8 Reasons It’s Tough to Rewatch ‘The Karate Kid’ Today

The Karate Kid is one of the most beloved ’80s movies of all time. It stars Ralph Macchio as Daniel LaRusso, a teenager who moves with his mother across the country from New Jersey to California. Daniel is having trouble fitting in and crosses paths with Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka), who, along with his friends, bullies Daniel. Johnny and his friends are all members of the Cobra Kai dojo and are top-notch karate students.

Daniel learns karate from the handyman in his apartment building, Mr. Miyagi (Pat Morita), and competes against the Cobra Kai group in the Under-18 All-Valley Karate Championships. Under Miyagi’s tutelage, Daniel learns a lot about life and overcoming adversity. The movie was a smash hit, earning $130 million at the box office against an $8 million budget. It has spawned numerous sequels and TV series, including the recently concluded series Cobra Kai and the Jackie Chan collaboration Karate Kid: Legends, as well as many imitators.

Convinced this is a great movie? Here’s why the magic of the 1980s classic doesn’t necessarily hold up anymore.

The Supporting Characters Are Incredibly Flat

As is the case in plenty of movies, the leading characters are important and take the narrative forward. But that doesn’t mean that the side characters need to be so underdeveloped. Ali’s entire purpose in the film is to be a prize for whoever wins the karate championship. She is Johnny’s girlfriend at the beginning of the film. But when he and Daniel face off at the end of the film, it’s almost a forgone conclusion that she is going to be with whoever the winner is.

Daniel’s mom (Randee Heller) doesn’t get much screentime and also doesn’t really provide much in the way of anything other than some support for Daniel. The rest of the Cobra Kai members, other than Johnny, are just meant to be background characters without much to do. It’s understandable that John G. Avildsen, the director, didn’t want to develop some of these characters. But the female characters especially feel woefully underdeveloped.

There’s No Depth to the Villains Either

The TV series Cobra Kai gives the best look into Johnny’s life, as it follows William Zabka’s character as an adult. But Johnny is supposed to be seen as the villain in the film with his outlandish bullying. He and his cohorts come across as mean and evil, just because they can be. Part of it is because they are being trained by an over-the-top wild card in John Kreese (Martin Kove), who thinks it’s socially acceptable to have kids bully one another rather than accept peace offerings to stop the fighting.

Seriously, Kreese is the biggest problem of the film. He’s the real villain, trying to get kids to injure one another just to make himself look good. He isn’t the first or the last adult who uses children’s sports accomplishments to make him feel better about himself. But he is arguably the most stereotypical. It’s also not really explained why he is the way he is, other than being a former Special Forces Vietnam War veteran.

’80s Villains Built on a Macho Attitude

The macho attitude of Kreese and the rest of Cobra Kai is a bit too outlandish. The toughest people are usually the ones who are the most athletic and the most talented physically. At least that’s what the film wants the audience to think. Johnny is just going along with how he was trained, and it is a bit hard to fault him for ending up the way he did, as it’s obvious this attitude was instilled in him and the other Cobra Kai members.

It does make for one-sided villains though. These guys are mean and bad because they feel they have to be. No one will respect them if they aren’t tough. That just isn’t the case in reality. But for many people transitioning into adulthood following being in wars, it’s a bit understandable.

Daniel’s Social Awkwardness Is Tough To Swallow

It’s hard to be a teenager anywhere. But imagine having to move to the complete opposite side of the country during high school. Starting fresh at that point in time in anyone’s life is never easy. Imagine doing this while being a socially awkward kid, and it’s hard to believe Daniel was even able to speak to anyone. I’m half-joking, but Macchio played up Daniel’s fish-out-of-water storyline a bit too much.

Daniel seems completely inept when it comes to speaking normally with other teens. He often just comes off as whiny. The filmmakers want you to think that Newark, New Jersey, where he came from, is a place that has four people in it and they don’t have to interact with one another (it’s not. It’s a very populated city). It’s cringeworthy to watch him try and talk to Ali Mills (Elisabeth Shue), and it’s even stranger to think that he’s hanging out with an elderly man as his best friend. It might not have bothered people back then, but it does come off a little strange now.

Toxic Masculinity and Fighting Your Way Through Tough Problems

This couples well with the one above, as the Cobra Kai method teaches people to fight their way through problems. Miyagi goes to Kreese and asks for understanding and peace to resolve the conflict between the boys. Kreese basically kicks him out of the dojo for suggesting such a thing. Toxic masculinity is a common trope in films, especially in the 1980s.

Could Daniel and Johnny have talked things through? Sure. But there is no exciting film by doing that. Would it have been better for the men? Maybe. But then audiences wouldn’t have gotten six seasons of Cobra Kai either.

The “Believe in Yourself” Trope Is Heavily Overplayed

Mr. Miyagi teaches Daniel a lot of things. He teaches him skills that he can take with him through life, but also teaches him skills that help him in karate. In fact, he even unknowingly teaches him the move that would win him the championship. But at the end of the day, Miyagi’s advice can be boiled down to “believe in yourself.”

This is a common theme in films and has been played out many times. Rocky, Rudy, Mulan, Cool Runnings, and even Legally Blonde all have underlying versions of the trope. If Daniel believes he can beat the rest of Cobra Kai, he probably can. That’s because he’s the main character and the movie demands it.

The Wise Old Asian Man Stereotype

The “wise Asian man” stereotype that Miyagi’s character fits into is a problem in its own right. He is treated as a beacon of hope and wisdom for an unsuspecting mind. But, he’s not teaching Daniel about rocket science. He’s giving him pretty basic advice. He should believe he can do something in order to achieve it.

He is trying to instill patience in him, which is helpful for anyone in any situation. He is also trying to teach him about respect, which the rest of the movie’s characters don’t acknowledge in their own lives. Some of these lessons are things Daniel should have probably known by the time he turned 17.

Overwhelming Use of ’80s Montage Music (and Stereotypical ’80s Clothing)

The movie can’t be faulted completely for having a heavy dose of time-period-appropriate music and clothing. The costume department can only work with what they’ve got when a movie is set in the present day. But did every teen in the movie, besides those doing karate and wearing gis, need to be so stereotypical? The bigger hair always gives it away.

Bill Conti was the music supervisor for this film and many in the franchise. Many people associate Conti with his training montage music from the Rocky films and from the Karate Kid franchise. It’s impossible to hear one of these upbeat, sweeping musical numbers without immediately picturing the rapid training taking place to move the narrative forward. That style of music and parts of the score are overused in the film, as there is a lot of conflict, and they always play up this specific type of music in those moments. It just gets in the way of some otherwise great scenes (trust me, I do appreciate them sometimes, but this movie has a lot of them).

Karate Takes Years of Patience and Practice To Master

Johnny had every right to be angry when he lost the tournament to a kid who just picked up karate weeks earlier. That’s because karate takes years of practice to become a master at. Johnny is a black belt in the sport, meaning he’s likely taken karate since he was a small child to be that good by the time he is 17 years old.

The fact that the film speeds up the training process through montages and fun lessons from Mr. Miyagi is a bit of an insult to people who have dedicated years to learning the craft. It can be hard to justify that Daniel is that naturally gifted an athlete to become as good at karate as he is. It could also be that the competitors at the Under 18 All-Valley Karate Championships just weren’t any good. But to make us believe that Daniel is as good as he is after just a few weeks is silly.

The Formulaic Ending Is Easy To See Coming

It’s important to give the screenwriters a bit of credit for having Daniel pull out the Crane Kick to win the match. That scene is iconic and will always be iconic. But there’s no way any audience member was sitting through The Karate Kid in 1984 and didn’t think Daniel would win the tournament. Even before the tournament begins, it’s a good bet that Daniel will face off against Johnny, and there’s no way the filmmakers were going to make that a matchup in the tournament’s first round.

It’s okay to lean into an easy narrative. But the tournament is all but decided once the suggestion of having the boys solve their differences in a karate tournament is mentioned. Why else would the audience want to sit through a couple hours of training and buildup? To see Daniel get knocked out by someone else and never face Johnny? It always had to happen this way, and that makes it a bit formulaic.​​​​​​

Release Date

June 22, 1984

Runtime

126 minutes

Director

John G. Avildsen

Writers

Robert Mark Kamen

Producers

Jerry Weintraub

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