No Surrender Cinema: Cobra Kai (Season 4)
2021 was a year of ups and downs for many of us, but if there’s one way it could end on a high note in regards to pop culture, it was with the release of Cobra Kai Season 4! Netflix may have waited until the 11th hour to drop this one on us, but you bet your ass it was worth the wait! Join me for a leg sweeping, crane kicking journey through all 10 episodes here in this edition of No Surrender Cinema!
SPOILER WARNING: Yes, I know that some of you may have not been able to binge every episode yet, but we here at Bulletproof Action pride ourselves on reviewing responsibly. Don’t scroll down any further if you haven’t finished the season yet. If you have finished the season, then keep on reading!
Terry Silver.
Terry F%&$ING Silver!
You didn’t have to sell me on Cobra Kai Season 4; it’s no secret that I’m a Day One fan of the Karate Kid franchise and have adored the continuation of the saga since it first dropped on Youtube several years ago. I couldn’t believe that I was living in a world where the rivalry between Johnny Lawrence and Daniel LaRusso was being revisited, but then they brought back John Kreese, and it was awesome. Then Elisabeth Shue showed up as Ali, the love of both Johnny and Daniel’s lives, and it was tremendous. Finally, last season, we got a glimpse at what happened to make John Kreese so cold and merciless through flashbacks to his tour in Vietnam, and that’s where we were finally graced with the origin story of the co-founders of Cobra Kai Karate. It was more than an Easter egg; it was telegraphing the next move. Terry Silver was coming back, and it would be sooner than later.
How soon? How about the opening scene? The first thing we see in Cobra Kai Season 4 is Silver, seated at a piano, hanging up on an incoming call from John Kreese. It seems that Terry Silver has mellowed with age; he has a beautiful, educated companion, a lavish home, and a circle of affluent friends to enjoy vegan tofu skewers with. It all comes as a bit of a shock to Kreese when he shows up on Silver’s doorstep looking to make amends. Silver isn’t particularly shocked to see his old friend, but more disappointed that John is trying to lure him back into his personal vendetta against Lawrence and LaRusso. It’s right here in the first episode that we get one of the highlights of the entire series thus far; Terry Silver explaining that his involvement in the events that took place in The Karate Kid Part III were due to him being high on cocaine and revenge. It was a clever way to utilize what many have called an over the top character and flesh him out so that he made more sense in this Cobra Kai world. Now that Silver has shed his vices and life of excess, he would have no reason to link up with Kreese again…until the poking, prodding, and challenging of his character became to be a bit much to handle. Eventually, John Kreese (and we the viewers) get what we want; the old Terry Silver, ponytail and all, standing by Kreese’s side to ensure the Cobra Kai dojo’s success at the All Valley Karate Tournament.
Elsewhere in the valley, Johnny and Daniel have no clue that Terry Silver is back in the picture (and Johnny wouldn’t know who the hell that is anyway), and have their hands full with their own set of problems. The merge of Eagle Fan and Miyagi-Do isn’t going as smoothly as the happy ending of Season 3 would have you think. Each man is pretty set in his way, and that causes all sorts of conflict with how the kids are trained. Johnny wants aggression, Daniel wants balance. Johnny think his offbeat methods work best, Daniel wants more structured teaching. The Lawrence/LaRusso superteam is looking more like a mixture of oil and water, even when Miguel and Sam do their best to prevent the alliance from blowing up in their faces.
Speaking of Miguel and Sam, things aren’t easy for them either. Although Kreese, Johnny, and Daniel came to an agreement that nothing would happen to the other’s students prior to the tournament, not an episode goes by where the kids aren’t squaring off in some fashion. Sam continues to run into her tormentor, Tory, which makes things super awkward when Sam’s mom, Amanda, starts to feel some empathy for Cobra Kai’s alpha female. Miguel continues to stand by Johnny’s side and try to help him navigate the modern world properly, but longs for Johnny to see their father/son style bonding for what it means to him. Hawk has to deal with the Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang kids being reluctant to let him back into the fold after his previous actions, and ultimately finds a way to prove himself to him. That happiness is short-lived, however, when the Cobra Kai’s strike, making Hawk pay for his desertion by stripping him of his identity and his confidence. Robby begins to assert himself more, defying authority and ignoring any chance at amends with his father or Daniel. He even snaps back at both Silver and Kreese at certain points! Robby continues to be the most loathsome character in the entire series, and by the time the tournament rolls around, you’re dying to see him get knocked on his ass.
For those keeping track, that’s just a small slice of what’s going on with our established characters; I haven’t even gotten to the new kid yet! Kenny Payne is a recent arrival in town and he’s having a rough go of things. It doesn’t help that a pack of junior high assholes aren’t making life any easier. They catfish him, chase him through a park, fill his locker with milk…name any asshole prank, they pulled it on this kid. Oh, but did I mention that the ringleader of the bullies is none other than Anthony LaRusso? That’s right, Daniel’s smart-mouthed young son has given in to peer pressure and turned into a little douche. Little does he know that the kid he’s picking on is the younger brother of Robby’s rival from juvenile hall! Worlds are colliding here in Cobra Kai, and the arrival of Kenny and elevation of the Anthony LaRusso character was a fun little side story that was woven well into the main thread of the show by the time everything was said and done.
If it’s one thing that Cobra Kai does well, it’s character depth, and Season 4 delivers so much of it. It can feel overwhelming at times who is involved in what, but it’s never too much and it never takes away from any of the story. Amanda LaRusso helping Tory out, the unresolved feelings in the Miguel/Sam/Robby/Tory drama, Johnny trying to do right by Miguel and his mother while struggling to be the best man he can be, and Daniel trying to live up to his own expectations of what Mr. Miyagi would want out of him carried quite an emotional punch, or crane kick. One of the most moving things you’ll ever see is when Miguel helps a drunk Johnny into bed and has the moment he’s been waiting for, only to realize that Johnny has no idea what he’s saying. That one hits hard, so don’t say I didn’t warn you.
Speaking of hitting hard, let’s talk fights! We get Lawrence vs. LaRusso again, this time with a humorous exclamation point on it. Robby cleans house on his fellow Cobra Kai when they feel that he should hit the bricks. Daniel gets to show his stuff in a brawl with members of a minor league hockey team. Then there’s the tournament action, but before that, we get a taste of what Karate Kid fans have been hoping for ever since this series premiered. A small taste of the dream match between Johnny Lawrence and Terry Silver! It wasn’t an epic final battle (if anything, more of a steppingstone for things to come), but I was psyched to see these two characters finally trade blows now that their paths had finally crossed.
Speaking of Mr. Silver, this review has now circled around back to him, and when it comes to character depth, his characterization was the greatest of all. Once Kreese gave him a taste of that Cobra Kai life again, he went from wine-sipping tranquility to enjoying every moment that he could spend making someone else’s life miserable. Terry Silver doesn’t need drugs or a life of excess to cross the line. Terry Silver is a sociopath, a great one, and when he has his mind set on something, nothing is going to stand in his way, neither friend nor foe. What goes down in Cobra Kai Season 4’s climax turns the world as we know it upside down, and it guarantees us that we haven’t seen the last of Terry Silver. Luckily, there are still other forces out there that can counteract his plan to poison the world with his brand of Cobra Kai Karate, and the final shot of Season 4 is another one that will put a smile on the face of any devoted Karate Kid franchise fan.
So, to summarize: we got Terry Silver back, references to Cynthia Rothrock, Bloodsport, The Last Dragon, and “Rowdy” Roddy Piper, new characters, storyline twists, another All Valley Karate Tournament showdown, and a fifth season already in the can. I know there’s a spoiler warning at the top of this column and I could say so much more, but I’m actually holding back here, because I hope anyone reading this that hasn’t seen the season yet can go and enjoy it the way I did. It will be interesting to see how the Cobra Kai crew tops this next season, but something tells me that’s a challenge they’re glad to accept.
All seasons of Cobra Kai are now streaming on Netflix
