Cobra Kai showrunners say that Cobra Kai season 6 is being written with hopes for more. Cobra Kai Season 4 just debuted and is currently trending #1 on Netflix, dethroning Adam McKay's Don't Look Up. Fan enthusiasm for the show is again at the forefront, as the events that transpired throughout Cobra Kai season 4 have left viewers wanting more. Luckily, Cobra Kai season 5 has already been shot, so the wait may be less than usual and better than ever, according to Thomas Ian Griffith, who plays returning villain Terry Silver from The Karate Kid: Part III in the latest season.
Created by Hayden Schlossberg, Jon Hurwitz, and Josh Heald, Cobra Kai follows the characters and events in the original The Karate Kid films, written by Robert Mark Kamen and directed by John G. Avildsen. Cobra Kai focuses on the relationship between Ralph Macchio's Daniel LaRusso and William Zabka's Johnny Lawrence, two karate students from different dojo's who share a bitter rivalry that's lasted for decades. In the show, which picks up some 30 years after the first The Karate Kid, Daniel and Johnny compete with one another (and former sensei's) and deal with their students (and offspring) who are starting rivalries of their own.
Cobra Kai Season 4, like previous seasons, ends on a cliffhanger, opening up the doors for new challenges, new friendships, new threats, and the continued battle for dojo supremacy in the valley. While Cobra Kai season 5 is already shot, the showrunners clarified where Cobra Kai season 6 is in terms of their overall plan, with Josh Heald telling Collider that, "We still have an endgame plan. We're still writing beyond Season 5." The showrunners also clarify where they are in terms of the planned number of seasons, with Jon Hurwitz saying, “We’ve never said from the beginning how many seasons there would be. I think we always viewed it as at least six was sort of in our heads, but we’re still figuring out exactly what the length for that landing is for all the reasons that Josh mentioned.” Heald's full response is below:
“There are characters and storylines that we’ve considered that, from the beginning, we would have said, ‘Okay, that’s a season,’ and that storyline ended up being an episode or two. And then there’s the opposite of that where you say, ‘Okay, this is a season,’ and now we’re going to extend that into multiple seasons. So we’ve always looked back at our original plan with open eyes because with so many new branches and so many new characters and interactions and what you’re seeing during production when, ‘Oh wow, these two people together, there’s something interesting about that duo,’ you want to lean more into it and when you do lean more into it, it naturally pushes other things along and further out. It’s changed at times, but it also hasn’t. We still have an endgame plan. We’re still writing beyond Season 5. But it’s been fun to bring in those new characters and storylines and let them lead the way sometimes.”
The showrunners have previously mentioned Cobra Kai spinoff shows being in the works, which is another way to keep the show outside the regular seasons/storyline. They also clarified that they've always looked back at their original plan with "open eyes," letting characters, interactions, and storylines develop and lead the way at times, which "pushes other things along and further out" as such. This approach could alter how many seasons the show ultimately has to tell the whole story, leading to the end.
Cobra Kai has become an unexpected phenomenon, standing as a perfect example of how to revive an older franchise to have appeal to both older and newer fans. The introduction of a new, younger cast, alongside the original mainstays, has made for a finely tuned engine of entertainment. Cobra Kai capitalizes on nostalgia while pushing the story out to a new generation, creating a fanbase that could potentially carry the series on for many years to come. With the current level of excitement for Cobra Kai, that scenario is not hard to fathom.
Source: Collider