Cobra Kai season 5 premieres Sept. 9, Netflix announced Thursday evening, during a panel discussion at Netflix is a Joke: The Festival in Los Angeles. A new trailer accompanied the announcement, and if you’re not fully caught up on the series, it’s got some spoilers that we’ll be discussing below.
[Ed. note: Spoilers for Cobra Kai season 4 follow.]
Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith), a character whose return after more than 30 years highlighted a strong fourth year and effectively redeemed a dud of a 1989 film, is now in charge at Cobra Kai, and the rich old sociopath is looking at franchising the operation all over the San Fernando Valley.
That task is a lot easier with John Kreese (Martin Kove) out of the way; Silver framed him up for the savage beating of Stingray (Paul Walter Hauser, seriously) and got Kreese put in the slammer. Daniel (Ralph Macchio) and Johnny’s (William Zabka) dojos split up, with Daniel’s new protege Hawk (Jacob Bertrand) winning the boys’ division of the All-Valley, and Cobra Kai’s Tori (Peyton List) taking down rival Samantha LaRusso (Mary Mouser), fighting for Johnny’s Eagle Fang. Also, Miguel (Xolo Maridueña) peaced the eff out of the semifinals to go find his father in Mexico (although Miguel and his mother are in fact Guatemalan). We see Johnny is in fact going after him, with Robby (Tanner Buchanan) reluctantly riding shotgun.
So, once again, Daniel is recommitting to kicking Cobra Kai out of the Valley, but he has to do it without Johnny. Fan favorite Chozen (Yuji Okumoto), The Karate Kid Part 2’s bad guy who made a face turn in season 3, is now stateside to supply Daniel-san with some muscle.
That covers pretty much all of the bases except for Kreese, who is not seen in this trailer. Nor do we see new rivals Kenny Payne (Dallas Dupree Young) and Anthony LaRusso (Griffin Santopietro), who fought bitterly in season 4 and should be headed to high school for season 5.
Cobra Kai season 5 was ordered in August 2021, four months before season 4’s New Year’s Eve premiere. Shooting began in Atlanta last fall. So with everyone back from pandemic-related delays, we get the next season three months before we got seasons 3 and 4.
