Will Cobra Kai season 6 culminate The Karate Kid Franchise? ( Photo Credit – YouTube )
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When The Karate Kid was released in 1984, nobody would have thought that the film would mark the beginning of a franchise that would span decades. After several sequels and a reboot, the martial arts franchise returned with the series Cobra Kai in 2018.
The Netflix comedy-drama series continued the storyline of the original films, focusing on the journey of Daniel LaRusso and Johnny Lawrence. Cobra Kai is now also headed toward its conclusion with Season 6, which will also mark the conclusion of the franchise, albeit a new Karate Kid film is already in the works.
The Next Karate Kid Film will Not Be a Continuation of Cobra Kai
The next installment in the franchise, titled Karate Kid, is set to be released in 2025. And while the film will once again star Ralph Macchio as Daniel LaRusso, it will not be a continuation of Cobra Kai, or the original film series, and will instead be set in ‘its own universe’. For the project, Macchio will be collaborating with Jackie Chan, who reprises his role as Mr. Han from the 2010 reboot of the film series.
While it remains to be seen how LaRusso’s story will be continued in another universe, Lawrence’s arc will likely conclude with the end of Cobra Kai Season 6. Series co-creator, Josh Heald, also confirmed that Cobra Kai, and in turn the original film series, is not linked with the 2025 feature.
“Our series doesn’t set up the movie, the movie kind of exists in its own piece of its own universe with Jackie Chan’s character, and Ralph’s character, and the various other characters in that story. So, I think Daniel is the piece that does tie in, but there’s nothing, from a storytelling or a character journey in our season that directly feeds into that project,” Heald stated. Hence, Cobra Kai Season 6 marks the end of a four-decade-long saga.
Why is Cobra Kai Season 6 the Last One?
Cobra Kai has been doing good viewership numbers on Netflix; however, the makers decided to end it after season 6 for the sake of the story. In an interview, co-creators Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg revealed that they made the decision to conclude the series after filming the fifth season.
“We knew in season five that we were in endgame times. It wasn’t until after we shot season five that we kind of worked out exactly, ‘Okay, this is going to be the end afterward,’” Schlossberg said in the interview.
“It was hugely important to us from the beginning [to have a finish line]. So, we knew where we wanted the Johnny and Daniel relationship to be, and we knew some of the things that are happening in that final episode. A lot of things evolved along the way, but there was always sort of that North Star, and we were determined to will as many seasons as possible,” added Hurwitz.
