The Karate Kid

[shrewd tundra]

https://tenor.com/view/yeah-alright-gif-14971024

Poll here: #unspooled-polls message

[shrewd tundra]

<@&961324191204925460>

[light goblet]

I just going to open this by saying that I loved this film so much when I was a child that I wanted to change my name to Daniel.

[river frost]

I sort of came to the Karate Kid pretty late. I had seen at least the first one when I was very young, but it wasn't really a part of my childhood, more of a "meme." After Cobra Kai was picked up by Netflix, the overwhelming positive buzz intrigued me, so I watched the first 3 films and fell in love.

The first Karate Kid, IMO, is a perfect film. It's legit a great film, not just good for a kids film....It's a great film that happens to be about high school kids. I knew I was in for a treat when the opening credits rolled and I saw "directed by John G. Avildsen" and "music by Bill Conti." And Daniel's a Jersey kid? I'm sold.

The characters all feel very real and well-rounded, even the ridiculous Kreese; and except for him, I love that none of the "bad guys" are really that bad, they're just kids who have been manipulated by their violent karate teacher. I'm listening to the section in the pod now, but just echoing Paul and Amy, Johnny and the other kids have this teen aggression that they don't know how to deal with.

I don't want to just go on and on, but lastly I'll just bring up how incredible the drinking scene is, how Miyagi slowly breaks down and Daniel is kinda left dumbfounded as he realizes what's going on. It's just a perfect scene.

I know 2 and especially 3 get a bad rep, but I love those films, 3 at times most of all. The premise is just so ridiculous and Terry Silver is just about the greatest '80s villain.

Cobra Kai surprises me with every season: It's such a great continuation of this story and these characters 30 years later and treats the source material very respectfully.

I'm kind of with Paul: I think Karate Kid is the better of the sports/underdog films Avildsen did. I love Rocky to death, including when that series goes nuts, but even in the first film Rocky never feels like a real person. He's a cartoon who's just dopey enough, just positive enough to accomplish anything. Daniel is fallible in real relatable ways

[river frost]

To Amy's comment about the illegal kicks in the tournament: that actually comes up in Cobra Kai!

[lunar galleon]

https://tenor.com/view/parappa-the-rapper1-parappa-chop-chop-master-onion-gif-21371032

Not sure if I'd put this one on. It ticks a lot of the boxes for getting on the list, but personally I could just never get into it. Undeniably a landmark and memorable film that has had a lot of influence. And it is a good movie. But... I just can't say that I think it goes on the list as a top 100. Not sure.

[cedar nimbus]

Personally I always had my issues with this film and I don’t think it holds up other than as a piece of nostalgia.
Daniel is pretty problematic as a protagonist, Pat Morita is great but not believable as a Karate expert (all his stuff was body double).
I was 19 when it came out and had struggled to learn wrestling and Judo so I found the notion that you could achieve black belt level ability in Karate over a single school semester preposterous.

Now at 58 having taught judo to generations of kids, I find it more preposterous than ever.
At least Rocky was already a boxer, and The Bad News Bears brought in ringers.

[spring hound]

I think it's legit a good movie, but not top 100 good. It's a little corny at times but there's something very grounded in seeing a lower middle class kid with a single mom. A lot of movies are about wealthy people and their wealth is treated as if it is normal, as if most people live that way. A kid like Daniel would be played for pathos in those kind of films. Or treated like being violent and getting into fights is just how things are if you aren't wealthy.

[vocal sparrow]

Pre-1970s yes, but a 1980s movie would not always be that way. That was peak Hollywood formula involves snob villains, and often in comedies it's snobs vs slobs.

[vocal sparrow]

I think the earlier beach fight and Daniel reading the book is supposed to imply that he has some base. But sure, it is ridiculous in a movie way how much he advances and what type of things he does to get better combat skills. Plausibility and movies aren't natural bed partners. His soccer prodigy stuff is also sorta funny if you've ever had to watch or play youth soccer as he's doing fairly basic stuff yet everyone reacts like a Martian landed.

[vocal sparrow]

On Rocky vs Karate Kid, to me, they're about at the same level. I give the tiebreak to Rocky because it is more iconic and culturally significant--supercharging the rise of jogging, the figure of Rocky, the score and iconography, and putting out a sports movie template. Plus, Stallone and Shire are a stronger lead pair. Ralph Macchio I think is good, yet, to me, he is a bit like Miles Teller, seeming like a hotheaded borderline cocksure dolt, who could chill out a bit. I always sense an unlikeable quality about Teller which his best movies toy with or successfully can submerge (Top Gun Maverick). Daniel also gets on my nerves watching Cobra Kai. Minute to minute, I would say Karate Kid is more entertaining and engaging than Rocky 1 though.

[spring hound]

that's interesting because I wasn't even thinking of movies from the 70s. 🤷‍♂️ You do you though!

[vocal sparrow]

Rocky also has rich vs poor in Apollo vs Rocky, but it's complicated some because of the racial dynamic and how Apollo is a clear Muhammad Ali analog.

This scene really makes it hard to ship Daniel and Ali over Rocky and Adrian. Poor silently suffering Shue. https://youtu.be/7yLk629mRKY?si=OM2VYOZYWCXuHq7v

[river frost]

I don't think he's supposed to come off as a soccer prodigy: There's a brief moment where he clumsily juggles to ball to show off in front of Ali but no one's shocked, the other kids just grab the ball and run away. It's more of a cute set up for Ali to show off her juggling skills and flirt a couple of scenes later.

But yeah, it's not realistic how Daniel gets so good so quickly even with Miyagi's training (and there's a throw away line about Daniel having had a few lessons at the YMCA in NJ). But, who cares, lol. That's not what this movie is about, and really no more ridiculous than journeyman boxer Rocky almost defeating the World Heavyweight Champion. That's why we like these films, because the protags overcome unrealistic odds.

[dull arch]

One interesting thing about Pat Morita is the hospital he spent his youth in was Shriners’ Hospital. He appreciated what the Shriners did for him so much, he spent his entire supporting the Hospitals, including his wife setting up a fund for it in Morita’s name.

Here’s an ad he did for Shriners’ Hospitals in the 80s: https://youtu.be/VcEiG6L56QE?si=x285USQLMsRj57LC

[frozen axle]

i think bringing up the comparison to Rocky just helps to guarantee that this gets voted down. which i'm fine with. nostalgia isn't enough to make goonies or labyrinth into good movies, and it's not enough to put this into space

[river frost]

Speaking as someone who came to Rocky, Labyrinth and The Karate Kid in their mid-to-late 30s, it's definitely not nostalgia that makes them great films, and that to me makes them space-worthy.

[shrewd tundra]

It’s a good film, and yes it is probably more fun to watch than Rocky. Does that make it a BETTER movie, though? I don’t know about that. I feel like the comparison illustrates the major difference between 70s and 80s cinema. In the 70s, everything is grittier and morally ambiguous (Apollo is the opponent but not really a villain), and the hero doesn’t win in the end. In the 80s, we have a sunnier tone and wall-to-wall pop songs, the villain (Kreese) is cartoonishly evil, and the hero definitely wins.

The Karate Kid is a good movie, but I think the 70s approach is a bit better.

[river frost]

True but then Rocky does win in 2 and it's hard to separate those films to me. They feel like 2 parts of the same film in a way the other Rocky films don't.

[river frost]

The original Rocky ending is a bit of having its cake and eating it, too. Rocky technically loses, but very narrowly by a few points, it's not decisive at all, that's why they end up having a rematch in 2. Rocky basically wins in 1, is what I'm saying: a nobody who goes through a few weeks/months of intense training and ends up holding his own against the World Heavyweight Champion for the full 30 rounds. That's so much more of a leap than Daniel beating Johnny at the local karate tournament.
Not that I think, personally, that a film is better or worse on realism alone.

[true orbit]

Not new here. Listened to every episode since the beginning. Have been on Discord since 2017 and just realized this week how to work the damn thing.😁 Turning on the notifications makes all of the difference.

Anyway, Rocky beats out Karate Kid simply because it is a more memorable film. Dont get me wrong; Karate Kid is memorable. I was shocked to learn from the episode that the Halloween fight scene was only 9 seconds, but Rocky has more meat on it

If you can only choose one -- it has to be Rocky despite the fact how iconic Mr. Migayi has transcended into it's own archetype.

True story-- when I went to Columbia College of Chicago in the late 90s; an African Ametican El Train employee would come up to me and other people on the train; and tell passengers that her Brother really wrote Rocky and Sylvester Stallone stole it.

[shrewd tundra]

Well, after 2 the Rocky movies become pretty cartoonish themselves for the rest of the 80s.

[river frost]

Totally. TBH, except for maybe Kreese I don't really see any of the characters in Karate Kid as cartoonish, at least not in the first one. Rocky is certainly more gritty in its look, but the characters are more caricature-ish, IMO.

IDK, I genuinely feel like Karate Kid is the one with more "meat" on it. I don't think you could argue that Rocky is less "culturally relevant," but certainly the characters in Karate Kid are more developed and fully formed.

[shrewd tundra]

No, in the first one the characters outside of Kreese aren’t too cartoonish (well, there’s also the “Get him a body baaaag!” kid). Though much like the Rocky movies, we eventually got the likes of Terry Silver.

https://tenor.com/view/i-want-him-to-experience-pain-terry-silver-thomas-ian-griffith-the-karate-kid3-make-him-suffer-gif-24815227

[river frost]

Just about the epitome of great 80s villains

Not joking, I love Terry Silver so much.

[river frost]

https://tenor.com/view/cobra-kai-never-dies-terry-silver-thomas-ian-griffith-john-kreese-martin-kove-gif-24815003

[cedar nimbus]

Rocky’s accomplishments are twofold in the original movie. 1. He goes the distance. This was really his goal as he had no expectation of winning.
He set himself a daunting, albeit more realistic goal and achieved it.
2. He helps Adrian come out of her shell so she see’s herself as worthy of love and dignity.
Both franchises got sillier as they wore on but I think Rocky is rocket worthy and KK is a kid version knockoff that is both less realistic and less well executed.
Rocky drew me in on first watch, KK had me rolling my eyes.

[river frost]

I'm sorry but there is nothing realistic about Rocky holding his own against Apollo. I'm surprised so many see an amateur going toe-to-toe with a professional at the top of his game as more believable than an amateur beating a slightly-less amateur.

Regarding Adrian, that has got to be one of the worst relationships in Hollywood. It starts with what is basically a ||sexual assault|| and Adrian's arc in every film is her going from not wanting Rocky to fight to arbitrarily supporting him because it's time for the film to have a training montage. There's nothing organic there.

I hate to knock on Rocky so much because I love those films but those specific points are not its strong suits.

[vocal sparrow]

I find it easy to separate. I know you mean in that it does complete a story. But the first doesn't have Rocky mostly having a moan and almost everyone being annoying until the last 35 minutes.

[river frost]

Every character's major moment is them having a moan, and Pauly is in the top 5 list of most annoying characters of all time

[white sable]

This movie had an impact on my childhood. With my friends in our neighbourhood we watched it on videocassette since we were too little to go to the theatre at the time of its original release. It coincided with the start of our local karate school and of course everyone signed up. That's when we found out that the reality of studying martial arts is different than the movies. Kumite (sparring), or as I called it "white-knuckle time", is an important part in Karate training and so my friends & I were left wondering how Daniel could advance in a tournament when he seems to be just practicing his forms during training. There is improvement value in regularly going toe to toe with someone who can punch you back 🙂
Rocky, during those times felt more grown-up and less relatable to me. But if there's only one Avildsen movie that can go to space to represent the human race and these were our top two, I would choose Rocky for its going the distance theme. KK does some of that same theme too but Rocky the character is more intentional about it

[cedar nimbus]

Rocky was not an amateur. He was a pro albeit a journeyman pro rather than a contender. It’s implied that he’s underrated because he’s unmanaged and has to work a day job.
When he gets the chance to seriously train full time he’s able to get closer to his potential.

A much more realistic scenario than Daniel going from no Karate ability to defacto black belt in a matter of months. Even training full time it would be unlikely and it’s not established that he drops out of school to train.

[river frost]

It's more that Daniel was getting better, more rounded training vs Kreese's flawed method of teaching pure offense. "Strike first. Strike Hard. No Mercy." When Daniel is able to exploit that Johnny has no counter because he was never taught it, a major reason all the cobra kai kids feel so betrayed by Kreese at the end

Rocky goes from hobbyist (with potential) to getting within inches of beating the world champ in a matter of weeks. The scale is completely different, IMO

[cedar nimbus]

Look, the Rocky story (1st movie only) was based on a real life underdog named Chuck Wepner who defied all expectations by hanging 14 rounds with Mohamed Ali, only going down late in the 15th.
Conversely there is no real life analogue for Daniel san. You just don’t go from zero to black belt in 2 three months let alone win a contact tournament.
Recall that Johnny was defending Valley champ, so Kreese’s instruction, misguided as it may have been could not have been that bad, or Johnny and the rest of the Kobras would have have long since had their collective a$$es handed to them by literally EVERY OTHER dojo in the valley.
Rocky is maybe one degree divorced from reality. Karate Kid is at least two or three.

[river frost]

Karate Kid is based off the screenwriter's own life and that of an article he read at the time of a nine year old earning a black belt to fight back against his bullies. Wepner was a professional boxer for 11 years before fighting Ali.... there's A LOT of embellishment in Rocky 1.

Not that level of realism is a good metric of quality to begin with, but we're on a tangent

[shrewd tundra]

Yeah, I’m gonna say that for these kinds of inspirational sports movies, real-life accuracy is not high on my list of needs.

[cedar nimbus]

Do they establish how long Rocky’s been boxing in the movie? He’s not a newb. He even wins his small time fight with spider early in the movie.

[keen rampart]

So I was excited to get to this Ep just now however in a wildly entertaining coincidence I just had happened to see this yesterday:

[shrewd tundra]

This is basically the premise of the Cobra Kai show.

[vocal sparrow]

Except the show never entirely goes there, although it's often at its best when it toys with that space

[shrewd tundra]

Right, it starts there with Johnny’s perspective but doesn’t entirely make Daniel the villain. (Maybe it should.)

[vocal sparrow]

It's obvious to me that Macchio won't go there. I think the show balanced things great for awhile but the last couple seasons it started to be more of an issue.

[shrewd tundra]

At some point you have to wonder how many teenage karate brawls one town will allow.

[river frost]

I mean, Daniel being the villain is a cute idea, but it would betray the character and Miyagi to actually make him one. He's a villain via misunderstandings

[vocal sparrow]

Yes that's the general approach. Yet he is such a know it all that the misunderstandings route kinda gets worn out, imo.

[river frost]

Hmm,I don't really see the character that way. He's stubborn at times but always ends up admitting when he was wrong

In the show

[vocal sparrow]

I think Macchio also maybe wasn't totally aware that coding his character as very rich and a car dealer would make many viewers entertain that he's the bad guy.

[vocal sparrow]

He does. I just find his imparting lessons constantly demeanor to when he does that and how he teaches tiresome.

He hardly ever does a full stop 100% apology and I'll do better without tons of explanations, excuses, or lesson takeaways.

Outside of marriage conflicts, but that's a sitcom type of joke usually.

[river frost]

I hear that

Though personally each season is stronger than the last dave for maybe the first one

[vocal sparrow]

That seems like a popular opinion. I kinda like Silver but I've found his seasons do break the show into an absurd type of territory that I'm not a big fan of. 5 was an improvement on 4 though.

[river frost]

God I loved the slow burn of season 4

[distant summit]

Given that it was mentioned on the pod. The Killing Fields is a great movie and deserved to be covered a lot more than The Karate Kid tbh. I hope they do it one day.

[cedar nimbus]

With the traumatic end of Season 2, I was starting to see Karate as a metaphor for gun ownership. Everyone is learning Karate to protect themselves individually but the net result on society was actually more violence.
Did not expect what seemed like a light hearted show to go to such a dark place.

[hot igloo]

That's pretty silly. But it's entertaining.

[hot igloo]

I think he's been boxing for a long time, but the stakes are higher for his fight.

He had 64 fights under his belt. It looks like he started in the late '60s in his fictional biography, so maybe 6-8 years as a professional.

I'm basing this off the Rocky wiki

Anyway, Karate Kid is a good movie. I'm not actually sure I saw it as a kid.

[keen rampart]

I didn’t hear them mention it in the episode but did anyone already ask if this movie was always titled Karate Kid?

Because it’s kind of a strange name, I think.

I mean sure there’s a Legionnaire with the same name but that character was from the 60s and half the folks in The Legion have ‘kid’ ‘lad’ or ‘lass’ in their code names, so it probably doesn’t have any relation 🤷‍♂️

Feels like the kinda 11th hr title a movie producer would just come up with 😏🤓

[distant summit]

Criminal that they did not mention Jason’s Community episode where he directs a stage adaptation of Karate Kid

Also that they didn’t mention Barney’s view of Karate Kid on How I Met Your Mother.

[hot igloo]

Fwiw, I would pretty comfortably take Rocky over the Karate Kid. Maybe it's because I have nostalgia for the former and not the latter. It's a perfectly valid comparison, though. Glad there was the discussion.

[hot igloo]

Some footnotes to the episode:
The Miyagi style is Gōjū Ryū (剛柔流), which is a main style of Karate (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gōjū-ryū).
The Cobra kai style mentioned by Paul is Tang Soo Do.
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tang_Soo_Do).
It's Korean and not Karate, but some forms are influenced by Karate and the Chinese characters are the same as the original characters for Karate (唐手道 - Chinese hand way).
Karate was originally 唐 (kara - China) 手 (te - hand), but they changed the character for China/Tang to the homonym meaning empty (空 kara) to hide the Chinese origins.

[hot igloo]

Sorry for all the Chinese characters. Hopefully that was coherent.

[river frost]

ooh, didn't know that history of the word, very cool!

Yeah, it's weird for me because I have no actual nostalgia for either franchise outside of the meme-osmosis. It's been interesting coming to a lot of these beloved films in my mid-late 30s

[hot igloo]

I'm the same age

[distant summit]

Kind of weird that in the remake they do Kung Fu but still call it The Karate Kid

[river frost]

That's the only Karate Kid I haven't seen, I wonder how the film addresses that, if at all. I love the idea of casting Jackie Chan as the mentor, but obviously they're not going to drop the Karate part from the name.

[distant summit]

I really hope they do Shaolin Soccer or Kung Fu Hustle on the pod some day

[hot igloo]

I saw it on an airplane, but I'm 60% sure he learns kung fu.

[river frost]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's kung fu in the film, but I wonder if there's some breaking the fourth wall comment about him not being a karate kid or something

[hot igloo]

I vaguely remember there being one

[cedar nimbus]

I always thought that was dumb. Kung Fu Kid works equally well as a title, but I guess they wanted to cash in on perceived strong branding.

[abstract tulip]

I bet I can beat all comers for "coming to Karate Kid pretty late". As of a year or two ago, I had never seen any of the movies, nor Cobra Kai. I knew "wax on, wax off" from cultural osmosis, but that was it. But my then tween (now teen) daughter rented it, and I was curious--and ended up being very impressed that, as you say, it's actually a really good movie.

[abstract tulip]

Pretty sure Rocky was a professional boxer, not an amateur.

[river frost]

I was being a bit facetious to express, what I felt was, a huge gap between Rocky's journey and Daniel's. Rocky is labelled as a journeyman, so he mainly spars at gyms and maybe has an occasional fight with an up-and-comer.

and I felt that Daniel, being a kid with some athletic skill and getting training from a master teacher, beating other kids given poor training was a smaller leap of believability

[abstract tulip]

IDK, reading the Wikipedia article about Wepner, it does sound pretty similar to Balboa: "This bout [with Muhammed Ali] was the first time Wepner had been able to train full-time; since 1970 his typical day had consisted of road work in the morning, followed by his job selling liquor during the day. Then he was able to spend his nights working out and sparring in Bayonne boxing clubs."

[hot igloo]

Rocky had more pro fights than Wepner at this point in their careers

(If we're pretending Rocky is real)

[river frost]

he boxed in the military for years and had a lot of wins, he wasn't just a dude who fought in the gym his whole career, and the fight was half as long as the one in Rocky and he was decisively outboxed by Ali

[hot igloo]

Do the military fights count towards his record or no?

[river frost]

I'm not sure but I don't think it matters for the point i'm trying to make

[hot igloo]

Fair. I was just trying to get a sense of the comparison.

Rocky was 43-21 with 40 KOs

[river frost]

in club fights, right?

[hot igloo]

I don't know how many were club fights

[river frost]

i think all of them

[hot igloo]

Not sure we get that information

[river frost]

Wepner was the NJ heavyweight champion

just skimming his wiki

[hot igloo]

Yeah, he was ranked 8th in the world at the time. It's not a like for like comparison

[river frost]

either way, my point is Karate Kid = low tier fighter beating low tier fighter, Rocky = low-mid tier fighter beating top-tier fighter

[shrewd tundra]

Well, technically Rocky doesn’t win (the first time).

[river frost]

Like I said earlier, it's a bit having its cake and eating it too. He very narrowly loses in points, I think it's unfair to call it a real loss.

That's basically the set up of 2

At least If we're comparing the reality of it all to the real life events where wepner was a better fighter and still decidedly got his booty handed to him

[abstract tulip]

I confess, I'm one of those who thought Stallone directed Rocky. The More You Know...

[hot igloo]

He wrote it. Writers often deserve more credit than they get, but this might be one case where the writer deserves a bit less credit.

[cedar nimbus]

Again, as someone who taught martial arts to kids for years, Daniel’s progress over such a short period of time is not even remotely credible. He also had no opportunity to spar with other youth his age and IIRC isn’t really even shown sparring with Miyagi very much.
It’s a Cinderella story, and requires fairy tale levels of suspension of disbelief.
It’s not far off from Hong Kong style martial arts movies where “Masters” (hate the term) are depicted as magical.
As for the Kobra Kai training being “bad” it was bad from an ethical and character development POV but effective from a technical POV. Don’t forget, Johnny was two time reigning champ.
My daughter attended a Kobra Kai-esque Cheerleading school. They regularly placed at Worlds but the treatment of students was brutal with all focus on winning at the expense of the student’s wellbeing.
Treated paying customers like a disposable commodity.
Left my daughter’s back wrecked for year’s. Very fortunate my corporate health insurance allowed for unlimited Physiotherapy claims for eligible dependants.
Sorry… bit of a rant…
Point is, even @$$h0£3$ can turn out successful competitors.

[river frost]

You're explaining to me that karate kid isn't realistic when I've been sayng that about both films the whole time. @cedar nimbus

Cobra Kai's training was bad from a technical sense because it wasn't well rounded and focused on beating other kids with poor training, but just because he was an asshole that doesn't make Johnny the best fighter. His training was about exploiting weaknesses, not becoming a great fighter

[cedar nimbus]

Johnny was a bit of an asshole but that’s entirely irrelevant as to whether he was an effective fighter.
The real issue was that Kreese was an asshole and his students were misguided.
They kinda retconned the difference between Miyagi do and Kobra Kai Karate (KKK ??? 😧) in Kobra Kai cuz I don’t think it was that strongly delineated in the movie.
Purportedly KK is offense oriented and MD is defense oriented. Both have their pros and cons but in a sports context with rules and referees agression is generally rewarded and stalling, passivity or always waiting for the opponent to attack first is frowned on or outright penalised. Not sure about current sport Karate but in both wrestling and Judo there’s more penalties and DQs for non-combativity or passivity than all other causes combined. In that context an overly defence oriented style wouldn’t fare well.
All martial arts seek to exploit weaknesses BTW. It would be foolish not too. More than that it’s a matter of capitalizing on the opponent’s mistakes or provoking a reaction and exploiting that reaction with a prepared response. ie provoking a mistake.
Meeting an opponent’s strength face on isn’t martial arts, it’s just brute force.
Honestly I don’t remember any exposition in the original movie about the specifics of KK as a style beyond “Strike First, Strike Hard” so I’m not sure what you’re basing your assertion on.

[river frost]

Idk, you were the one bringing up Johnny being an asshole, it was my point that being one is irrelevant, lol. So was the fact that kreese was misguiding these kids by teaching themhow to get around the rules and cheat their way to victory while not teaching proper defense and sportsmanship.
Miyago-do isn't just focused on defense nor is it passive: it uses hard and soft strikes while using circular movements to control the opponent. Btw, it's Cobra Kai with C, not k.

Part of what they retcon in the show is Miyagi didn't teach Daniel the more overtly violent moves and techniques (killing blows), but it was always a balance of offense and defense

Which assertion do you mean? That cobra kai fights dirty? Their motto is "Strike Hard, Strike First...." but you forgot the "No Mercy" bit. Kreese straight up tells Johnny to cheat on the climactic fight, seriously injuring Daniel's leg.

It's not just exploiting the opponent's mistake with a prepared response, it's dirty cheaty fighting. That's fine if you're in a war but not in a local kids tournament, something Kreese couldn't understand

[cedar nimbus]

The point is that whatever Kreese was doing, it was working and his students were winning. The dirty fighting was mainly directed at Daniel because Kreese saw it as a payback situation for Miyagi “assaulting” his students but really to assuage his embarrassment at having his top students bested in an altercation which he felt reflected badly on the school and by extension himself. It was personal and all about ego.
The fact that they were fighting dirty against him made Daniel’s victory a little more plausible since the rules would have been in his favor but not enough to be overall a plausible situation.
At the risk of repeating myself ad-nauseam, you just DON’T go from zero to black belt in 3 to six months.
Daniel would have had to have been some sort of athletic phenom who barely needed Karate in the first place but that was definitely not the case.
Daniel IRL wouldn’t have made it past the first round. In fact IRL he wouldn’t even have been allowed to compete cuz neither he nor Miyagi had any credentials in the Valley Karate association or any other recognized US governing body for that matter.
As for Miyagi if he’s such a great teacher where is his school and where are his other students. If we look at what is known about his back story, he probably hasn’t done Karate since his youth in Okinawa. He then spent time in the USA as an immigrant, in an internment camp, and in the military before eventually becoming a gardener with an improbably good vintage car collection. When did he ever have a career as a great Karate practitioner, competitor, teacher?
Absolutely no evidence that ever happened.

At least with Mickey we know he was a great boxer back in the day and we know Rocky is a journeyman pro. The backstory is clearer and leap forward far smaller and more probable in a similar time frame.
Factor in that A Creed underestimated Rocky and did not prepare as he would have for a contender. He was shown to be distracted by the business and promotion aspects of the upcoming fight rather than focussed on training.

[river frost]

Why would you assume that Miyagi wasn't practicing karate all those years? Just because he doesn't run a school? That's a pretty large leap of logic. It's pretty established that Miyagi was a master who was hesitant to teach because he was very anti-violence. There were 40 years between him being in the military and retiring as a gardener with an improbably good vintage car collection.
Similarly regarding Kreese, why would you assume that the dirty tactics were only used against Daniel during that one fight? The film portrays him as a man who cheats and bullies to get a win. Cobra Kai's whole ethos was using whatever means necessary to win. "The point is whatever Kreese was doing, it was working.." lol, yes, he was fighting dirty against poorly trained McFranchises, getting around the rules, sneaking in illegal moves behind the refs' backs.

[river frost]

I don't even think the film was trying to say that Daniel was a "better" fighter than Johnny, but a more patient person. Johnny was used to bullying his way to the top (and bullying kids who have learned karate from a McFranchise), and when that doesn't work he gets emotionally flustered, makes mistakes and leaves himself open. That's what was happening to Daniel until Miyagi was able to get his nerves back in place. Daniel didn't become a black belt (in fact they have to lie about both of their credentials to be allowed to enter the tourny) but he also didn't start from zero.

[hot igloo]

I frankly don't think the film was trying to say much about Daniel as a fighter. His victory is attributed mostly to heart and desire, though he might have some beginners luck (see: catching the fly)

[cedar nimbus]

You can try and rationalize it all you want, the fact is Daniel’s apparent progress in such a short time frame is simply not possible and anyone who ACTUALLY does martial arts will affirm that.
You can make up head canon or you can go by what’s portrayed on the screen. I say the dirty tactics were mostly directed at Daniel because that’s what was shown on the screen. Likewise the movie doesn’t show or suggest that the other schools are McDojos.
The movie is also completely silent on what Miyagi did in the intervening years so it’s unlikely it was Karate or that ought to have been mentioned.
Miyagi honestly is arguably a racist stereotype. He’s portrayed as an asian version of the “magical negro” trope. An exotic figure capable of assisting the protagonist in magical ways that derive from his exoticism.
It’s clear I’m not going to convince you and ultimately both Rocky and KK are fairy tales but as someone who’s been on the mats, taken his lumps and most importantly actually taught martial arts to hundreds of beginners, I find Rocky, by far, the more credible of the two.

[hot igloo]

The only thing I disagree with there is the film being silent on what Miyagi did implies anything or ought to be anything.

[river frost]

Yes, that's just making up your own head canon to rationalize your position.

[river frost]

Cobra Kai is itself a McDojo: Former military sensei, young teens with black belts, cult mentality, its students can't win a one-on-one fight, Kreese focuses on reputation over proper instruction (teaching the kids how to cheat). Even the decor: black sleeveless uniforms, all the propaganda all over the walls). This is all on screen and strongly suggests the lack of seriousness in the karate scene at that time and place.

[hot igloo]

I don't really agree with that either

You're developing plot points from poor production design when the script tells us otherwise.

[river frost]

I disagree with your definition of plot 😛
But seriously, there's nothing poor about the production design, it's great and very intentional: I brought it up earlier but part of the inspiration for the film was the writer's own experience, including having a former military sensei who pushed violence and poor ethics over proper training. He lived this. Every last bit of that dojo, down to the Kreese cardboard standee is very intentional. Honestly it seems a bit obvious now that we're really examining it. Maybe they didn't have the term McDojo yet, I have no idea, but that's what cobra kai is. I know we don't consider sequels in these discussions but this is also a major aspect of 3

The franchising part

[cedar nimbus]

There’s a distinction between a McDojo and an abusive and/or militant dojo and I would say CK is more the latter.
A true McDojo, especially in Karate, generally eschews competition in favour of lots of kata, frequent exams and rapid promotion. You’ll see ten year black belts who’ve never been to a competition cuz they’ve been told their technique is “too deadly”.
For all its faults, I wouldn’t characterize CK as a McDojo based not least on their willingness to engage other schools in a competition run by a third party.
That said, I still wouldn’t want my kid training there.
Honestly, I think the whole Daniel/Miyagi story kinda supports the McDojo mythos, in that it posits a reality where you can become a “black belt” ie an expert practitioner, in very little time, if you just train under the right “master”.
What McDojo’s are generally selling IRL is the Karate Kid fantasy for a price paid under a fixed non-refundable contract.
What these McDojo’s absolutely DON’T want you doing is to actually try your hand at competition against real schools or you’ll quickly find out just how crappy your training actually is.

[river frost]

Fair, I couldn't find a more appropriate term for ck other than just calling it a bad school (not just militant) since what I'm trying to say is more specific than that. It's like 3/4 the way to being a mcdojo, just missing the franchise. There are certainly mcdojos that compete (tiger schullman), though. Again, Daniel isn't meant to be an expert in the film, but certainly the martial arts explosion from the 70s expanded in the 80s thanks to films like karate kid

I guess I'm seeing things a bit inverse from you. In karate kid, the town is filled with McDojos, which would be appropriate given the time and place. Along comes a very violent school of amateurs that dominates for a couple of years with brute force, cheating and intimidation.

[cedar nimbus]

That would be an interesting movie, but that was not the plot of this movie.

[river frost]

no it's not the plot

[distant summit]

This movie does not deserve this much talk tbh