Cobra Kai – Let’s Begin

The scene opens to a beautiful beach house with music coming from the home. A gentleman with long gray hair and a red bathrobe is at the piano while his phone begins to ring. When he picks it up, John Kreese (Martin Kove) is on the line and is immediately hung up on. The gentleman then picks up where he left off on the piano, completing the piece to its conclusion. 

Meanwhile at Miyagi-Do Johnny (William Zabka) and Daniel (Ralph Macchio) are ready to start training their students together, but the students are not clear on what that means. In particular, Demetri (Gianni DeCenzo) is not clear as to what that means. While Daniel tries to speak with the students, his calmer approach and Johnny’s brash styles clash. As the day continues Daniel questions Johnny’s interest to striking without anticipation while Johnny uses the “wax on, wax off” technique as a reason for his students to clean his car. Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang Karate clearly have opposite approaches to their teaching. Both Sam (Mary Mouser) and Miguel (Xolo Maridueña) are ready to double-down on finding a way to bring the teams together and combine their skills.  

At Cobra Kai the atmosphere is filled with apprehension and chauvinism at its finest with Kyler (Joe Seo) and the remaining Cobra Kai students. Angered by the loss of her fight against Sam, Tory (Peyton List) diligently continues to train while her fellow classmates treat the dojo as a place to talk shop. Robby’s (Tanner Buchanan) entrance immediately breaks up the fight, but Robby shows reluctance to considering joining Cobra Kai. As Robby shares with Kreese how Johnny and Daniel are teaming up, Kreese is working out a team-up of his own. While Robby continues to grapple with his identity, Tory has no qualms about pushing him to her own breaking point. As she goads him for straddling the line between Miyagi-Do and Cobra Kai, Robby still feels conflicted about the hatred that Tory carries for Sam—especially since Robby knows that Sam is better than what Tory believes her to be.  

After the break-in at the LaRusso residence, measures have been taken to enhance a sense of security for the family—and those measures have taken some getting used to. While Daniel fights to disarm the alarm, his wife Amanda (Courtney Henggeler) later reveals that she feels trapped in their home with the new security system. Daniel tries to assure Amanda that they will succeed in the tournament and put an end to Cobra Kai, especially with Sam on the team. In the other room, Sam looks over apprehensively as she knows that their best shot to winning against Cobra Kai is with Robby on their side. Unfortunately, Sam is unsuccessful in getting Robby to come back when she confronts him later in the episode. Robby decides to join Cobra Kai and prove that in order to win against Miyagi-Do, Cobra Kai needs to learn Miyagi-Do karate. 

Across town Johnny attempts to impress Miguel’s family by cooking dinner for them, not knowing that they are Ecuadorian, not Mexican. But it is the thought that counts as the family sits down to a lovely meal, only for Miguel to bring up Johnny and Ali’s (Elisabeth Shue) meet up to an unknowing Carmen (Vanessa Rubio). After dinner Johnny hopes to rekindle the spark between him and Carmen, yet she pushes that they remain friends and take it slow.  

Not deterred by the hang-up earlier in the episode, Kreese goes directly to the residence of the gentleman from the beginning of the episode to confront him—none other than Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith) from The Karate Kid: Part III. What Kreese did not expect upon seeing Terry was that he has become a little less badass and a tad more bougie than Kreese can handle. From Terry’s pretentious spouse Cheyenne (Salome Azizi) to even more pretentious Emile (Kevin Allison) complimenting Kreese on his jawline, Kreese is determined to bring Terry back to his roots and into the Cobra Kai fold one more time. Terry initially rebuffs Kreese’s offer, but this is clearly not the end of Kreese’s determination to bring Terry back into the Cobra Kai fold. Later, Terry’s own inability to turn down Kreese returns as he kicks a wine bottle sitting on a table into the wall.  

Deciding to practice their techniques separately, Miyagi-Do and Eagle Fang continue to train on opposite sides of Miyagi-Do. Despite their best efforts, the sounds of Hawk (Jacob Bertrand) getting a bit of comeuppance from his former Cobra Kai ways continues to be a hindrance to Daniel teaching effectively. When Daniel and Johnny get into another spat over their teaching methods, Hawk ventures inside to Miyagi-Do and is intrigued by its teachings, yet still rebuffed by his Miyagi-Do friends as they are still apprehensive about his switch to Eagle Fang from Cobra Kai. Eventually, it is Hawk who helps to bring the two dojos together when he enlists the group to help him with building a sparring deck in the back of Miyagi-Do. Johnny and Daniel meet at Johnny’s apartment to discuss the path forward, deciding that they cannot work together. But when they get to Miyagi-Do to tell their students, they change their mind once they see that the students collectively built the sparring deck together. Because of the teamwork, Johnny and Daniel agree to team up once more.