Spoilers

The final five episodes of the final season of Cobra Kai dropped on Netflix, bringing the series to a satisfying conclusion.

The tragic ending to episode 10 did not really play a piece in these final episodes very much. But the Sekai Taikai coming back to the Valley to complete the tournament was weird, yet worked.

There were a lot of great character moments in this last five episodes where we saw more of the development of these characters than what we saw in the first ten episodes. Moments between Johnny and Creese, Sam and Tori, Tori and Robbie, Dmitri and Hawk, and Johnny and Daniel.

Highlights included Johnny and Carmen’s wedding, both of the final matches in the Sekai Taikai with Tori and Miguel, the return to Cobra Kai, the moment when Daniel LaRusso walked out in Cobra Kai gear, the boat explosion, all the callbacks to the previous seasons and the Karate Kid movies.

My least favorite part of these episodes were the part in Korea with Kim Da-eun and her grandfather. This was a big thing is episode 11, but meant nothing after that.

Mixed: When the tie happened in the Sekai Taikai and it was announced that the tie breaker would be a battle of the two sensei. I literally laughed loudly at the silliness of that twist. Yes, the results in episode 15 turned out epically, but the very idea is just stupid and made no sense.

I thought there was so much more emotion in this block of episodes than previous ones that it was such a strong conclusion to the series. I did like how, in the end, it circled back to having Johnny front and center. This show did start off with Johnny as the main character and Daniel as a supporting character, which changed as the seasons progressed. The turn back to the Cobra Kai roots worked really well and made a lot of sense.

Even more, I was please that they did not make Johnny do the crane kick in that final battle to win the match. I really thought that is where they were going with that match, but the way they did it was so much better and felt far less forced than the crane kick would have felt.

We do not learn anything more about Miyagi’s past, and I actually think that worked well too. That felt like a side story that did not matter in the long run. Once they dealt with it in this episode, Daniel was able to accept the unknown and move on.

So after six seasons Cobra Kai had some really cheesy moments and some that were so far over the top, but it formed together with some excellent storytelling and character development. It also introduced us to a group of characters that we truly liked watching and provided a wonderful conclusion. I wondered if season five should have been the series conclusion, but after seeing these last five episodes, I am glad that they took it one more season.