Cobra Kai

Benvinguts to Barcelona

Season 6

Episode 6

Editorial review

3 stars

***

Photo: CURTIS BONDS BAKER/NETFLIX

¡Bienvenidos a España! After a few months of rest, Cobra Kai is back for the second of the three final batches of episodes. When the July midseason finale of Cobra Kai Moving on to the Sekai Taikai, I had some mild concerns: if the big world tournament ended in the next few episodes, what else would there be to tell in this final season? But after watching the first episode of this next batch, I feel reassured. The All Valley Tournament in season four lasted two whole episodes, and this one could last five. I’m all for spreading the event over multiple episodes, especially if it means getting to know the competitors on the other teams better. This shouldn’t feel like yet another battle between Miyagi-Do and Cobra Kai, even if it inevitably comes down to them in the finale.

“Benvinguts a Barcelona” starts immediately after the ceremony at the end of the last episode, the night before the tournament starts. This means that the cast must be divided again into children and adults. While participants go on an excursion to L’Aquàrium Barcelona, ​​their senseis will talk to sponsors at a cocktail mixer.

I felt like the last episode rushed a bit to get everyone to Spain, so it’s nice to see this episode moving a bit slower, even if it means delaying some of the payouts and some of the having to repeat stories we already know. Johnny and Daniel are still on opposite sides, working together as senseis and sharing the same hotel room, but refuse to be friendly. Daniel worries about Johnny screwing up with the sponsors, and we see the guy immediately almost get into a fight over the last two steaks at the buffet. But as always, Daniel has an equally deep sense of aggression, and he is the one who almost becomes violent when Kreese threatens him.

And yet the biggest embarrassment is Chozen, who acts as if he just drank an original recipe Four Loko. He is completely sloppy and smashes vases full of the same flowers he brought to Okinawa to win over Kumiko. Unfortunately, someone he hilariously calls “Towel Man” (then “Shower Man”) answered her door, so it looks like Kumiko has another man in her life. But then again, Chozen didn’t stick around long enough to learn who exactly the man is. It’s entirely possible that he doesn’t understand the full truth about Towel Man’s identity.

Johnny discovers at the mixer that winning the tournament could lead to lucrative brand deals that would put Miguel through college and easily provide for Carmen and their child (plus Rosa). Daniel also has an epiphany, albeit one that will affect him less on a material level and more on an emotional level. After showing Mr. Miyagi’s bloody Sekai Taikai headband to Representative Gunther and another dojo equipment and clothing expert, he gets a lead on a legendary champion named Master Serrano, who Miyagi may have known from back in their tournament days.

During their excursion, the children are kept busy by their own mix of minor drama and more serious conflict. This is a very necessary episode for Tory, whose perspective we haven’t heard since she stormed out of the Miyagi-Do captain competition after her mother died. She seems fully aware of Cobra Kai’s unappealing qualities this time around, based on her reactions to Kim Da-Eun calling her a rat and downplaying what she did with Tory’s hand last season. But it’s as she later explains to Robby: Because Sam was almost guaranteed a captaincy spot, this felt like the only option to compete. At least she still seems to have Kreese in her corner.

Fresh off that anxious conversation, Robby accepts Kwon’s challenge to a high-kick match, gambling away his and Demetri’s room if he loses. He gets even more excited when Sam calls him out for being played by Kreese again; He knew Kreese had approached Tory after she broke out of prison but didn’t tell anyone, and then she got sucked back into Cobra Kai. Everyone seems annoyed with Robby, who is clearly distracted as he heads to tomorrow’s tournament, but most are hesitant to confront him about it directly, perhaps afraid they will disrupt the peace and throw him off his game even more.

Tory does attempt to ease Robby’s suffering… by putting their relationship on hold when he visits her in the middle of the night. She might think this will actually help him after hearing from Sam that he can’t concentrate while he’s so worried about his girlfriend – but it clearly backfires, because it turns out that getting dumped doesn’t help you concentrate either! From one point of view, Tory may have actively (albeit unintentionally) sabotaged the competition by breaking his heart. Robby is right to point out that she only trusts herself, a core problem that she cannot overcome despite Miyagi-Do’s positive influence.

The first event the next day is called ‘Captain’s War’ and involves entire dojos competing against each other in groups of four, each tasked with protecting their own captains and eliminating the others. Tory knows Miyagi-Do, so her dojo really needs to listen to her, but Kwon walks all over her until she takes Kim Da-Eun’s advice and gives him no choice but to follow. The Miyagi-Do competitors quickly fall away, and Robby gets distracted by Tory and messes up.

This provides a good opportunity to really establish dojos other than Miyagi-Do and Cobra Kai, and there has been… some success. Flachi Della Notte, one of the two new teams in Miyagi-Do’s group, is effortlessly decimated in the background before we get a chance to see much of them. But the Iron Dragon dojo actually wins the first round, with their two captains dealing with Tory, Kwon and Yoon without much problem. (They were so confident that the other fighters on their team actually voluntarily resigned, which is pretty badass.) “Welcome to Barcelona, ​​bitch,” says the girl credited as Zara, who Tory briefly met during the earlier taking photos. It seems like she could be a fierce new antagonist in these middle episodes, along with her sensei (the man who stole Johnny’s steak).

“Benvinguts a Barcelona” feels mostly like a setup episode; the one event we do see probably doesn’t matter all that much when it comes to determining Miyagi-Do’s place in the tournament, and both Daniel and Johnny’s goals and conflicts in Barcelona are still being determined. But I’m pretty excited about the upcoming tournament, which should feel different from the usual competitions in the Valley. Who doesn’t need a little vacation every now and then?

• RIP Chad McQueen, who played Dutch in the original film and died in September. There were once plans to bring him on board for a cameo Cobra Kaibut it never worked.

• Apparently Kreese’s charges were dropped because he is a veteran with PTSD who was supposedly innocent forced escape. I’m not sure if that makes sense, but sure.

• “Are these your models? I have much prettier children in my dojo. Let me show you some pictures.” “That’s not really the criteria.”

• I really like the conversation when Sam tells Tory that she felt hurt because she didn’t contact her after her mother’s death, but instead ran into the arms of Cobra Kai. The conflicts can get repetitive in this show, but it’s the changing contexts that keep the rivalry interesting.

• I recently rewatched part of the Disney Channel Original Movie Johnny Tsunami for a Halloween costume and discovered that Yuji Okumoto (aka Chozen) played Johnny’s father, so that was a fun discovery.