It was a tough one I know

Maybe this just needed some space. Because Cobra Kai is a camp masterpiece and this could have used some of the gleeful stupidity that Johnny Lawrence brings to the mat.

If the series didn’t exist, maybe Machio throwing on the gi and headband for the first time since the ‘80s would have actually meant something…

but with Cobra Kai as a streaming smash there’s the need to bring in the suddenly relevant Miyagi mythos.

Result is half a movie that was working fine on its own and then the Daniel LaRussa stuff just fudging it up.

The split narrative, master and creation, and book end “let me tell you my story” sequences are distracting. There’s enough power in image and emotion to this master’s creation- I wish he would have let it roam.

Missed on the big screen, watched attentively over two nights on Netflix.

Is the Del Toro-Frank adaptation too on the nose? The thematic build up from his previous creature features sets the bar almost too high for what ends up as sort of rote.

flashing back and forth, both timelines unfolding to the audiences at the same time. Can’t argue with the result though, and the cinematic scaling is well deserved, with over a billion in box office to show for it

But you don’t feel the creeping terror of the years. You don’t feel the passage of time by linking the children to the adults.

The perfect delivery of the King opus would have been an 8 part HBO series (tapping Mike Flanagan of course)…

The child actors once again face their fears as the adults encounter them anew, struggling to remember anything.

The problem, is, we remember all of it just fine from the first movie.

Love the casting and many of the segments from the source material are recreated adequately.

The separation renders the sequel redundant, the stakes superfluous. The film knows this and tries to double back to what was essentially a complete story of the youths beating down their collective bogeyman.