Who is Cobra Kai‘s best karate master: Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka) or Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio)? Set 34 years after the events of The Karate Kid, Cobra Kai continues the lifelong rivalry between Johnny and Daniel that started in high school. Although the original Karate Kid movie trilogy centered on Daniel’s conflicts and Johnny only appeared in the original 1984 film, by Cobra Kai, they are both senseis of their own respective dojos – but which of them is really better at karate?
By the time Daniel moved to California in the summer of ’84, Lawrence was already the prized student of the Cobra Kai dojo headed by John Kreese (Martin Kove). Johnny was also the defending two-time All-Valley Under 18 Karate Champion. Comparatively, at the time they met, Daniel only had a few karate courses at the YMCA in New Jersey whereas Johnny was the acknowledged king of karate at their high school. Of course, after Mr. Miyagi (Noriyuki “Pat” Morita) became LaRusso’s sensei and arranged for the two teenagers to compete in the All-Valley tournament, Daniel-san became a quick study in Miyagi’s style of karate. As every Karate Kid fan knows, Daniel beat Johnny to become the All-Valley Champion. And, like Lawrence, LaRusso also became a two-time All-Valley Karate Champion when he successfully defended the title in The Karate Kid Part III.
In terms of their fighting styles and disciplines, Daniel and Johnny are polar opposites. Johnny is a lifelong devotee to Cobra Kai’s offense-based style of “strike first, strike hard, no mercy”. Sensei Lawrence even teaches his students that offense is the optimal defense. A self-styled “badass”, Johnny is an aggressive fighter and he boasts that, “I may not always win but I never back down from a fight.” As an adult, Johnny has been in street fights against multiple opponents and he also beat his own sensei, Kreese, who hailed Lawrence as “the best student in the history of Cobra Kai”. However, Johnny had begun to get “soft” by Cobra Kai season 2, which Kreese exploited when he stole the dojo from under his ex-student.
The Karate Kid movies offer a lot more evidence of Daniel’s fighting style, which is rooted in Miyagi-Do karate’s defense-based system. Mr. Miyagi drilled “focus”, meditation, blocks, and defense into Daniel-san, which is the system the wise old master personally employed: “The best way to block a punch is to not be there”. However, after he beat Johnny in ’84, Daniel found himself in some violent fights, both in tournaments with Mike Barnes (Sean Kanan), and in The Karate Kid Part II, where Daniel defeated Chozen Toguchi (Yuji Okomoto) in a violent battle. But Daniel is also a hothead who can easily fly off the handle when he feels threatened or frustrated and, in The Karate Kid Part III, Daniel was tricked into joining Cobra Kai, which fueled his aggressive tendencies. Ultimately, however, Daniel-san finds a way to get his hand raised in the end.
Johnny and Daniel each teach their distinctly opposite karate philosophies to their students and they have both been successful. Johnny’s coaching in the Cobra Kai style led to his prized student, Miguel Diaz (Xolo Mariduena), winning the All-Valley tournament, ironically by beating Daniel’s student, Robby Keene (Tanner Buchanan), who is Johnny’s son. But in Cobra Kai season 2, the students of Miyagi-Do ultimately won the violent all-out brawl with Cobra Kai at their high school, which tragically ended with Miguel being critically injured.
Since they’re both the stars of the series, which intriguingly showcases their virtues and their flaws in equal measure, Cobra Kai is careful not to say for certain who is better at karate between Daniel and Johnny. Lawrence, overall, does seem more athletic than Daniel, who models himself after Mr. Miyagi – and LaRusso’s late sensei didn’t resemble an athlete but he was a supremely gifted fighter regardless. Based on The Karate Kid movies, Daniel can boast more victories than Johnny, and, with his happy marriage, loving family, and affluent lifestyle, LaRusso is also clearly the winner at life. But Johnny always has something to prove that fuels him to keep trying hard, even after a lifetime of failure. Overall, Cobra Kai explores the good and the limitations of both Miyagi-Do and Cobra Kai, and perhaps the best fighter will be the one who can fuse the best of both forms of karate.
