i’m getting married in 15 hours

Cobra Kai (2018 — )

orchestra au but im too lazy to draw the instruments 🥰

lil notes

This is how MOST of their sparring sessions end, tbh.🙄

idc i will die defending cobra kai as one of the most well-written shows ever. every single disagreement between daniel and johnny all depends on perspective. well minus the part where daniel did literally kidnap johnny’s son but that’s not the point rn.

like, every angle of this show depends on the characters making assumptions based on the evidence they’re presented with, their past experiences and what they’ve been taught and by who. the plot revolves around both johnny and daniel believing that *they* are the moral epicenter of the world, that what their senseis taught them was *objectively correct* (or at least made them very very tough), and that they’re the one that holds all the right answers. like, daniel was absolutely tormented by cobra kai as a teenager, and johnny was just refusing to take shit from some yappy upstart. there is just something poetic about the first couple seasons in the way the narratives are pieced together, and both johnny and daniel’s inability to let each other go.

daniel has absolutely no reason to interfere with cobra kai. he’s got a car dealership! he has kids to care for! he’s got a loving wife at home and a membership at the country club! but he is the moral epicenter of the world - cobra kai teaches evil. he has to interfere, as is his duty as Karate God. johnny has nearly the same mindset in reverse, cobra kai saved *him* when he was a kid, and he needed to be saved again. and when miguel needed to be saved, johnny brought back the only thing he thought could do the job.

i think, as far as i’ve watched, the only character really attempting to grow is johnny. he’s trying to unsimplify the cobra kai mindset. in real life there are complicated situations where mercy is required. defeat is inevitable. there are times where you’re not the one that hits first or hardest. and as johnny gets older and learns and relearns these lessons, he’s realizing that he cannot impose unto his kids what was taught to him.

daniel - who hasn’t done this - has never had change required of him. in high school he was (pretty objectively, in my opinion) absolutely in the moral right. and everything in his life has reinforced that and never gave him reason to doubt his perspective. it’s why he refuses to talk to johnny, to learn a fucking thing about the man he’s despised for 30 years for the high crime of being a shitty teenager. i mean, besides the fact that they’re both very stubborn.

i think 90% of what makes this show work so well is that neither daniel nor johnny completely grew out of being 16. like, being self centered and self pitying is one of the great hallmarks of teenager-dom and they keep reeling each other back to that. and they’re all constantly surrounded by teenagers! like Everyone Hates Me and Im The Only One Who’s Ever Felt Like This and Im The Only One Who’s Right And Why Cant Anyone Hear What Im Saying and Im The Only Person To Ever Have This Happen To Me!!!!! My Life Is So Much Worse Than Anyone Else’s!!

cobra kai being a continuation of the movies instead of a spin-off or a legacy retelling is SO important because it shows how neither of them actually ever grew up. the teenage view of life is so limited that it’s basically impossible to get a message through to a 16 year old. like i’m not sure daniel or johnny ever got to that point in their lives where they could see that other people were Just Like Me Too, so everyone can say whatever they want to them. you can say, hey i went through something like this so heres some advice - but they Know Everything!! so why would they ever listen to you??

does that make sense does anyone else get it

Thanks, man. I don't know what happened. I must have tripped over something…

the lawrusso queer agenda strikes again

Billy’s cute face

Taken from Ron Thomas' IMDB

sam: i made you a friendship bracelet

Demetri: im not really a jewelry person

Sam: you don't have to wear it

Demetri: no, im gonna wear it forever. Back off

oh darling, even rome fell

i want to write fic however i've never had an original thought in my life

i can't lie to you i loveee bad endings sometimes. what if nothing worked out. what if the characters gave into their worst instincts. what if they became worse. what if there's truly no hope left. what will they do out of desperation? who will they become as their worst selves?

ok only 1 person cares but that's all it takes for me ghslkfghkdfh @amadeusevenstar you asked so here i am yet again... warning this is ridiculously and embarrassingly long, like idk what possessed me to write this in like 5 minutes...

as that prev post said by purpleheartskies, carmen has never once shown any interest in remotely encouraging johnny to have any kind of relationship with his actual biological son.  she shows us over and over again that her only concern is miguel.  (and i’ve said this - this is valid, unless and until you are looking to be in a serious relationship with this man (who HAS A BIOLOGICAL CHILD THAT’S NOT YOURS), have his child, and push some kind of nuclear family with him that you haven't really even had a conversation about). however, again like OP mentioned, carmen has explicitly - multiple times - made it very clear that she wants him to be a better figure for miguel (and eventually their baby).

i love that OP mentioned carmen getting upset with johnny multiple times about miguel being violent/getting into fights, when miguel is the one choosing to act that way. johnny has never under any circumstances taught the kids to fight in the way miguel (OR hawk for that matter) choose to behave. these are choices they are making using cobra kai as an ego boost and scapegoat.

again, as they stated, "[carmen] has willingly chosen to be in a relationship with johnny who [SHE KNOWS] is robby's father, and to encourage johnny to gradually take on more of a father-figure role to miguel since the school fight and now of course to the baby she and johnny are going to have, regardless of johnny's negative past and present behavior with robby." also, and i know i've talked about this before - she doesn’t know or ever seem to care about anything johnny’s gone through, or robby for that matter.

the impotence scene conversation is really what makes me the most upset i think. carmen did not give a single shit about how johnny felt in that moment. she is nothing but condescending, talks down to him like a child (she does this often). all she ever does is manipulate how johnny’s feeling to make it about miguel so that she can make sure he’s not going to leave miguel like his father did, because she’s so insecure about it. like i’m sick. first and foremost the fact that she doesn’t even ask him to tell her more about how he feels about miguel drifting to daniel, how he watched his own son do that and now he’s watching miguel do it and he’s got this feeling in his chest like it’s happening all over again. how sick he feels at the idea of having neither of them. how he can’t even be with carmen if not for miguel because what would tether them? also, the fact that she just skips straight to telling miguel they’re banging so that.....maybe he’ll care about johnny again? what the hell? besides the weirdness of that, johnny’s response is such a perfect opening for her to learn more, lean into his story, hear about his childhood and how he felt when his own mom started dating other guys. she doesn’t ask because she DOESN’T CARE!! she just uses it as an opportunity to talk down to him like a kid. she knows how talking to him like that affects him because she doesn’t even talk to her CHILD like that. she talks to him like that because she’s trying to manipulate him to doing what she wants him to do. she’s done it multiple times. anyways…

another thing she does that i truly have never understood is act like johnny's supposed to be some well-developed dad to (HER) 16 year old.........because....she.....says so?????? or something????? like she is obviously aware he couldn't be a father to his own biological son when it "mattered".....but somehow as soon as it's miguel (and then later their unborn kid) he's supposed to.....just magically know what to say and do and also not feel nervous or apprehensive about it all? like never mind the fact that he has his own biological son that he never even got practice in being a dad to because of his own past - how would he know how to do this now? how could you expect him to?? like are you literally joking? i honestly cannot tell if the writers are self-aware enough to be doing this on purpose or they’re just trying to make it "haha so funny johnny sucks at being a dad he's so dumb!!!!" it's so gross uuuuuugggghhhhhhh

also, i know i talked about this before, but the "figure out to not be that guy" statement is so genuinely disgusting to even say and i don’t understand how even the general public could hear that and think johnny (or anyone) deserves something like that, when SHE'S the one pursuing this relationship?!??!!?!  like did he mess up?  sure.  but holy shit - she doesn’t even give him the space to be a father to robby and she is all-consumed with idea of him being a deadbeat to their unborn kid already.  if you’re so scared of that, maybe you, i don’t know, shouldn’t be having se/x w said deadbeat just because you want your son to have a father figure?  if he’s so awful why are you wasting your time?  because miguel loves him, she’d do anything for miguel, and is so insecure about being a single mother she’s clinging onto the first father-figure to care about miguel maybe???????  she doesn’t care that johnny would’ve been there for miguel for the rest of his natural life with or without her. just the fact that the GA can watch the way she acts and be like “aww i’m so happy for johnny he’s gonna have a family and get to be a ‘real dad’ and have love <3.” ...... bye

AND ANOTHER MF THING: this is from purpleheartskies' post: "in s5e5, she was only okay with robby having dinner with them after miguel said he was okay with it. robby is johnny's son! why is carmen in a relationship with robby's father?” NO LITERALLY. ROBBY BARELY HAD A MOTHER FIGURE. SHE DOES NOT CARE TO PLAY MOM TO JOHNNY’S KID WITH ANOTHER WOMAN BUT EXPECTS JOHNNY TO BE SUPER DAD TO HER KID!!!!! she does not ever seem to care about robby at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! how are you going to act like johnny can’t step up, and then get in his face about “being that guy” when you’ve literally never said one single word to robby or even pretended to care from a motherly standpoint????? what?????????? it's honestly been a while since i've seen the later seasons and it will be a while before i get there in my rewatch so this is a genuine question: did carmen ever voice concern about robby being in cobra kai under kreese? sleeping in the dojo? did she ever mention caring at all about silver manipulating robby or even ask??

the only two things in that post that OP made that i wanted to clarify where i stand on it were about johnny caring about robby's trauma and also the very end when they talked about johnny continuing to neglect robby for the diaz's, and i've already said how i feel in the tags of that one so i'll try and keep this brief. i agree with the sentiments btw like no argument here at all, but johnny absolutely cares how both robby and miguel feel about the b*by. it’s written all over his face and in his body language in that stupid scene where the boys find out. that is one of the most poorly written and OOC things i’ve seen in a long time lmao but i’ve also talked about that before. johnny absolutely cares who robby spends the summer with, that's why he's so freaked about robby being with the larussos (i think that's what OP is referring to pls forgive me if not). he’s offered for robby to stay with him and he won’t. johnny absolutely cares about the life of trauma he’s left robby and would kill to go back and fix it and make better choices. like maybe shannon doesn’t care before rehab, but i 100% believe johnny does. it needs to be clear that his prioritization of the diaz’s almost exclusively comes from carmen’s pressure on him. like i said, sure he’s trying his hardest to not mess up with miguel in the way he did with robby, but i think he is equally trying to make it up to robby and doesn’t feel the space to because he feels so afraid that carmen’s going to get an attitude with him (and ultimately leave him like everyone else has, at which point he'd feel like an even bigger POS). he’s almost caught between a rock and a hard place. sure from the outside looking in it’s easy to see what decisions he should make. but he’s a messed up character that's not always going to act the way a non-fucked-up person thinks he should. like that’s the whole point is that johnny lawrence has royally messed up and is trying to work it out because he CARES. and really, he’s trying. like he’s really, really trying. anywho johnny get behind me i’ve got this one-

fr let me wrap this up -- all of this would make sense if jarmen was bones next season. but of course they won't be because to the GA i feel like it'd be "out of the blue" and they'd have to deal w wrapping the baby plot up in a different way. anyways tune in next week when i write yet another thesis on something only one other person cares about <3<3<3<3<3<3<3

have edited my tags on that post re: jarmen+robby bc i feel like there were somethings i needed to ~clarify~ if anyone cares where i stand LMAO

It’s different, when you’re a girl.

have edited my tags on that post re: jarmen+robby bc i feel like there were somethings i needed to ~clarify~ if anyone cares where i stand LMAO