Cobra Kai Season 3: Here's what you need to know

Cobra Kai became a surprise streaming hit for Google’s YouTube Originals lineup. Now, the series is available to stream on Netflix. After making the first two seasons available, the streaming giant debuted the long-awaited third season of the show this year.

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Here’s what you need to know about Cobra Kai season 3 on Netflix, plus some more information on this hit series.

When was the Cobra Kai Season 3 release date?

Netflix dropped the third season on January 1, 2021.  All three current seasons are available to stream on the service right now.

What is Cobra Kai about, anyway?

The series is a continuation of the original Karate Kid movie series from the 1980s. That film series centered on Daniel LaRusso, a young teenager in a town near Los Angeles who learns martial arts from his master “Mr. Miyagi.” LaRusso has to ultimately battle another martial artist, Johnny Lawrence. He is a member of the Cobra Kai dojo in the first Karate Kid movie. In the climax of that film, LaRusso defeats Lawrence in a match at the All-Valley Karate Tournament.

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The Cobra Kai series takes place in the present day, where Lawrence, now in his 50s, is down on his luck, and LaRusso has become a successful car salesman. Lawrence then encounters a teenager being bullied and fights off the attackers. The teen asks Lawrence to teach him martial arts, and that leads him to reopen the Cobra Kai dojo. The series shows the new conflicts between Lawrence and LaRusso, who opens up his own Miyagi-Do dojo. It also shows off the conflicts for the students at both dojos, which include Johnny’s son Robby who is a member of Danny’s dojo.

Ralph Macchio and William Zabka reprise their roles from The Karate Kid movie series as Danny LaRusso and Johnny Lawrence. The show itself is a mix of drama and comedy, with the theme of adults not being able to let go of their pasts.

What is Cobra Kai Season 3 all about?

Cobra Kai Season 3 followed up on the events at the end of the second season. The final episode of that season saw a massive fight between members of the two dojos at the local high school. One of Johnny’s students, Miguel, ended up in the hospital after an attack by Johnny’s son Robby. Both Danny and Johnny, as well as Johnny’s former master John Kreese (played by Martin Kove) have to deal with the consequences of the fight throughout the season. Danny also makes a trip back to Okinawa, Japan (the setting of The Karate Kid: Part 2), where he meets both his old girlfriend from that movie as well as his old adversary, Chozen. 

The third season continues to show Danny, Johnny, and Kreese in conflict with each other. The final episode brings some of these long-standing feuds to an end, while also expanding the reach of the season to bring in even more characters from the original Karate Kid films.

Reviews of the third season have been mostly positive. Entertainment Weekly’s review stated that while it had a rough start, by the end it showed that Cobra Kai was still “one of the cleverest reboots in our nostalgia-drunk era.” The Hollywood Reporter’s review had a similar opinion, saying that while it takes a while to get going, by the end it had “some of the series’ best work to date.”

In July 2021, the third season of the show was nominated for four Emmy awards, including one for Outstanding Comedy Series.

Will there be a Cobra Kai Season 4 on Netflix?

Yes! Netflix has confirmed that Cobra Kai Season 4 has been greenlighted. It will drop on the service sometime in the fourth quarter of 2021.

Wasn’t the show on YouTube first?

Yes. Cobra Kai debuted in 2018 on Google’s YouTube video platform as part of its YouTube Originals lineup of scripted series. This was Google’s attempt to launch a service that would more directly compete with Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and other premium subscription services. People could watch the show if they paid for a YouTube Premium subscription (previously known as YouTube Red).

The series was a huge success, and YouTube actually approved the production for a third season. However, several months later, Google decided to get out of the original scripted TV show business. Cobra Kai was then picked up by Netflix, and its first two seasons debuted on the streaming service on August 28, 2020, followed by the third season that debuted on Netflix.

That’s what you need to know about Cobra Kai Season 3 on Netflix. Check out the show before season 4 begins on the streaming service.

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