Posted in: Netflix, Preview, streaming, TV, YouTube | Tagged: back to the future, bleeding cool, cable, cobra kai, Daniel, hayden schlossberg, Johnny, Jon Hurwitz, Josh Heald, karate kid, miyagi, preview, season 3, streaming, television, tv

Cobra Kai Creators Discuss Spinoffs, Tackling Back to the Future

Cobra Kai creators and executive producers Jon Hurwitz, Josh Heald, and Hayden Schlossberg are having a pretty good week, with the first two seasons "waxing on" and "waxing off" over on Netflix (sorry, YouTube) and a brief teaser for 2021's third season that found Daniel (Ralph Macchio) visiting Mr. Miyagi's old stomping grounds overseas. Now, the trio has returned for their seasonal sit-down with /Film (check out the excellent interview here), and there were three topics that caught our eyeballs the most: their thoughts on any more spinoff series from The Karate Kid or spinoffs originating from the popular sequel series; and how they wouldn't mind applying a little Cobra Kai "magic" to the "Back the Future" film franchise.

When it comes to spinoffs, Hurwitz recognizes that the franchise has a number of characters that they can work with but that it's also important that the series stakes out its own identity with its own cast of characters. "We have put thought into spin-off ideas. We love just The Karate Kid universe, love all the characters from back in the day and we love the characters we've created," Hurwitz explained. "It's hard for me to give you an exact answer to this, but what I can say is that we have a list of at least five different scenarios that we would pursue, that we could consider. Now, some of them are untraditional. Some of them are unlike any kind of spin-off you've ever seen before. But, every time we're writing episodes of the show, we're falling in love with the characters that we're creating and examining characters from the past. Within the world of Cobra Kai, there are certain things that you can explore and certain things that don't fit into that particular box, but there may be opportunities down the road to break out one of these characters and get to know them better or to explore different times in characters' lives or what have you."

As for the idea of how the trio would take a Cobra Kai approach to Back to the Future, Hurwitz doesn't hide that they're Karate Kid-level fans of the films or deny that they might have some idea- but also made sure everyone understood that decisions like that are outside of their control (but they're available for a meeting): "We've gotten in trouble in the past when we talk about our Back to the Future desires. Maybe we have a little more of a leg to stand on than we did back when we were just the Harold and Kumar guys. What I can say is we love the Back to the Future universe as much as we love the Karate Kid universe. Those characters equally were a part of our lives and continue to be a part of our lives.," Hurwitz said. "We know that the team that has made the Back to the Future movies seems to have little interest in continuing in that world and we respect that. As long as they feel that way, there's really nothing to be done. If they ever change their minds and happen to check out Cobra Kai and like what we did with this in the world of Karate Kid, then we would be well prepared for any meetings that we would have going forward."

Schlossberg sees a number of similarities between the two franchises- and believes it's more a matter of "when" than "if" Back to the Future gets a sequel revisit: "They're very similar franchises in so many ways with this kind of older character with a younger character as your two leads. There's the same nostalgia associated. They came out around the same time. There's a lot of possibilities there, but I also think we understand if we were the people creating a franchise, and we were a part of something, especially given Michael J. Fox's situation with his health, we totally understand the logic of just saying, "Hey, that was a great trilogy back in the day." I'm sure, regardless of what anybody's demands are, 100 years from now, 200 years from now, it's such a great story, it will be remade in some sort of way in the distant future. We don't need to make that because we're just fans and we can just imagine it in our minds if that's what it ends up being."

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!