Season endings are sometimes a lot. You know that when it comes to the end of a season or a series, there will be something that are tied up and somethings that will always be left hanging. You may be satisfied, you may not be.
But hey, that’s the beauty of things – the beauty of good television. It makes you feel something.
While we don’t believe that this season has been its best season, We do believe that it has been a strong season. The characters feel as though they have grown and changed, but it’s also if some have changed to be people that we don’t recognize or want to recognize.
The season finale of Cobra Kai did not disappoint. As we’re watching so many lives change, so many things happen, so many lies told, and an All Valley Champion crowned, all you can think watching it is – how can these characters recover from the life that they have now created for themselves.
It’s time for the finals. We open this episode in a hospital, but it’s Ray. As usual, it is something that you are like WTF, but then you know that everything means something in this show.
The All Valley Tournament is going on and Miguel is going to be fine. His back is hurting, but he’s fine. He pulled a muscle. He has 30 minutes to decide if he is going to fight or not. And by the look on his face, he doesn’t know what he wants to do. We do believe that the interaction with Johnny when he was drunk has changed everything for Miguel. It hurt him. He’d felt like Johnny was a father and then he realized that he wasn’t on the same thought process as him.
And that was too much.
While Miguel is making decisions, Dmitri and Robby are fighting and the match was closely contested. But Robby won. And no shocker here, Sam and Tori are in the final round for girls division.
Kenny, in the meantime, has found strength, but it seems as though he’s taken things to a new extreme. Well, a Cobra Kai one. Kenny lost to Robby and he’s upset. It’s got to be hard to have your ass kicked by the person supposed to be mentoring you. And at his age, I wouldn’t be able to separate it all out. Anthony goes in the back and apologizes to Kenny, but Kenny reacts and starts beating Anthony up. Robby walks into the locker room and intervenes in their fight, surprised that Anthony was the bully.
But even more you can see that Robby feels like he failed. He wanted Kenny to be better that him or his brother – to not go down the road of making the same mistakes.
Cobra Kai seems to fuck up lives. And for Johnny, it’s been something that has changed his entire life. Kreese runs into him backstage and tries to frame it that he’s always done what he could when Johnny was younger to protect him. It’s a weird way to frame it, but hey, what do I know. But as usual Kreese gets under his skin and this pushes Johnny to push Miguel.
Johnny wants Miguel to win, but it’s for the wrong reasons. He wants to spite Daniel and Kreese. Miguel has one minute to make it to the match, but he doesn’t show up. Instead Hawk and Robby end up fighting. But Miguel is making his amends with Sam and I have to say I am glad about that.
Hawk and Robby’s match is intense. They both can sense what is coming, since they both have trained the Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do route. Hawk has a time out and asks Daniel what to do. It’s an important match because Cobra Kai has enough points to win, they just need to win this one. Miyagi-Do will need to win both matches – the boys and the girls.
Luckily Hawk pulls out the win for Miyagi-Do.
Amanda runs into Tory backstage. Tory has a soft spot for Amanda, we think. She wants a mother’s love, the love that she can’t get from her Mom right now. Amanda just asks that Tory plays by the rules. And in the front, another LaRusso is asking for something. Daniel asks Johnny to team up and help him with this match. The thing that we loved is that Johnny and Daniel have seen that they are good together and they have grown from the past.
But the scene that really got us, was Sam hugging her Dad and him telling her that he wants her to be herself and not a version of him. He’s realizing his shortcomings and the things that he needs to be better at. Which is something that we can respect.
Sam and Tory fight, and Tory wins. Part of me is really confused by this, but also even more confused when Silver goes to the microphone and says that they will be opening a lot of Cobra Kai Dojo’s and I am like wait… hasn’t Kreese put him in his place a lot? Why is this flying?
Now, I truly believe that Kreese is a manipulative dick, but Silver is bat shit crazy. Cobra Kai is celebrating their win and we see Silver paying off one of the referees. Cobra Kai didn’t win fair? Go figure.
It’s the last 8 minutes that really got to us. Because it was filled with a lot of emotion.
Johnny goes to Cobra Kai and everything is gone. Robby shows up and says that he is upset. He’s upset over Kenny and what happened there. Robby tells Johnny how he’s feeling and how he’s sick of the mistakes, the hurt, the pain. Johnny tries to take the blame and take some of the burden off of his son, but Robby doesn’t want to hear that.
“I’m sick of blaming you, dad.” Robby says.
Tanner Buchanan delivered such emotion that we started to cry also. We’ve been through a road with Robby, but as we’ve gone through it – Tanner has delivered unbelievably great performances. He can show such range and we love it.
Johnny goes to see Carmen and we find out Miguel is gone. He left a letter, but he feels that he needs to go and find his father. There is a big issue – his father doesn’t know that he exists. Johnny promises to find him and all we can think – is a Johnny and Daniel road trip coming?
Silver made a bargain with Stingray, and he ends up orchestrating it so that Kreese gets arrested for the beatdown. This frees Silver up to take over Cobra Kai. We know that Kreese is a villain and the truth is, Silver may be even a bigger one.
And Daniel. He’s at Mr. Miyagi’s headstone, telling him about what has happened. Despite the deal, there is no ways that Daniel is stepping down. Instead he’s brought someone to help him – Chozen.
Season 5 is definitely going to fuck with our emotions. We’re living for it.
Cobra Kai is streaming now on Netflix.
