Diksha Sundriyal
The first season of ‘Cobra Kai’, a follow-up of ‘The Karate Kid‘ series, builds upon the rivalry of Daniel and Johnny, as both of them get a team of their own. The second season picks up with the ending scene of its predecessor and begins with intense action, foreshadowing the conflicts that would appear for the rest of its run.
The return of Kreese opens old wounds for Johnny and they get into a fight. Kreese apologizes to Johnny for treating him badly and tries to get into his good graces. He offers to become a part of Cobra Kai again. Johnny is reluctant at first but then decides to give him a second chance. Meanwhile, Daniel starts Miyagi-Do and gets Samantha back into karate. Here’s how these events affect the lives of all the characters in the show.
Cobra Kai Season 2 Recap
The rivalry between Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do worsens as the story moves forward. While both Daniel and Johnny try to stay away from harming each other, their pupils develop animosity and act upon it. The fire is fuelled by Kreese.
To promote his dojo, Daniel makes a video ad in which he disses Cobra Kai. In return, Johnny creates an ad of his own. To bring more attention to his dojo, Daniel organizes a performance at the Valley Fest, but the Cobra Kai gang gets a whiff of it and they take over the attention with an aggressive display of their own. Robby advises Daniel to make a video of them fighting each other or someone else to promote their dojo. Daniel decides that if students are to join his dojo, they should do it of their own accord.
Johnny eases down once Daniel’s advertisement campaign dies down, but Kreese pushes Hawk to do something to put Miyagi-Do into their place. This leads Hawk and a couple of other students to trash Daniel’s dojo. They also steal Mr. Miyagi’s Medal of Honour and vandalize the car he had gifted to Daniel. In his anger, Daniel storms into Cobra Kai, but Johnny holds back his anger and no fight ensues. However, Daniel tells the students to come to Miyagi-Do if they are fed up with the aggressive and violent methods of Cobra Kai, and some of them follow him.
Eventually, Johnny realizes that Kreese is not a good influence on his students and tells him to leave. Miguel discovers that it was Hawk who trashed Miyagi-Do when he finds him wearing Mr. Miyagi’s Medal of Honour. He returns it to Robby and tells him to apologize to Sam for him, but Robby leaves the medal inside the dojo to be found by Demetri later.
Johnny and Daniel reconcile when they meet each other at a restaurant. Their partners ease the tension between them, and it looks like the war that Kreese had wanted to start between Cobra Kai and Miyagi-Do has died down too. But another problem emerges the next day.
The Love Triangles
While Daniel and Johnny figure out their dojos and the rivalry, the kids go through a change in their relationships. Sam keeps her distance from Miguel. He thinks of ways to win her back, but the entry of Tory at Cobra Kai distracts him. He starts dating her, while Sam and Robby get attracted to each other. Tory and Sam’s first meeting leads to an instant dislike between them, which worsens with every other encounter, especially when Sam discovers that Tory is dating Miguel.
Daniel’s increased involvement with the dojo leads to a disbalance in his marriage and his profession. Amanda gets angry with him when he keeps skipping work for training. Johnny, on the other hand, finds himself attracted to Carmen, Miguel’s mother. After various unsuccessful attempts at online dating, he finally asks her out on a date. Another personal crisis in his life arrives when Miguel discovers that Robby is his son, following which, he convinces Miguel that the welfare of Cobra Kai is first and foremost in his mind.
Before the first day of school, everyone gets together at a party. Tory and Sam get into a drinking game. At the end of the party, Miguel and Sam kiss each other, which angers Tory. Demetri’s attempts to reconcile with Hawk go in vain and he picks on his ex-best friend by revealing his embarrassing secrets to everyone. The party is put to rest at the arrival of the cops. Sam asks Robby to take her somewhere else because she doesn’t want her parents to find out that she had been drinking.
The Ending
After the events of the party, things go downhill for all the characters. Disturbed by Sam’s absence at home, Daniel tracks down her phone and finds her and Robby at Johnny’s place. Instead of talking to him about it, Daniel gets into a fight with Johnny, takes Sam away from there, while also letting go of Robby. Miguel tries to reach Tory, but she keeps her distance from him.
At school, Robby comes clean to Sam about the medal of honor that Miguel had returned. Before she can tell him about what happened between her and Miguel, the class bell rings. Tory confronts Sam in front of the whole school and a fight erupts between them, which leads to all the Miyagi-Do and Cobra Kai fighting against each other.
Hawk runs after Demetri, but by now, the latter has learned enough defense to beat him. Tory is beaten by Sam. Despite overpowering Robby, Miguel shows mercy to him, as taught by Johnny. However, an angry Robby attacks back and throws him down the staircase. While Miguel is rushed to the hospital, Robby runs away. Amanda tells Daniel to shut down his dojo as his rivalry with Johnny is only causing problems for everyone. Carmen breaks up with a heart-broken Johnny. When he goes back to his dojo, he finds that Kreese is back and has taken over his students. Kreese reveals that while Johnny had been away, he took over the deal of the dojo from the owner of the building and has also brainwashed his students to follow him instead of Johnny.
Having lost everything that he had worked to build all this while, Johnny gets drunk, abandons his car, and throws away his phone. In the last scene, we get a glimpse at his phone’s screen where a notification pops up with Ali’s name on it.
Read More: Where is Cobra Kai Filmed?
