This is it. After six years and six seasons (the last one split into three parts), “Cobra Kai” has finally arrived at its final episodes. Though individually, the three parts of season 6 felt slow and incomplete, together they make for one of the best seasons of the show, particularly because part 3 has some of the best episodes in the entire show. (In other words, Netflix probably shouldn’t have split them all up like this.) 

“Cobra Kai” has come a long way. It survived skepticism and the loss of its original release platform to become one of the best shows of the past few years, and one of the best legacy sequels, period. It is truly stunning that this show — which started out as a more grounded and dramatic version of a joke from “How I Met Your Mother” — would end up not just doing a very effective reboot of “The Karate Kid” starring a new generation of karate enthusiasts, but also serving as the dream sequel to the first three “Karate Kid” movies. In the past six years, we’ve seen Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) and Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka) argue and bicker like an old married couple before eventually becoming good friends. They’ve even teamed up with other antagonists, Chozen (Yuji Okumoto) and Mike Barnes (Sean Kanan), to fight both John Kreese (Martin Kove) and Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith).

“Cobra Kai” is a show that has always understood how and when to do fan service, leaning into nostalgia in order to say something new about beloved characters, and echoing the past in order to explore new stories. In its final episodes, “Cobra Kai” turns everything to 11 and delivers five hours full of the wildest moments not just in the show, but the franchise at large. 

Part 2 of season 6 left off after the Sekai Taikai was interrupted by a violent brawl that resulted in an unexpected and tragic death. The new episodes pick up shortly thereafter, with the tournament officially canceled and everyone still reeling from the violent events and from having their chance at glory taken from them. That is until Terry Silver (of course, who else?) schemes his way into arranging the rest of the tournament to play out anyway — this time at the familiar location that once hosted the 1984 All-Valley Tournament.

Not everyone is on board. For one, John Kreese is not interested in having another one of his students killed. Herein lies arguably the biggest surprise and the best storyline of the season, as we see a radically different Kreese, one that is utterly shocked by the death of Kwon. What follows is the culmination of the themes of the entire franchise, that of the relationship between teachers and students, and how the faults of the teacher impact their students. Martin Kove does a spectacular job portraying Kreese’s crisis of faith, reflecting on his past actions and whether there is a space for him in this world of karate.

This theme also extends to Daniel and Johnny. The former finally gets a resolution to the season-long mystery of Miyagi’s past, which has been and remains underwhelming. Sure, it is interesting for the show to argue that Miyagi was no saint, and to see Daniel come to terms with the fact that his mentor was a flawed man, but to make it a mystery box element throughout the entire season made the resolution come across as underwhelming.

If part 3 of “Cobra Kai” season 6 makes something clear, it’s that this show has always been the journey of William Zabka’s Johnny Lawrence. Zabka gets the big spotlight these last five episodes, doing some career-best work as Johnny confronts his demons, the damage Kreese has done to him, and his insecurities, while also recognizing his achievements and how far he’s come.

“Cobra Kai” has always been good at knowing how to weaponize nostalgia in the right ways, and the final episodes are all about looking back so you can look forward. There are plenty of references, homages, direct callbacks, and outright recreations of moments from the very first “Karate Kid” in these episodes, and they never feel like the writers nodding at the audience. 

Instead, the references are there to say something about both the past and the present, to show the progression the characters have been to. Without spoiling any surprises, let’s just say that the final episodes of “Cobra Kai” are a fan’s dreams come true, and the culmination of six years’ worth of earning the right callbacks at the right time. When the moment of truth came for this show, it proved that it was the best around.

/Film rating 8 out of 10

“Cobra Kai” season 6 part 3 is streaming on Netflix starting February 13, 2025.