliminated but then has to get brought back
Speaker 6: and how do they do that? The Russian team is
Speaker 6: caught taking performance enhancing drugs, Yeah, which causes the Russians
Speaker 6: to go utterly ape shit, and right when the actual
Speaker 6: one on one matches are supposed to start, the Russian
Speaker 6: coach knocks out the German head of the Federation and
Speaker 6: then just all hell breaks loose, and honestly, I was
Speaker 6: gonna say, jump the shark has been replaced with a
Speaker 6: royal rumble on at the Psychai Tai Chai until the
Speaker 6: kid fell.
Speaker 2: On the knife.
Speaker 7: So that's the plot summary.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so starting at the end, not the end end,
Speaker 2: but the last episode. I actually when they were just like, okay,
Speaker 2: forget all this, We're just gonna have everybody fight everybody,
Speaker 2: I was like, Ah, they've accepted what they are, you
Speaker 2: know where I remember one of the ridiculous fight scenes
Speaker 2: that maybe it was the Larusso's house, I'm not sure.
Speaker 2: And at the end of one season, one of the
Speaker 2: season finales, I remember we might have had a split
Speaker 2: feelings about it, I'm not sure, but I was kind
Speaker 2: of like, they're just fighting. That's fine, Like this is
Speaker 2: where we are, you know, like instead of having these
Speaker 2: little individual reasons for everybody wanting to fight each other
Speaker 2: and like there's these like rational things, it's just like
Speaker 2: all right, just everybody fight, you know, and it's like,
Speaker 2: that's just how they're going to end a season, or
Speaker 2: I guess in this instance, that's how they're going to
Speaker 2: end a you know, a half season, third season. What
Speaker 2: are they doing? What are we doing with these part seasons?
Speaker 2: Just call it another seas.
Speaker 7: Like I go, stretching it out as much as.
Speaker 2: We started this. I know, Stranger Things did Breaking Bad.
Speaker 2: I blame Breaking Bad. That's the first one I remember.
Speaker 6: No, I think it actually started because the writers strike,
Speaker 6: not the recent one, but the one, uh like fifteen
Speaker 6: years ago, because that caused a lot of like part one,
Speaker 6: part two of seasons for like legit reasons, and then
Speaker 6: after that a lot of people were like, oh, hey,
Speaker 6: that was kind of cool.
Speaker 7: Double the marketing, double the money.
Speaker 2: Maybe maybe that was like almost twenty years ago now,
Speaker 2: right that writer's strike, I think, I think so, yeah,
Speaker 2: But yeah, I know Breaking Bad used the we're gonna
Speaker 2: split season six into two half seasons, and it's like,
Speaker 2: why isn't it season six and seven? And also, you know,
Speaker 2: going back further, I blame Quentin Tarantino with Kill Bill
Speaker 2: one and two. But whatever, anyway, I digress. So I
Speaker 2: actually once they just started fighting each other. I was like,
Speaker 2: all right, whatever, like it's cool, Like let's just watch
Speaker 2: some stunts, you know. And so that, like I was like,
Speaker 2: this is obviously ridiculous, but at least it's ridiculous without
Speaker 2: a bunch of dialogue, you know. And one part that
Speaker 2: you glossed over in the or that you you left
Speaker 2: out of the extraordinarily unnecessarily complicated plot was the whole
Speaker 2: thing with Devin uh not poisoning, but like drugging Kenny
Speaker 2: basically so that he had to yeah, and then admitting
Speaker 2: what she'd done. And Kenny was already on the way
Speaker 2: to come back because Miguel and Johnny were gonna go
Speaker 2: back because Carmen was maybe dying, and then she was
Speaker 2: just fine and was like, oh no, go back and
Speaker 2: do karate boys. And actually that maybe had some of
Speaker 2: my favorite moments, even though the whole thing was ridiculous,
Speaker 2: just like the Johnny and Miguel dynamic I do believe
Speaker 2: is the heart of this show, you know. And and
Speaker 2: so it was like we get maybe five minutes of
Speaker 2: what made this show worth watching to me in the
Speaker 2: first place. But but then Devin and Kenny kind of
Speaker 2: like they're kind of cool with each other, and then
Speaker 2: they fight together, not against each other, but together as
Speaker 2: a team against a bunch of people, like going up
Speaker 2: levels in hystericcase. I don't I don't even know what
Speaker 2: was happening, like in terms of like why is who
Speaker 2: going where? Or whatever? Like, I thought it was cool
Speaker 2: that at least they gave those two characters a little
Speaker 2: bit of their two in terms of, like, you know,
Speaker 2: I wasn't crazy about the way they'd handled either of them,
Speaker 2: and just at least letting them kind of have that
Speaker 2: fight there I thought was cool. Not like total redemption
Speaker 2: or anything for the show or the writers, but like
Speaker 2: that was nice and I.
Speaker 7: Did like that.
Speaker 6: So, yeah, as Paul said, we find out that Karmen's
Speaker 6: been pregnant this whole time. Carmen is Miguel's mother. Also,
Speaker 6: I think she's now married to Johnny Ort least certainly there.
Speaker 2: There were either engaged, sure that they have a kid
Speaker 2: coming in Yes, right, I mean.
Speaker 6: She's right, he's the father, clearly, and everyone's happy about that,
Speaker 6: and she gets like something happens. They get a call
Speaker 6: from the doctors, and so Miguel and Johnny jump on
Speaker 6: a plane and then as you said, get there and
Speaker 6: then go right back, which is, by the way I
Speaker 6: looked it up, Barcelona to LA that's fourteen hour flights.
Speaker 2: That's long.
Speaker 6: I mean fourteen hour flights in like three days, and
Speaker 6: that is in great condition to keep fighting question Mark.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can say I've flown from New York to
Speaker 2: LA and from New York to Norway and it takes
Speaker 2: a day, you know, it's like and I mean I've
Speaker 2: flown to Korea and then usually we have a day
Speaker 2: before we do training because if you try and train
Speaker 2: the day after a thirteen hour flight, you're not going
Speaker 2: to feel good. No, it's just not going to feel good.
Speaker 2: It's probably easier when you're eighteen, but I mean I
Speaker 2: was like early to mid twenties when I did that,
Speaker 2: and it was, Yeah, your muscles get tight when you
Speaker 2: sit still.
Speaker 6: Airline seats have gotten a lot Worseman, he does get
Speaker 6: to fly first class one way. Yeah, and it's kind
Speaker 6: of funny the way that's all done. But yeah, So
Speaker 6: the point is when Miguel, we think is going to
Speaker 6: be taken off the board, there's a question of who's
Speaker 6: going to fight next, right, And I was really.
Speaker 7: Worried they were going to give it to Anthony.
Speaker 6: Oh, Anthony is the little brother of Samantha another LaRusso,
Speaker 6: and he's learned to be okay at fighting, and in
Speaker 6: this world, it seems that makes you world class.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeahh six months of training, you're good, Go fight
Speaker 2: the world champion.
Speaker 6: It doesn't, though, And I did really like, like even
Speaker 6: before we got that scene with Kenny and Devin, just
Speaker 6: the fact that Kenny was the one who was chosen.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it wasn't even a question. It was just like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: well Kenny, of course Kenny, right.
Speaker 7: Yeah, exactly, and they do.
Speaker 6: Also he gets some kind of a nice moment with Anthony,
Speaker 6: although once again missus LaRusso proving herself not to be
Speaker 6: Mother of the Year.
Speaker 2: Yeah, in my mind it was. It was pretty weird.
Speaker 6: But she basically makes Anthony apologized for something he very
Speaker 6: clearly didn't do, and then his response is that he's
Speaker 6: gonna poison himself with laxatives as well in solidarity, which
Speaker 6: I don't get.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think he's he's taking responsibility for having
Speaker 2: bullied Kenny because he did. That was real, He bullied Kenny.
Speaker 2: He didn't do this one last thing, But it's not
Speaker 2: that he should apologize for doing that thing, but that
Speaker 2: thing did lead to Kenny getting bullied more and so
Speaker 2: taking responsibility for the bullying he did and saying, Hey,
Speaker 2: I understand that what I did wasn't right and I
Speaker 2: can't undo it, but I'm going to do something horrible
Speaker 2: to myself that you can then make fun of me for.
Speaker 2: I'm going to embarrass myself in a way that you know,
Speaker 2: is basically trying to kind of you know, I'm not
Speaker 2: gonna maybe take a video of it and post it
Speaker 2: on social media. But like I I kind of appreciated that,
Speaker 2: Like I actually sort of thought that made I feel
Speaker 2: like maybe Henny would have been like, all right, all right,
Speaker 2: we're good, We're good. You don't have to actually drink
Speaker 2: the whole thing. But like I mean, I guess he
Speaker 2: was pretty mad still, So see.
Speaker 7: I actually thought he kind of did what.
Speaker 6: It was funny is the Kennedy base, Like, while Anthony
Speaker 6: is saying this, Kenny takes the phone call from Devin
Speaker 6: and finds out that it was her. So Kenny is like, an, yeah,
Speaker 6: He's like whatever, d Yeah, And I was worried We're
Speaker 6: gonna get a lot more about Anthony doing that. Yeah,
Speaker 6: he'd already had a couple other stuff of middle school
Speaker 6: not high school humor, but fair enough, we moved on.
Speaker 6: But yeah, that was a nice moment, and there is
Speaker 6: a nice Dmitri is a kind of a schmuck through
Speaker 6: a lot of the seas.
Speaker 7: He dances with a pretty girl.
Speaker 6: Which is not like he is taking his cheating in
Speaker 6: a way that kind of made me raise my eyebrows
Speaker 6: and roll my eyes, but whatever, but he's also being
Speaker 6: a dick of it having gotten into mit And then
Speaker 6: when Kenny comes back, he's immediately like, oh, Kenny's gonna
Speaker 6: be a trader.
Speaker 7: Kenny's gonna be a trader.
Speaker 6: And kind of because of that, Kenny's well maybe I
Speaker 6: should be a trader. And so we're like, maybe it
Speaker 6: should be a trader. And they do a nice thing
Speaker 6: of Kenny, like jumping into one of those fights and
Speaker 6: like taking up two guys pretty quickly, and I was
Speaker 6: just like, Okay, good justice for Kenny because I liked
Speaker 6: him a lot.
Speaker 2: And I felt like there was with all of the
Speaker 2: stuff going on, I was like, you can't have like
Speaker 2: thirty seconds for like Dimitrian Hawk to acknowledge that like
Speaker 2: they were wrong, you know, because how kind of bought
Speaker 2: into what Dimitri was selling Eli, and so it was
Speaker 2: just kind of like I felt like that was a beat,
Speaker 2: a story beat that was missing.
Speaker 6: You know, they acknowledge it to each other, right, but
Speaker 6: them to like exactly, Kenny, well.
Speaker 2: Done, exactly, you know, like sorry, like an apology, you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: ten seconds. Even geez Toy.
Speaker 7: Is once again shipped on by the whole show.
Speaker 2: I don't know, I'm not as I'm not as sold
Speaker 2: on that, Okay, I I don't know. I don't think
Speaker 2: she's necessarily I think that might be your interpretation of
Speaker 2: what they're trying to put out there. I feel like
Speaker 2: I thought she came off as reasonable, and I felt
Speaker 2: like the show understood that to an extent, and that
Speaker 2: the that part of it was the Miaguito people kind
Speaker 2: of accepting her choice to something like that. It was
Speaker 2: them dealing with their reaction as opposed to you know.
Speaker 2: And I mean, like, I think the way she went
Speaker 2: about it wasn't great, but the way they went about
Speaker 2: it wasn't great either. And I do think I mean
Speaker 2: at the end, she just kind of turned back to
Speaker 2: like teaming up with them, you know, when when it
Speaker 2: like you know, when it was going down, when it
Speaker 2: was like no longer a tournament, when it's like, okay,
Speaker 2: we're fighting for real now, Okay, I'm on your I'm
Speaker 2: on your side.
Speaker 6: You know, I should have been clear when I say
Speaker 6: shad On, I don't mean that I think they make
Speaker 6: her make bad decisions, they make her the bad guy.
Speaker 6: I mean that, like, continuing the trend of the last
Speaker 6: four seasons, bad things happened to her and she can't win.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, yeah, that that's what I meant, because and
Speaker 6: like in terms of her kind of like getting that redemption, Like, yeah,
Speaker 6: I I agree with you that it seems that they
Speaker 6: kind of forgive her and they kind of understand her.
Speaker 7: And you're right, I.
Speaker 6: Don't think the show thinks that she was like horrible,
Speaker 6: but it does seem like it's like, oh, you were
Speaker 6: in your grief and you made a dumb decision and
Speaker 6: we're okay with that, instead of like.
Speaker 7: The Larusso's were really horrible to you and should have let.
Speaker 6: You fight when you like, there's just never been that acknowledgment. Yeah,
Speaker 6: but that's yeah, I heard go on.
Speaker 2: Oh just I just I guess I kind of disagree
Speaker 2: on maybe how they mean it or like, I don't
Speaker 2: think they are showing it to be like that she
Speaker 2: did make a bad decision, but like that's fair, but
Speaker 2: definitely they don't get the she doesn't get the kind
Speaker 2: of acknowledgment from everyone else that like, you know, she
Speaker 2: made her choice and like that's her choice to make
Speaker 2: and you.
Speaker 7: Know, right, No, I think I think it's clearly true.
Speaker 6: And and the Cobra Kai team is portrayed like quant Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 6: Kuan is definitely just like I said, just kind of
Speaker 6: like a dick and he's hitting on her and she's
Speaker 6: annoyed by that. But we do get a nice kind
Speaker 6: of some development from Kim, including her having this kind
Speaker 6: of hilarious episode where her and Chosen are both looking
Speaker 6: for their kids and keep running into each other, right,
Speaker 6: and then get into the and there's just this kind
Speaker 6: of like building tension and then they like fight and
Speaker 6: fight and fight and kiss. Yeah, and it was really
Speaker 6: kind of nice and like, and she gets to have
Speaker 6: a couple of nice moments with Toy where it's still like, Okay,
Speaker 6: you're not Miyagi Doo by any means, but like before
Speaker 6: she'd been like Tori, I don't care what's happening to you.
Speaker 6: But then she kind of gets hurt by Chosen a
Speaker 6: little bit as well, and she kind of looks at
Speaker 6: Tory and be like, yes, they will break our heart,
Speaker 6: they betray.
Speaker 7: Them to make all that take that anger. Yeah, which
Speaker 7: was an interesting moment for sure.
Speaker 2: And I feel like she also she was the leader
Speaker 2: of Cobra Kai, right, right, And then then Chris comes
Speaker 2: in and he's like, no, I'm going to be the
Speaker 2: leader of Cobra Kai. But like, I feel like the
Speaker 2: arc that if I mean, I mean, we'll get to
Speaker 2: like I don't even know if I want to contemplate
Speaker 2: the third part, but I feel like a good, a
Speaker 2: good ending to the series would be like her and
Speaker 2: Chosen running Cobra Kai or something. Yeah, I can see
Speaker 2: you know, or even Johnny you know, like I mean,
Speaker 2: because I feel like the show is called Cobra Kai
Speaker 2: and their tagline is Cobra Kaind never dies, right.
Speaker 6: And I will say that I was worried early in
Speaker 6: the season because but when the when this part of
Speaker 6: the season starts, we're pretty solid in the world of
Speaker 6: Miagito good Cobra Kai bad, and that has been very
Speaker 6: tied up with a lot of Danny good Johnny bad,
Speaker 6: and I kind of didn't want to see that anymore
Speaker 6: because I was like, that felt like the whole point
Speaker 6: of your original Seasons was like, maybe that's not always true,
Speaker 6: and maybe like Danny grows up to be the bully
Speaker 6: and Johnny grows up to be a decent guy with
Speaker 6: some flaws, to be sure, and towards the end in
Speaker 6: this part, at least, while they're still very like Miagiedo,
Speaker 6: it felt like there was a little more recognition of like, yeah,
Speaker 6: like like Johnny's style and Danny's style both have some
Speaker 6: real merits to them, and that you know, it's not
Speaker 6: just like the Miyagi is the perfect way, and that
Speaker 6: both Johnny as a teacher, but also the style that
Speaker 6: he's dedicated to, which is much more cobra kai, has
Speaker 6: some real value and merit beyond it being you know,
Speaker 6: sweep the leg and bribe the judge, you know, all
Speaker 6: this nonsense.
Speaker 2: It's a martial art, you know, And it's like martial
Speaker 2: arts are their own things. It's like a mini culture,
Speaker 2: and each art is its own art, and each teacher
Speaker 2: is their own teacher, and so you know, you can
Speaker 2: have an art and then you have a new teacher,
Speaker 2: and it's it's a different thing. You know, it's the
Speaker 2: same thing coming through a different person, but it ends
Speaker 2: up therefore it ends up different. And so you know,
Speaker 2: and I mean this is how martial arts evolve as well,
Speaker 2: where you don't have you know, one, It's like most
Speaker 2: martial arts come from other martial arts, you know, like
Speaker 2: these are different branches of the same tree basically, And
Speaker 2: so I think there's often basically being like, oh, this
Speaker 2: is the good one and this is the bad one.
Speaker 2: Is like it's like looking at cultures and being like, oh,
Speaker 2: this is a good culture. This is a bad culture.
Speaker 2: It's like that's not it's not really good, you know,
Speaker 2: a good way of looking at things. And I think
Speaker 2: a lot of times that doesn't mean you can't look
Speaker 2: at a culture and say, well, I think this aspect
Speaker 2: of this culture is very problematic. I think it's very
Speaker 2: harmful to people within the culture or without it, right,
Speaker 2: But that doesn't mean like that like one is good
Speaker 2: and another's bad. And and you know, I think Miagi
Speaker 2: Do is like I think it's mostly a good martial
Speaker 2: art and it seems like that's very positive outlook, you know,
Speaker 2: but that doesn't mean that that there's not room for
Speaker 2: something else to have value. And so I do think
Speaker 2: having Cobra Kai like basically being able to see the
Speaker 2: value in it and having the show come back around
Speaker 2: to being able to sort of display that value as
Speaker 2: opposed to I feel like that's kind of I feel
Speaker 2: like maybe there's a redemption arc for Cobra Kai the
Speaker 2: very much hope the school, you know, because.
Speaker 6: And again I do think like kind of like you said,
Speaker 6: like any like any culture isn't my atheistic, Any culture
Speaker 6: isn't monolithic. Many cultures are monotheistic, That's whole of the story,
Speaker 6: but like can have trends, and I think the idea
Speaker 6: of Cobra Kai is definitely much more a like do
Speaker 6: anything you can to win right, which there is an
Speaker 6: interpretation of that which I think is generally the one
Speaker 6: and very much the one that Johnny does says, which
Speaker 6: is what he means is like never quit, never give
Speaker 6: up on yourself, don't accept defeat as a possibility, and
Speaker 6: do everything you can within the rules to win right.
Speaker 7: I think it's understandable that.
Speaker 6: Some people would take like that the Cobra Kai philosophy
Speaker 6: would lead a person towards do anything you can to
Speaker 6: win means going outside the lines of the rules more
Speaker 6: than something like Myagi Doo would so, like, I don't
Speaker 6: not bothered by the fact that there are the Silvers
Speaker 6: and the and the creases who are involved in that,
Speaker 6: but yeah, I would like it if there was some
Speaker 6: level of like that doesn't mean that Miagi Doo fully defense.
Speaker 6: I mean, you know, it's kind of like the Jedi
Speaker 6: and Sith, you know, like or I mean the Sith
Speaker 6: is clearly yeah, but the Jedi are not all good
Speaker 6: good good, and like the dark Side can have some possibilities, you.
Speaker 2: Know exactly, and when you're specifically talking about learning self
Speaker 2: defense or you know, in the ability to defend yourself
Speaker 2: can also extend to the ability to defend others. Like
Speaker 2: once something comes to violence, it comes to violence, you know, right,
Speaker 2: and so you can you can temper that by saying, Okay, well,
Speaker 2: don't don't be the one who brings it to violence.
Speaker 2: But if somebody else does, like you know, win like
Speaker 2: you know, yeah, don't let them succeed in in leveraging
Speaker 2: their willingness to commit violence. Don't don't let that become
Speaker 2: a way that they can oppress.
Speaker 6: Basically, I think it's Captain America who says that his
Speaker 6: father taught him don't start the fight but end it
Speaker 6: maybe yeah, yeah, but seems like that's kind of similar idea.
Speaker 2: Mhm.
Speaker 7: So let's talk about the Miagi of it all.
Speaker 2: Ohagi, Okay, yeah, sure, sure, that's that's not even the
Speaker 2: worst part for me.
Speaker 6: But no, it's not the worst part, but anything. Yeah,
Speaker 6: so we get we get a dream. So we find
Speaker 6: out that like, uh, Mayagi fought in the side Taychai
Speaker 6: a long time ago. Uh he wears this captain's thing
Speaker 6: that is covered in blood, and uh we learned that
Speaker 6: he had killed someone in a fight.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that somebody, Yes, that someone dies, he thought
Speaker 2: someone in the competition and that person died.
Speaker 7: And there's no.
Speaker 6: Indication given that like he used like a deaf move
Speaker 6: that he shouldn't have, or like he didn't stop when
Speaker 6: like you know, time was called or something. Someone died.
Speaker 6: And the the German guy who was running it all said, yeah,
Speaker 6: that did happen sometimes, like we tried to avoid it obviously,
Speaker 6: but in a way that's kind of like it doesn't
Speaker 6: happen anymore.
Speaker 2: Until well, that wasn't in the competition that was Battle Royale.
Speaker 6: Although the utter lack of security by the people running
Speaker 6: this tournament might be mentioned in the numerous lawsuits that
Speaker 6: are gonna happen, but we'll get to that in a second.
Speaker 6: But yeah, so Danny starts having like and he gets
Speaker 6: sent off on a weld goose chase to try and
Speaker 6: find information about Yagi, which turns out to just be
Speaker 6: the plot to lock him in a dog cage with
Speaker 6: people who also just torture dogs for no good reason
Speaker 6: other than to remind us that they are bad, bad.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, it's just establish their awfulness, I guess, right.
Speaker 6: But the dogs get freed and get to like eat
Speaker 6: their opponents, you know, their oppressors, so it's good for them,
Speaker 6: Like Johnny's cold, like like the.
Speaker 7: Dogs, Danny, thank you.
Speaker 6: The dogs just like tear into the guy who's been
Speaker 6: like locking him up and he's like, you should have
Speaker 6: fed your dogs, and he walks out and I was
Speaker 6: one of those but but yeah, so anyway, and then
Speaker 6: Danny has a dream in which he kind of like
Speaker 6: sees himself fighting a younger version of Miyagi, and then
Speaker 6: like a cut to what I guess is an AI
Speaker 6: generated older version of Miyagi.
Speaker 7: Do you care about that storyline in the slightest what storyline?
Speaker 2: I don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 7: Okay, that's fair.
Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure that didn't happen.
Speaker 6: Yes there is there, There is no Miyagika.
Speaker 7: I'm okay with that.
Speaker 2: Uh, yes, No, So I don't care about that storyline
Speaker 2: in terms of like, oh I need to know what
Speaker 2: happened that whole time, I was like, what are we doing?
Speaker 2: Like can we just go and see a tournament where
Speaker 2: kids fight each other? Like isn't that what we're here for?
Speaker 2: Aren't they just supposed to be fighting. Isn't there like
Speaker 2: a tournament, like give me the pod racing, you know,
Speaker 2: But like they're like, no, we're gonna give you everything
Speaker 2: except for anything resembling a martial arts tournament, including what
Speaker 2: was supposedly the martial arts tournament, which, by the way,
Speaker 2: if you're fighting with no gear up on platforms that
Speaker 2: you can fall off of. And I know there was
Speaker 2: padding after the like super high one, but the earlier
Speaker 2: one I didn't really see padding. But like they're they're
Speaker 2: fighting with no gear full contact. Yeah, no one does that.
Speaker 2: Like if you do that, there may be deaths. There
Speaker 2: will be severe injuries like all the time, all the time.
Speaker 6: Like, like you think concussions have a bad rate in football,
Speaker 6: you have people kicking each other in the head without
Speaker 6: protection on a regular basis, Like that is a one
Speaker 6: way take ato concussion land.
Speaker 2: Yeah, people are gonna punch each other in the mouth
Speaker 2: and break their hands. By the way, if you knock
Speaker 2: someone's tooth out of their mouth, you're probably gonna hurt yourself.
Speaker 2: You don't punch someone in the jaw, That's why. That's
Speaker 2: why punch them in the throat. You hit them in
Speaker 2: the eyes, you hit them in the temples. The mouth
Speaker 2: is a very bad place to locate your knuckles, like
Speaker 2: you will probably injure yourself. And so the idea that like,
Speaker 2: ooh there was a fatality like fifty years ago or
Speaker 2: something is like, yeah, of course there was, Like look
Speaker 2: at what you're doing, Oh, that doesn't happen anymore. It
Speaker 2: would probably, I mean, there is fighting with punching to
Speaker 2: the head in various sports, right, but it's like bare
Speaker 2: knuckle boxing is something very different from boxing with gloves. Right,
Speaker 2: My understanding is it doesn't happen quite so much anymore.
Speaker 7: No, Right, it was not good for people. It was
Speaker 7: concussions box got Boxing with.
Speaker 2: Gloves and head gear isn't good for people, but people
Speaker 2: do it, but it's much less bad. And so martial
Speaker 2: arts competitions. If you're wearing no gear, it's going to
Speaker 2: be a stop match, which is how most karate is.
Speaker 2: And I'm not saying that none of this happens anywhere
Speaker 2: in the world, you know, and I'm not quite sure
Speaker 2: what you wear in muay Thai, but like my point is,
Speaker 2: if these kids were going at it with each other
Speaker 2: with no gear, like a fatality should not be a
Speaker 2: shocking result. It would be a terrible result. But like
Speaker 2: when you hit someone hard and there's no protective equipment involved,
Speaker 2: someone might die. Like that's just how it works. And
Speaker 2: somebody is very likely to get seriously injured in something
Speaker 2: like this, Like every tournament, there would be a serious injury, and.
Speaker 6: Especially those platforms, Like yet you're falling onto padding, but
Speaker 6: you're often falling head first. Yes, you can fall out
Speaker 6: that you phone your head, you could break your neck,
Speaker 6: you could break your back, like you could just even
Speaker 6: if you're like getting a dislocated shoulder, like like not
Speaker 6: life threatening, but like bad, Yeah, like would be happening.
Speaker 7: Half the team would be like unable to fight it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and now the show has had a general conceit
Speaker 2: that no serious injuries are going to occur by accident
Speaker 2: during martial arts fighting. That's basically been kind of the
Speaker 2: it's it's like a version of comic book violence. Right,
Speaker 2: It's right, it's martial arts.
Speaker 7: We won't kill unless you intentionally.
Speaker 2: Hit, right exactly, And like there's an extent to which
Speaker 2: I'm okay with that, Like that's fine if that's your paradigm.
Speaker 2: But then what you don't do is go and try
Speaker 2: and like raise the stakes by like having someone fall
Speaker 2: on a knife, because like, to me, the message is like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: once knives are involved, someone's probably gonna die. Like there
Speaker 2: was one fight where somebody had a knife and they died,
Speaker 2: And there were a bunch of fights that people were
Speaker 2: not at all exercising any caution and apparently no one died.
Speaker 6: Well, and let's tell the whole story of what happens
Speaker 6: with a knife. It'll be brief, but it's worth going into.
Speaker 6: So Cris has had this knife. It's a knife that
Speaker 6: he got from from the grandfather of Kim, who's like
Speaker 6: the grandmaster of this former karate. It goes all the
Speaker 6: way back to his time in Vietnam and he he
Speaker 6: the knife gets stolen, He gets back and he is
Speaker 6: just gonna kill Silver after Cobra Kai gets knocked out
Speaker 6: of the tournament and he's still planning to but then
Speaker 6: he finds out his team is back in it. But
Speaker 6: then all this fighting breaks out and he's like, screw it,
Speaker 6: I'm gonna go kill Silver. And originally, at least they
Speaker 6: sort of set it up as the kids are gonna
Speaker 6: have this kid fight, I mean the high schoolers, but
Speaker 6: still like the kids are gonna have this martial arts fight.
Speaker 6: And then often like a back room, in a locker
Speaker 6: room somewhere, Crease and Silver are possibly can have a
Speaker 6: fight to the death. But then like he does, walk
Speaker 6: through a room of a whole hunch of kids jumping
Speaker 6: at each other and fighting each other.
Speaker 7: He's not holding a knife, he just tucks it into
Speaker 7: the back of his pants. He gets knocked out somehow.
Speaker 6: And then the part that I find the hardest to believe,
Speaker 6: again because we have no characterization for him, like we've
Speaker 6: seen in the show other people who are raised in
Speaker 6: you know, borderline abusive, if not abusive situations where they're
Speaker 6: told like their only value is that they're good at fighting.
Speaker 6: Like Axel, who's the person on Iron Dragon, is kind
Speaker 6: of in that situation. Johnny was definitely in that situation.
Speaker 6: Silver was in that situation. Crease was that situation at
Speaker 6: one point, like it fucks with you and it makes
Speaker 6: you do stupid shit when you lose. But the idea
Speaker 6: that he would just see a knife there and grab
Speaker 6: it and decide I'm gonna go kill someone on international television, yeah,
Speaker 6: which because for some reason they didn't cut the TV
Speaker 6: when the whole thing battle Royale and again there's no security.
Speaker 7: Just to make that clear. Did that seem in any
Speaker 7: way believable to you?
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't believe of a fight like this
Speaker 2: would ever break out at a martial arts tournament like this.
Speaker 2: I mean, the only ones where I could see something
Speaker 2: like that happen would be where there was some kind
Speaker 2: of external political turmoil that like there were tensions that
Speaker 2: were like that like transcended martial arts.
Speaker 6: But like the if there's a Russian team and a
Speaker 6: Ukrainian team and an Israeli team.
Speaker 2: Right, sure, yeah, sure, Like I could see the.
Speaker 6: American team and anyone else who was legitimate reason to
Speaker 6: hate us, like whatever it.
Speaker 2: Is, but like it's but it's like the the whole
Speaker 2: animosity between all of the competitors is so anethema to
Speaker 2: the way martial arts, big international martial arts tournaments actually function,
Speaker 2: as far as my understanding and certainly in terms of
Speaker 2: my experience in a smaller pool fighting with people, like
Speaker 2: there's the real experience of like just beating the crap
Speaker 2: out of each other and then like shaking hands, you know,
Speaker 2: kind of half hugging each and like, you know, maybe
Speaker 2: some people grab a beer afterwards, maybe some people just
Speaker 2: sit around and eat pizza and chat about whatever. But
Speaker 2: it's like there is this real like you know, we
Speaker 2: fought hard and like we're good. And yeah, I'm sure
Speaker 2: that's not always everybody's experience, but like the idea that
Speaker 2: this tournament is this like there's this much animosity between
Speaker 2: all the teams just doesn't ring true to me. I'm
Speaker 2: sure there are times when it's true, and I don't know. No,
Speaker 2: the short answer is no, it doesn't feel at all realistic.
Speaker 2: I do think keeping the feed live is semi realistic
Speaker 2: because it's like, oh, this is good television. You know,
Speaker 2: everything will be fine. No one ever gets injured unless
Speaker 2: somebody's deliberately trying to kill them. Oh, you know. And
Speaker 2: there's a whole history of that knife, of the the
Speaker 2: jong do, which is like, I won't even get into it,
Speaker 2: but there there they were often used for suicide. Actually okay,
Speaker 2: and there's a whole whole thing.
Speaker 6: But he he starts out by pointing the knife at himself,
Speaker 6: and I had a moment where I was like, you realize,
Speaker 6: sapuku is not Korean, it's Japanese.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, Sadly, Korea also has a history of all
Speaker 2: those mostly women who were widows. And then if you
Speaker 2: can kill yourself, then you can never be accused of infidelity,
Speaker 2: and then like your family gets money or something. I
Speaker 2: don't know. This is this is not a current day practice. Yeah,
Speaker 2: this is you know from well.
Speaker 6: Like when he pointed that knife in himself, did you
Speaker 6: have that moment? Do you have that same thought for
Speaker 6: a second?
Speaker 2: Not really, I was just like what are we doing?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I was like what it is going on? I mean
Speaker 2: I was like, well one of these people is probably
Speaker 2: now somebody's gonna die because there's a knife, you know,
Speaker 2: Chekhov's in Jong do you know, like like great and
Speaker 2: like to me the thing there's two things that I
Speaker 2: absolutely detested about three maybe right. So one the fact
Speaker 2: that we have a oh, we're gonna raise the stakes
Speaker 2: by killing off a character in a show where we've
Speaker 2: never really killed off a character except like maybe the
Speaker 2: head of the Iron Dragons killed someone in a cage match.
Speaker 2: It looks like probably, but it was kind of it
Speaker 2: was a little bit like jet in anyway, Like, now
Speaker 2: we're gonna raise the stakes by killing someone, but it's
Speaker 2: not gonna be with hand to hand fighting. It's gonna
Speaker 2: be with a knife, right, which is like almost like
Speaker 2: kind of telling a lie to me about like hand
Speaker 2: to hand fighting. Like if you're trying to show how
Speaker 2: deadly the tournament is and how the stakes are high,
Speaker 2: then why are you introducing this external factor that's not
Speaker 2: really part of the tournament, you know, So like that
Speaker 2: felt weird to me in that way, so I felt
Speaker 2: like they're kind of cheating that. And then the second
Speaker 2: one was it's this, we're going to raise the stakes
Speaker 2: by killing off a character. We haven't given any real
Speaker 2: personality besides like one trait, and you haven't had that
Speaker 2: long to get attached to. This is just the tenth
Speaker 2: episode he's been in, right, So it's not like one
Speaker 2: of the recur you know, characters from not one of
Speaker 2: the main characters really, right, it's one of the recurring
Speaker 2: characters from this season. And then also like when you like,
Speaker 2: I've given them like a lot of slack, I think
Speaker 2: in terms of their both lack of and generally poor
Speaker 2: Asian representation, because I do feel like there really is
Speaker 2: a place for martial arts stories that are not primarily
Speaker 2: about Asian or Asian American people. I think those are
Speaker 2: stories that deserve to exist. I think that insisting that
Speaker 2: every martial arts story has to have a bunch of
Speaker 2: Asian people in it, I don't think is I think
Speaker 2: is kind of anti Asian.
Speaker 6: Also, and I loved that at one point they had
Speaker 6: an Asian character who wasn't into martial arts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that was great and then he started martial less.
Speaker 2: But like, ye, you know, and they've gotten better in
Speaker 2: terms of having more Asian characters, but when the show
Speaker 2: has been so bad in that regard in the first place,
Speaker 2: and it's kind of like I feel like I was
Speaker 2: kind of like giving them a pass and like, certainly
Speaker 2: not everybody had to, you know, and certainly there were
Speaker 2: things that are like that's uncomfortable, and I'm sure something's
Speaker 2: made some people more uncomfortable than others. But I felt
Speaker 2: like they were making some progress in that regard. But
Speaker 2: then if like the only character you kill off after
Speaker 2: being so bad on that front is like you know this,
Speaker 2: you know, Asian villain really without any personality beyond like
Speaker 2: I want to win and like I'm willing to do
Speaker 2: anything it It doesn't feel good.
Speaker 7: It doesn't.
Speaker 6: And to give a clear picture to those who didn't
Speaker 6: watch the show of what we mean by this, like
Speaker 6: there are teams from all over the.
Speaker 2: World, and there's sixteen teams.
Speaker 6: Right, it's never stated that there can only be one
Speaker 6: team from any one country, but apparently the San Fernando
Speaker 6: Valley is the only part of the United States.
Speaker 7: That cares about martial arts.
Speaker 6: But like they mentioned the other teams that they're fighting,
Speaker 6: and there's a Spanish team, there's an Irish team, which
Speaker 6: are played as villains too. For like if anyone's going
Speaker 6: to be like, yeah, this is all good fun, let's
Speaker 6: go have a beer, like it's the Irish team.
Speaker 2: The Irish and orange by the way.
Speaker 7: Yes, which which I did check.
Speaker 2: That is the thing. I mean, I know it's part
Speaker 2: of the flag. I mean orange and green.
Speaker 7: Quick story.
Speaker 6: Orange is the color of the Protestant settlers, William of
Speaker 6: Orange and all that green has been the color of
Speaker 6: the Irish. The flag was meant to be a flag
Speaker 6: of unity, but then kind of obviously it didn't happen
Speaker 6: because there wasn't unification in two thousand. In twenty two,
Speaker 6: I believe the Irish Olympic team or some some major
Speaker 6: Irish sorry, the men's soccer team. I think it was
Speaker 6: the World Cup in two that in twenty two played
Speaker 6: in orange and it was like a really big deal
Speaker 6: because the first time any Irish team had won orange
Speaker 6: in twenty five years.
Speaker 7: So I said, I was like, they're an orange really.
Speaker 6: But okay, but happened two years ago. Maybe it's happening again,
Speaker 6: who knows. But like there's a Swedish team, there's an
Speaker 6: Irish team, there's a Brazilian team, which great, let's have
Speaker 6: like Brazil.
Speaker 7: At least.
Speaker 6: I was happy that we're getting outside of Europe. But
Speaker 6: like we never mentioned a Japanese team.
Speaker 2: Yeah, which there is. There is a Japanese team, right.
Speaker 6: They just don't play any meaningful role. There's a Russian team,
Speaker 6: as we mentioned. Yeah, there's a Kenyan team. Don't remember
Speaker 6: saying much about them.
Speaker 7: Yep.
Speaker 6: I didn't see any other team from any other part
Speaker 6: of Asia.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, well technically Cobra Kai I guess is from.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I did other than other other than and I
Speaker 6: guess Iron Dragon is from Hong Kong.
Speaker 7: Yes, but I don't think they ever say that word.
Speaker 2: And no, they have a they have a logo. I
Speaker 2: mean they have the flat you know, the red yeah,
Speaker 2: the white whatever it is flower inside the red circle. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so so that's that's on the back of their uniforms,
Speaker 2: but they never mentioned it. And just for the record,
Speaker 2: like the Iron Dragon's team, their coach is Asian, right
Speaker 2: or Asian English or something, I'm not sure. And they're
Speaker 2: four non captains are all Asian, but then they're two
Speaker 2: like captains are both not Asian, and the four non
Speaker 2: captains just like take a knee and bow out all
Speaker 2: the time and just let the captains do everything. So
Speaker 2: it kind of felt like they were like, oh no, no, look,
Speaker 2: look we have Asian characters, and it's like but those
Speaker 2: aren't characters. Those are like what are you talking about?
Speaker 6: And Zara, Well, the actress is Asian, so I think
Speaker 6: we're supposed to think that she might be Asian, but
Speaker 6: she's South Asian. She's Indian and great, like South Asian
Speaker 6: representation is great, but it's it's not East Asian.
Speaker 2: And I mean, I think they're meant to be an
Speaker 2: international team, you know, And I mean Hong Kong is
Speaker 2: an extremely international.
Speaker 7: Chinese in Hong Kong makes complete sense.
Speaker 2: And I I liked him a lot actually, like a
Speaker 2: lot of the stuff with his character was kind of
Speaker 2: like what, I don't know. I just I actually enjoyed
Speaker 2: Mortal Kombat a surprising amount and I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: that's that guy.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think I suggested you watch it because I
Speaker 7: was like, this is really weird how much I like
Speaker 7: maybe the other Yeah.
Speaker 6: He was also in Shadow and Boone, which like, oh right,
Speaker 6: and like I wanted to like Axel, who's the male
Speaker 6: of Darren Dragons, But other than having a mild crush
Speaker 6: on Sammy and then getting pissed at Miguel but then
Speaker 6: coming to help Sammy in the fight, he doesn't really
Speaker 6: do anything.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, he kind of started to have a little
Speaker 2: character development, and then they're like, how about if we
Speaker 2: just give him one character trait for the moment.
Speaker 6: Right, and he has this like Wolf treats him horribly
Speaker 6: and he's in that like, you know, you have to
Speaker 6: do this.
Speaker 2: You have nothing.
Speaker 7: You can't do this.
Speaker 2: That's the that's the coach, the or the the sense
Speaker 2: or the leader of the right. Which then again it's like, okay,
Speaker 2: you have a team from Hong Kong, but Terry Silver
Speaker 2: took them over, just like you have a team from
Speaker 2: Korea which was like originally Korean but then actually but
Speaker 2: then was Chris and then was Johnny and then was
Speaker 2: Korean again, but then Chris takes them over, you know.
Speaker 2: So it's like, so you have like three teams kind
Speaker 2: of we're sort of from Asia and like one of them,
Speaker 2: one of them isn't like taken over by like someone
Speaker 2: from the US, and but we never see them, like
Speaker 2: I don't even know what the you know, like did
Speaker 2: like I don't, I don't know.
Speaker 7: They and the Russian.
Speaker 6: The Russian team is so they're not fine, but their
Speaker 6: their sense is are just like they're basically acting like
Speaker 6: rooted out idiots, like they're just so for some reason
Speaker 6: they decide in one episode, I think five people with
Speaker 6: five different accents call Sammy a bitch, Like what are
Speaker 6: we doing here?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm not sure that was all to her, but
Speaker 2: I think I think it's a lot of I think
Speaker 2: it was just people like, you know, welcome to Barcelona, bitch.
Speaker 2: But in like all these different I was just like,
Speaker 2: do we need this many of this? You know?
Speaker 7: Yeah, like it a lot, a lot. I kind of
Speaker 7: felt bad.
Speaker 6: I'm kind of curious the actress who played Zara if
Speaker 6: she was a little frustrated with that part, because it like, yeah,
Speaker 6: she it.
Speaker 7: Like influencers are a thing, and.
Speaker 6: Some of them you might have have negative issues with
Speaker 6: I have, you know, certainly some, but like I don't
Speaker 6: know these people. I just see what they're presenting and
Speaker 6: are in a media economy and in ironment that's encouraging
Speaker 6: them to be like these things that don't often come
Speaker 6: off well. And like clearly the actresses won and like
Speaker 6: she's using it to be an influencer in martial arts
Speaker 6: and she's a model and she looks really good and like,
Speaker 6: God bless her, what the hell's wrong with that? And
Speaker 6: the betrayal of her as an influencer is so shitty
Speaker 6: and like, like the only re exposure to what I
Speaker 6: have is from cosplayers or kind of have kind of
Speaker 6: like big influencer accounts, but they're so happy to lift
Speaker 6: each other up and come and support each other. And
Speaker 6: so she kind of is in an elevator with Sammy
Speaker 6: and Tory, no, Sammy and Devin at one point, and
Speaker 6: it's just like talking to her fans, like while she's
Speaker 6: live streaming, it's like, yeah, I don't even show. The
Speaker 6: people on my stream aren't even worth it, you know,
Speaker 6: like they're not as good fighters as me.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, she said, only winners, like I only
Speaker 2: tell the stories of winners, you know.
Speaker 6: And it's just so petty and like the way she
Speaker 6: goes at the Robbie and maybe assaults him while he's
Speaker 6: drunk or maybe she was drunk too.
Speaker 2: Or life vanished, however you want to say it.
Speaker 6: But yeah, whatever it is, it's it definitely seems like, yeah,
Speaker 6: it seems like she's basically doing it just to fuck
Speaker 6: with toy and also to have a like, look, this
Speaker 6: is a toy that I want so I can, and
Speaker 6: it just it just felt really mean to her character
Speaker 6: in a way that I just didn't think like the
Speaker 6: actress was great.
Speaker 7: Actress was an incredible martial artist. Yeah, probably the best
Speaker 7: female martial artists we've seen on the show.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I'm trying to I don't I don't want
Speaker 2: to totally sign off on that without being able to
Speaker 2: mentally catalog everybody, but like, yeah, that is probably accurate.
Speaker 2: I mean, she's phenomenal at Yeah, she's got like yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: I think her and Brandon ah Lee are the two
Speaker 2: most impressive. I mean, I think best martial artists is
Speaker 2: a thing that you don't know if you're watching the show,
Speaker 2: but most impressive in terms of on screen display of
Speaker 2: athleticism and martial arts martial arts athleticism, because like the
Speaker 2: what it actually means to be a good martial artist
Speaker 2: is not something you're necessarily going to be able to
Speaker 2: tell from someone acting and performing a choreographed dance, right,
Speaker 2: Like somebody might not be able to do ninety percent
Speaker 2: of what someone much more athletic and acrobatic can do.
Speaker 2: By the way, like everybody was doing ridiculous acrobatic stuff,
Speaker 2: like they just decided this is how they're doing it now.
Speaker 2: But like like Robbie and whatever, but like but like
Speaker 2: if that one person can stand there and time you
Speaker 2: and when you come on, they come in, they just
Speaker 2: hate you with a reverse punch, Like that's a better
Speaker 2: martial artist. And I don't care if you could do
Speaker 2: it five point forty kick you know, like that that's
Speaker 2: not that's a very cool thing. And in terms of
Speaker 2: like exhibitions and stuff and in terms of certain types
Speaker 2: of competition, that's awesome and can be great.
Speaker 6: But if you leave yourself undefended while you're doing that,
Speaker 6: then yeah, it's not good.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I mean not even just that, it's like
Speaker 2: that's not really that's not the thing you train to
Speaker 2: be a better fighter, right, Like that's that's to show off.
Speaker 2: Mostly there are certain things that do look flashy that
Speaker 2: can be useful, but like a lot of the most
Speaker 2: the most relevant martial arts skills are like much less
Speaker 2: impressive and it's really more about timing and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: But but yeah, she's awesome. That's that's the point, if
Speaker 2: that's what you're getting at.
Speaker 7: Yeah, and just that the character I thought was like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I I I doubt like she's super disappointed with
Speaker 2: the character because like she's twenty one, hasn't had any
Speaker 2: other big acting roles, and she got to be in
Speaker 2: a series that's quite popular and do tons of awesome
Speaker 2: martial arts, Like, yeah, that's true. You know, It's like this,
Speaker 2: this isn't necessarily someone who's been in acting school since
Speaker 2: she was two, someone who's been doing martial arts since
Speaker 2: she was two, you know. And I certainly don't want
Speaker 2: to speak for her, but my guess is that the
Speaker 2: majority of the actors actually probably feel better about their
Speaker 2: characters than we do. Like I know from what I've
Speaker 2: heard anyway of uh master Kim, of what she's said
Speaker 2: about her character, like really appreciating the opportunity to actually
Speaker 2: play a female sense, which they didn't even really have
Speaker 2: any of up until her, you know. And it's like,
Speaker 2: you know, we can be critical of her character or
Speaker 2: the lack of depth, or I do think actually there's
Speaker 2: room there for that to end up being a satisfying story. Also,
Speaker 2: I really feel like she had an Australian accent in
Speaker 2: the first episodes she showed up in and now I
Speaker 2: think she's doing a Korean accent. And I know she
Speaker 2: is Australian, but I don't know maybe her maybe she
Speaker 2: was always doing an accent, but it came out Australian
Speaker 2: and now it sounds more like a Korean accent. I
Speaker 2: don't know, but like I do think there's an extent
Speaker 2: to which, like actors sometimes probably try to find the
Speaker 2: most they can within the character. Not that there's not
Speaker 2: gonna be disappointment that there's not or that there's some
Speaker 2: things that they're like, I don't feel like that, why
Speaker 2: would this character do this? Like you know, we're doing
Speaker 2: this thing again, you know, but like.
Speaker 7: I'll just put it this way.
Speaker 6: Even ten years the actor thing, Zara gets to have
Speaker 6: a great career and she gets up to play some
Speaker 6: parts where there's also some acting depth or some more
Speaker 6: sure I could see her saying something like, you know,
Speaker 6: I'm always grateful to Cobra Kai for getting my start,
Speaker 6: but this character feels like a more accurate representation of
Speaker 6: some kind of like thing about like but yeah, I agree,
Speaker 6: like like for your start, Like I don't think anyone's complaint,
Speaker 6: you know.
Speaker 7: So we actually got a question in the chat from.
Speaker 6: Max Kelly that leads into kind of a we'll get
Speaker 6: to the exact question, but don't want to start with
Speaker 6: something a little broader. What will the final fight of
Speaker 6: the series be And what I want to start with
Speaker 6: is I've seen a lot of stuff online talking about,
Speaker 6: oh my god, I can't wait till like part three,
Speaker 6: because what's gonna happen when we get back to the
Speaker 6: you know thing? And like to me, like, these are
Speaker 6: kids right right, parents walking there or back home, even
Speaker 6: before someone gets killed, they have so little control that
Speaker 6: was happening. And I'm gonna keep harpening on no security thing,
Speaker 6: but like literally, when the kids start fighting, the adults
Speaker 6: have no way to stop it. Lots of people are
Speaker 6: gonna get hurt, and then someone actually dies on live
Speaker 6: international television.
Speaker 7: I don't think there's any way Like everyone's going home
Speaker 7: and and there's.
Speaker 6: Probably a lot of lawsuits being filed, and I don't
Speaker 6: think there's any way that like everyone's like, oh, that's
Speaker 6: really sad, let's have a funeral, and then two days
Speaker 6: later we're continuing the tournament, right like this is over?
Speaker 2: Eyah? Do you mean do you mean in a logical
Speaker 2: world that's what would happen? Or do you mean okay, because.
Speaker 7: A logical world, there's any way this tournament continues.
Speaker 2: Here's the thing, judging by the way they've conducted things
Speaker 2: to this point. Yes, yes, I think these people who
Speaker 2: decided that this whole thing was a good idea would
Speaker 2: start the tournament. Again, I don't think they would start
Speaker 2: it like the next day. I think maybe they would say, Okay,
Speaker 2: you know, we're gonna we're gonna take a week off
Speaker 2: or something, you know, two weeks. Oh, and then we
Speaker 2: have to figure out who's gonna replace the dead guy
Speaker 2: on Cobra Kai's roster. You know, Like I feel like
Speaker 2: that's like, yeah, I do feel like these people like
Speaker 2: name a good idea they've had, you know, and obviously
Speaker 2: the writers would likely just be like, oh, yeah, we're
Speaker 2: gonna do that, but maybe not. Maybe that is the
Speaker 2: end of But it feels like there's too much like
Speaker 2: un resolved, you know. It's like, well, is that going
Speaker 2: to be the end of that? And then like I
Speaker 2: originally what I was thinking is like this. Once I
Speaker 2: discovered that this was actually only the second third and
Speaker 2: not the last half, I was like oh, But like
Speaker 2: I was like, okay, what if for this third they
Speaker 2: go big and they do this big tournament and then
Speaker 2: at the end of the tournament, the third part is
Speaker 2: like this like dnumat of like now we're gonna go home.
Speaker 2: What happens when you go home after something like that? Right?
Speaker 2: What if you lose? What if you win? Like what
Speaker 2: if some of you loosen some of you win because
Speaker 2: you're on different teams or whatever, Like what.
Speaker 6: If Miguel wins but he doesn't get into Stanford? But
Speaker 6: if you know, like all the stuff that going back
Speaker 6: to their.
Speaker 2: Lives exactly, because I feel like the show started small,
Speaker 2: and I think it was good because it was small,
Speaker 2: Like The Karate Kid is the story of a kid
Speaker 2: getting bullied but also kind of being a bully. Like,
Speaker 2: you know, it was less than like rewatching the Karate Kid.
Speaker 2: It's less like Johnny's just bullying Danny. Like Danny kind
Speaker 2: of sticks up for himself and like does some similar
Speaker 2: kind of prankish type whatever type stuff back.
Speaker 7: He makes Peter Parker look polite, right, Like he talks back.
Speaker 2: He fight exactly, and then him getting threatened his safety
Speaker 2: getting threatened by you know, a group of kids who
Speaker 2: know karate. And then one guy teaches one kid karate
Speaker 2: and then they go to a tournament and he wins
Speaker 2: the tournament. And that's that's the story. That's the whole thing.
Speaker 2: Like the stakes are like, this kid's worried about getting
Speaker 2: beat up. He learns karate, he wins a tournament, and
Speaker 2: now he's not worried about getting beat up. That's you know,
Speaker 2: there's there's a girl, you know, that's the thing. But
Speaker 2: like that's basically the plot. And and then the plot
Speaker 2: of season one of Cobra Kai was like similarly small.
Speaker 2: There's a kid who's getting bullied and he's you know,
Speaker 2: kind of afraid for his safety, but also he's lacking
Speaker 2: the confidence of just being able to stick up for himself.
Speaker 2: And then you know, the guy teaches him karate and
Speaker 2: then he goes to a tournament and like he feels
Speaker 2: better about himself, you know, And like there's there's more
Speaker 2: layers to that. It's a series. It's ten episodes, right,
Speaker 2: it's longer than a movie. But it's simple. It's small,
Speaker 2: and the heart of it is this relationship between these
Speaker 2: two characters. It's not the relationship between Danny and Johnny.
Speaker 2: That's not heart of the show. You know. It's not
Speaker 2: between Robbie and Miguel's. It's Miguel and Johnny I think
Speaker 2: are really the core of the show. And I feel
Speaker 2: like seeing what happens after this big moment, because that's
Speaker 2: this whole show, is what happens after losing that big tournament.
Speaker 2: Well what if they lost this tournament and then they
Speaker 2: came back and he didn't get into store, or he
Speaker 2: gotten to Stanford and couldn't go or whatever. You know,
Speaker 2: it's like what happens now, Like do they run a
Speaker 2: dojo together? You know? Do they do that as like
Speaker 2: a business, like because like Miguel could teach by this point,
Speaker 2: you know, and so I feel like that would be
Speaker 2: an interesting story that I don't think we're gonna get.
Speaker 2: And to me, the last fight would be not a fight,
Speaker 2: it would be like some new kid coming in and
Speaker 2: like Miguel teaching him, you know, like this is how
Speaker 2: you tie your belt? You know, Okay, we now we
Speaker 2: say yes sense, you know, Like to me, that would
Speaker 2: be a great ending to the show. And maybe we
Speaker 2: will get something like that in a five minute scene
Speaker 2: or something at the end. I don't know, not to
Speaker 2: say that Miguel should become a karate teacher, you know,
Speaker 2: but he could, you know, And it's like he doesn't
Speaker 2: have to go to Stanford, but he can't and we'll see.
Speaker 6: Yeah, But like like I do think by this point
Speaker 6: it's become more of an ensemble show in a way
Speaker 6: that I mostly like, I don't like that Danny Lrusso
Speaker 6: has become such a big part of it, and and
Speaker 6: that we're kind of we backed away from the original
Speaker 6: idea of like that Larusso's kind of gotten a swollen
Speaker 6: head and becoming kind of an idiot, and Johnny is our.
Speaker 7: Very much a screwed up guy.
Speaker 6: Like I think he was just as much of a
Speaker 6: protagonist as Miguel was in season one, Like.
Speaker 2: You said, yes, the dynamic, Yeah, now.
Speaker 6: I think like, like one of the things I think
Speaker 6: it's been a running theme is Johnny trying to also
Speaker 6: fix his relationship with his you know, son, Robbie, and.
Speaker 7: That now like like there's always a.
Speaker 6: Father son dynamic between him and Miguel, but then once
Speaker 6: he becomes partners with Carmen, like he's now kind of
Speaker 6: a stepfather, And an important moment like where Miguel feels
Speaker 6: like he's favoring Robbie, like he says, like you're my
Speaker 6: son too, And so I feel like Robbie and Sammy
Speaker 6: and Tory have all become part of it, and yeah,
Speaker 6: I care about all of them. Yeah, like Sammy, Sammy
Speaker 6: and Hawk and Eli and all of them are going
Speaker 6: to be going off to colleges. Robbie's not, Tory's probably not.
Speaker 6: I care what happens to them. I want to know
Speaker 6: what's going on with them. Yeah, the whole kind of
Speaker 6: like you know, Hobbits go back to the Shire would
Speaker 6: have been great for a final five episodes.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I'm gonna.
Speaker 6: Watch because as terrible as I thought this was, it
Speaker 6: was entertaining and I never wanted like, I never wanted
Speaker 6: to stop, and everyone was like, oh god, I after
Speaker 6: watch one more episode, I was like, oh.
Speaker 7: My god, this is horrible, give me more popcorn.
Speaker 2: I watch it.
Speaker 7: In part because I was like rehearse, like, yeah.
Speaker 2: You're like, oh this is I'm gonna say this about
Speaker 2: this thing.
Speaker 7: YEP.
Speaker 6: One thing I sometimes do now, especially if Paul has
Speaker 6: seen something, is I will message Paul as we're going
Speaker 6: about things, I say about things I think of what
Speaker 6: we're seeing, and then often like I will watch a
Speaker 6: lot later into the night, Paul's an hour ahead of me,
Speaker 6: and so sometimes Paul gets to wake up to like
Speaker 6: two pages of Discord saying like.
Speaker 7: I was something to say, but a lot of it
Speaker 7: was very negative.
Speaker 6: But yeah, I I really want to think that there's
Speaker 6: gonna be some like Missus LaRusso has always been the
Speaker 6: one who is like, guys, I feel like she's the
Speaker 6: only one who's ever had the perspective on this, And
Speaker 6: I feel like like most of these kids.
Speaker 7: Have parents right right back home somewhere.
Speaker 6: And that most of them would be like, I am
Speaker 6: okay with you traveling around the world for high school athletics.
Speaker 6: This is a big deal. And if someone died in
Speaker 6: a freak accident, maybe I'm still okay.
Speaker 7: But a person died a because.
Speaker 6: People had no like the the the organizers had no
Speaker 6: idea what to do when all this fighting broke out,
Speaker 6: and also because one of the adults who was like
Speaker 6: officially supposed to be taking care of these kids brought
Speaker 6: a knife into the fight that they got a kid
Speaker 6: used to try and like try.
Speaker 7: To kill someone else and kill themselves.
Speaker 6: So if you told me that, like because we are
Speaker 6: technically in the finals, and if you told me therefore
Speaker 6: that like most of the schools went home and Cobra
Speaker 6: Kai was like, no, Cobra Kai never dies. Well, one
Speaker 6: of us did die, but Cobra Kai itself never dies
Speaker 6: and that like maybe even like half of Miyagi Doo
Speaker 6: goes home and that's why Toy switched asides or something,
Speaker 6: because like Dmitri's parents are not letting him stay.
Speaker 7: Let's be there.
Speaker 6: So yeah, but you're probably right, like we probably do
Speaker 6: have to finish this damn thing. So if that's the case,
Speaker 6: who's the final fight between?
Speaker 2: Oh, I don't care, like I seriously like in terms
Speaker 2: of the actual I mean, I think Torri will probably
Speaker 2: beat up Zara. I think I don't even like did
Speaker 2: they do start? Did they start the semifinals? Like I
Speaker 2: don't they didn't, So they got to the semifinals, turned
Speaker 2: out Cobra Kai was going to be in it, and
Speaker 2: then while they were setting that up, the head of
Speaker 2: the Russian team came over.
Speaker 6: And kicked the German, the head of the federation right ahead,
Speaker 6: and we all got started right right.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, So, like I mean, the Iron Dragons are
Speaker 2: obviously the best and they should win, like they're just
Speaker 2: like also just like I don't know, I mean, I
Speaker 2: guess maybe Kwan is just more like impressive and less
Speaker 2: like like I was saying before, like timing and stuff
Speaker 2: like that is more important than necessarily being able to
Speaker 2: do something fancy, but like him losing and something. I
Speaker 2: just it felt like you know, they're like they'll nerf
Speaker 2: and buff characters based on just the outcome they want,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 6: And so Robbie got his heart a little broken and
Speaker 6: lost all ability to fight whatsoever for the first like
Speaker 6: five episodes. Right.
Speaker 2: See that part doesn't bother me so much, because if
Speaker 2: you lose focus, you really can lose the ability to compete.
Speaker 2: Like that's real. But what can't happen is you get
Speaker 2: motivation and suddenly like you get superpowers. Like that's not
Speaker 2: how things work, right, Like you have your ceiling, that's
Speaker 2: the best you can fight, and you can fight that
Speaker 2: well when you're really focused and right, and some kind
Speaker 2: of extra adrenaline whatever can help you do certain things.
Speaker 2: But actually too much adrenaline can really interfere. But like
Speaker 2: losing focus, like getting worse, fine if there's like a
Speaker 2: real concrete reason, but like just randomly getting worse so
Speaker 2: that someone else can win because the writers decided. It's
Speaker 2: like I don't know that.
Speaker 6: I think with Kwan, I a little bit believed it because,
Speaker 6: like what you said about adrenaline, the sense that I
Speaker 6: got was that he was someone who was the best
Speaker 6: of the best, but also had on some level never
Speaker 6: really meet in his match, and that fighting Axel and
Speaker 6: fighting Miguel, and also like some of his other teammate
Speaker 6: Like there is a great scene I think probably my
Speaker 6: favorite fighting scene is where Eli and Dmitri hawking. Dmitri,
Speaker 6: who been having fights all this time, wind up like
Speaker 6: in this kind of the tag in tagout they're fighting
Speaker 6: another of the Korean fighters who's not Kwan, and they
Speaker 6: realized they kind of have him cornered over where Dmitri
Speaker 6: and Eli can keep tagging each other in, but they
Speaker 6: can stop him from tagging out, and he gets exhausted,
Speaker 6: And I thought that was like brilliantly done, and I
Speaker 6: love like him reaching out of hand and kicking it down.
Speaker 7: Really well done.
Speaker 6: But I guess I got sense that Kwan was the
Speaker 6: kind of person who, like kind of like Johnny in
Speaker 6: the original movie, as he got more and more frustrated
Speaker 6: that he wasn't winning, lost focus in that regard, like
Speaker 6: it became more of the adrenaline.
Speaker 7: It became more than like.
Speaker 6: No, I'm the best, I have to do this right,
Speaker 6: I kind of have to believe or also you don't
Speaker 6: believe he goes to the knife, right right?
Speaker 7: Right?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess maybe I would have to watch it
Speaker 2: again to really have an opinion on that. And that's
Speaker 2: not gonna happen.
Speaker 7: It's just not gonna do.
Speaker 2: That wouldn't be prudent.
Speaker 7: No oh hello hello?
Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, I mean, I like, who's even left?
Speaker 2: I mean I I do feel like I think Tory
Speaker 2: should beat Sam, yes, like please? And I forget what
Speaker 2: the matchups are? Who who are the Iron Dragons fighting?
Speaker 2: Are they fighting Cobra Kai or are they fighting?
Speaker 6: So it's the idea, is that this point that you're
Speaker 6: representing your team, but everyone's fighting as individuals from here on.
Speaker 6: And there are four teams left. There's Cobra Kai, Miagi
Speaker 6: Do Iron Dragons, and the Spanish team whose name I
Speaker 6: do not remember because we pay almost no attention.
Speaker 2: To it, thank you.
Speaker 7: So.
Speaker 6: And in the first match, if I remember, it was
Speaker 6: going to be Miguel against Axel and Kwan against the
Speaker 6: Spanish guy, and then it was going to be Sam
Speaker 6: against Tory Miguel. But isn't isn't Robbie You're Robbie Robbie, Yeah, Robbie,
Speaker 6: Robbi against Axel fighting for Sam's love, and then.
Speaker 2: Uh, it's Robbie not.
Speaker 7: Miguel, right right, you're right God.
Speaker 2: And then Sam against Zara.
Speaker 6: No, I think it's I think, yes, Sam against zaraig
Speaker 6: because then Inventory against the Spanish girl, I think.
Speaker 2: And then question Mark against the Spanish dude. I guess
Speaker 2: TBD is up for for Cobra Kai. I feel like
Speaker 2: that should be Miguel. Yeah, I mean I think Creese
Speaker 2: should get booted, and then Miguel should be the replacement
Speaker 2: for and then obviously all the Cobra Kai and the you.
Speaker 6: Know, because Chris gets i mean booted, hopefully arrested.
Speaker 2: But he's a veteran with PTSD.
Speaker 7: So anything's okay. But so.
Speaker 6: What if Johnny takes over Cobra KAII and with him, Yeah,
Speaker 6: except Robbi would hate it.
Speaker 2: Like, No, I don't think Johnny would take over. I mean,
Speaker 2: maybe he will, but I feel like I want, you know,
Speaker 2: Master Kim to actually like have a team. I don't know, Yeah,
Speaker 2: but maybe Johnny goes over there and partners with her,
Speaker 2: you know, probably chosen would yeah, but no, but I
Speaker 2: mean it could be like Johnny goes over there and
Speaker 2: coaches Miguel and and she coaches Tori, and like, I
Speaker 2: want Cobra Kai to win in that matchup, you know,
Speaker 2: and that I think that's probably that That's how I
Speaker 2: would end it if I were contractually obligated to write
Speaker 2: the last five episodes and have the first four be
Speaker 2: about the Psychai tai Kai or two or three or something,
Speaker 2: this whole Miagi thing. I don't even like what I
Speaker 2: uh I've said.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I would end the Psychi tay Kai in the
Speaker 6: first episode and then just go back and have that,
Speaker 6: you know, hobbits in the shire last four episodes.
Speaker 2: I do think what's his name, Wolf, the Lewis Tan character, Like,
Speaker 2: I feel like something more is gonna happen with him,
Speaker 2: Like I think outside of the just being a coach
Speaker 2: for the tournament, you know, or sense like, I think
Speaker 2: there's something there, probably I don't know, unless they just
Speaker 2: keep focused too much on Crease and Silver, Like I
Speaker 2: feel like, can we just can we just be done
Speaker 2: with them? Can they just can they just kind of
Speaker 2: you know, like.
Speaker 7: I really don't care about them anymore?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel like and and that's my overwriting criticism
Speaker 2: of this season I'm gonna call it, is that I
Speaker 2: feel like we're just retreading the same ground again, and like,
Speaker 2: I guess we're getting some cool martial arts that's a
Speaker 2: little different from what we saw earlier, you know, I
Speaker 2: think and I do think one difficulty of the show
Speaker 2: is that you're getting exceptional martial artists in terms of
Speaker 2: at least like physical ability, athleticism and everything to play
Speaker 2: these characters. And then your main cast is a bunch
Speaker 2: of people who have you know, made a great effort
Speaker 2: to learn martial arts and look credible as local competitors.
Speaker 2: But like you know, the international stage and the regional
Speaker 2: stage are just so I mean, it's not the same,
Speaker 2: and so it's it's just it. It definitely feels like
Speaker 2: there's just this like it feels like Cobraka not Cobra KAII.
Speaker 2: But it feels like the Miagi Doo people and and
Speaker 2: Tori should just be overmatched, like they've never fought nationally.
Speaker 2: They haven't gone around, you know, like their training for
Speaker 2: this was like they saw a bunch of tourists destinate
Speaker 2: places in Barcelona, you know, like the train. It just
Speaker 2: it wasn't to me. I feel like, to jump to
Speaker 2: this level of competition, it doesn't really feel credible. To me,
Speaker 2: and you.
Speaker 7: Know, I think I think it's true, all right.
Speaker 6: I think we're about trying to wrap up any of
Speaker 6: the last quick things you want to throw out there.
Speaker 6: And I'm sure you want to give a whole ramp
Speaker 6: about martial arts, which I want to hold.
Speaker 7: Maybe another thing. I just want to say something about it, shortly, quickly.
Speaker 2: No, the only thing I want to say is how
Speaker 2: how it has the Stranger Things problem where they paused
Speaker 2: between I don't know how long there was in production
Speaker 2: time between this set of episodes in the previous one
Speaker 2: or that one in the one before, but Uno O'Brien,
Speaker 2: who plays Devin Lee, shot ups like a foot or
Speaker 2: something and just towers over Sam over Samantha like foot taller.
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, man, I feel like I'm watching Stranger
Speaker 2: Things here. Yeah, Because like they they hired for the
Speaker 2: main characters who were the older characters, they hired young
Speaker 2: looking adults. Yeah, and then they The thing about hiring
Speaker 2: young looking adults to play teenagers is as they get older,
Speaker 2: they still not being young looking at all. No, for
Speaker 2: a while, they're still young looking adults, so the characters
Speaker 2: don't look like they've aged. But then when you hire
Speaker 2: children or like young teenagers to play younger characters. Time
Speaker 2: passes and those people become adults. They don't necessarily become
Speaker 2: young looking adults.
Speaker 7: Oh, I see you're saying.
Speaker 6: Yeah, she's like Devon's actress was younger than Sammy's actress. Yeah,
Speaker 6: but Sam's actress had been done growing in Devin's actress, well.
Speaker 2: Exactly, she was a young woman who looked had that
Speaker 2: kind of like young looking face, right, and she's she's
Speaker 2: still a young woman with a kind of young looking face,
Speaker 2: whereas Devin was like a I don't know how old
Speaker 2: she was, but I think she was like pretty young
Speaker 2: when she was first cast, and she looks pretty young.
Speaker 2: And then now time has passed years in the making
Speaker 2: of the series, and she just grew. She grew, you know,
Speaker 2: and like I don't know if she's an adult yet
Speaker 2: or whatever, but like she's deaf definitely, Like the change
Speaker 2: in age makes a bigger difference the younger you are, right, Yeah,
Speaker 2: And you can't choose someone for going for being a
Speaker 2: young looking adult when they're still a kid, because you
Speaker 2: don't know how they're gonna look when they're an adult.
Speaker 2: You might have an idea, you know, but it's like
Speaker 2: in Stranger Things. It's you're just looking at them, like,
Speaker 2: what's what's going on here?
Speaker 7: And like.
Speaker 2: Whatever, whatever, it's not. I don't really care. I just
Speaker 2: think it's kind of funny. It is definitely fun particularly
Speaker 2: because they just put them right next to each other,
Speaker 2: just straight up put them right next to each other,
Speaker 2: just like a foot taller.
Speaker 6: It was like, wow, yeah, I would definitely agree with that.
Speaker 6: That's one last thing I was gonna say that's related
Speaker 6: to that. Nope, totally gone from my head. Any last things.
Speaker 2: That That was my last things.
Speaker 7: It all to Audians. Thank you all so much. Members.
Speaker 7: We're not gonna do an episode this week.
Speaker 6: It's been a really rough week for me the city
Speaker 6: of Columbus, fole my car listening to the Star Wars episode,
Speaker 6: and I'll give you a full explanation of what happened.
Speaker 6: But Paul, thank you so much for doing this. To
Speaker 6: all of our listeners, thank you so much. Please think
Speaker 6: about becoming a member. Five dollars a month, fifty five
Speaker 6: dollars a year. To everybody we have.
Speaker 2: Spoken, strike first, but not yourself.
Speaker 7: Strike yourself with mercy. Wait, that's und