YMMV / The Karate Kid Part III

• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • At the beginning of the film, it is revealed that Cobra Kai's defeat by Daniel (and Kreese's own defeat by Miyagi) led to all of Kreese's students leaving and his dojo in ruin. Did his students leave because he strangled Johnny for losing the tournament, this being the Heel Realization they needed, or were they simply doing what he taught them and treated their loss as a sign that Kreese was unworthy of their respect? Cobra Kai more or less confirms it's the former. Johnny's friends have all moved on and they are horrified to learn that Johnny has brought Cobra Kai back and especially that he is trusting Kreese again. However, Dutch might be a case of the latter, as we learn he is constantly in and out of prison while the others have reformed and become upstanding citizens, and he is the only Cobra Kai student who doesn't visibly object to Kreese attacking Johnny in Part II.
  • How much of Mike Barnes' personality was out of malice and how much was out of greed? While most of Barnes' behavior could be summed up to just wanting to get rich quick, some of his actions like breaking the bonsai tree after Daniel signed up, served no purpose in his pursuit. Cobra Kai would later indicate that Mike started out as a Punch-Clock Villain who only harassed Daniel on Silver's orders but ended up Becoming the Mask.
  • Was the referee's failure to disqualify Mike Barnes despite his illegal moves simple incompetence or was he bribed by Terry Silver (as Silver would later do with competition referees in Cobra Kai)?
• Badass Decay: It's difficult to believe that Daniel would be bullied with mere beatings again after fighting for his very life against Chozen in Part 2. Especially against a guy who is obviously an exaggerated Expy of Johnny Lawrence.
• Catharsis Factor: Daniel defeating Barnes and how utterly demoralized Silver, Kreese and Snake all look afterward.
• Evil Is Cool: As mentioned below, Terry Silver's hammy performance is what makes the movie bearable. So cool that Silver and Kreese continues to taunt Miyagi just seconds after having got their butts kicked by him. Silver goes full ham with a bucket of paint dripping down his face!
• Fanon Discontinuity: Fans were very willing to ignore this film existed... until Cobra Kai revealed it was still canon. Thankfully, the blow is greatly softened by the show retroactively providing additional context for this film's more contentious elements and better integrating them into the overall plot. Thomas Ian Griffith returning to play a more nuanced (but still villainous) Silver certainly didn't hurt, either.
• Franchise Original Sin: Daniel's talkativeness when nervous made him lovably gawky in the first and second films, but his excessive, almost nonstop yammering in this movie comes off as if Ralph Macchio were being paid by the word, and gets annoying very quickly.
• Ham and Cheese:
  • Thomas Ian Griffith as Terry Silver. He's one physical deformity away from being a Captain Planet villain — and one "conquer the world" plot away from a Bond villain.
  • While Griffith is the main attraction here, Martin Kove isn't left entirely out of the fun. When Daniel is attempting to flee the Cobra Kai dojo after Silver reveals his true colors, Kreese jumps out from behind a cardboard cutout of himself with a crazy expression and roars at him like a Scooby-Doo villain!
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • Terry Silver's iconic ponytail takes on a significantly different meaning after season 3 of Cobra Kai reveals that it's his way of honoring the memory of one of his and Kreese's deceased friends. Season 4 also retroactively reveals that Terry's over-the-top Evil Is Hammy shenanigans in this film are because he's actually a raging coke fiend, and high on booger sugar for most of the time we see him.
  • It's hard to see Kreese and Terry as friends working together to destroy Daniel when in Season 4 of Cobra Kai, the two slowly drift apart, with Kreese constantly overriding Terry's ideas and wishes for Cobra Kai until come the season finale, Terry betrays Kreese and gets him arrested.
  • Not to mention, Terry's desire to expand Cobra Kai. While it does appear over the top and is rendered complete and utter bullshit as his champion, Mike, loses to Daniel by the end of the film, Cobra Kai Season 4 has Terry resuming his plan, this time with far greater success as Cobra Kai wins the tournament against Daniel LaRusso's Miyagi-Do. Season 5 pretty much shows what could've been if Terry was successful with his plan much, much earlier.
  • In addition to that, the referee's being too lenient with Barnes straight up abusing Daniel in the tournament. Season 4 sheds a darker light in this in regards to the fact that Silver bribed the ref in the 2019 All-Valley Tournament to guarantee Cobra Kai’s victory; meaning that the ref in the 1985 tournament could have possibly also been on his payroll, too.
  • Some Hilarious in Hindsight when Jessica Andrews shares with Daniel the issues she has with Lizzie-Anne Rooney briefly stealing her boyfriend, dubbing her a "traitor". Lizzie-Anne makes her grand first on-screen appearance in Cobra Kai's Season 5 and boy, given her bitchy attitude to Jessica and Amanda, does Jessica have every right to hate her guts.
  • Let’s also not forget the entirety of Mike Barnes’s tenure as a character in the Miyagi-verse, especially his relationship with Terry Silver. To start off, everything that Barnes did to Daniel was part of the contract that Silver had him sign as his champion — making it clear that Barnes’s heinous actions could have possibly been an act that he forced upon himself as a means to ultimately get the money that he needed (which in turn, makes Silver a much worse person than he really is given that he doesn’t really care about Barnes, only using him as a tool for revenge on Kreese’s behalf). Then Barnes ends up banned from karate due to Silver ordering him to illegally beat down Daniel in the tournament, eventually leading him into a downfall somewhat similar to Johnny — except his purpose in doing karate again is all but gone. At this point, Barnes has nothing but contempt for Silver, calling him crazy and shady. Then, when Barnes changes for the better and turns his life around (by making a living in the furniture trade, marrying the daughter of his new mentor, a furniture store magnate, and taking over the store), he makes good with Daniel, an act that Silver punishes by by burning down his furniture store, an attack that leaves Barnes both destitute and separated from his beloved wife. Talk about being used as a tool for someone else’s ambitions, and then having your life ruined by the very same person years later. It’s no wonder that Barnes was more than willing to attack Silver in his mansion in the Cobra Kai Season 5 finale — even though Daniel thinks it’s a stupid idea, you can hardly blame Barnes, as he now has even more reason to hate Silver than Daniel himself does.
  • Even though he was still beaten rather convincingly by Mr. Miyagi, Silver holding on his own against the Miyagi-Do sensei better than anyone else in the series shows just how much of a dangerous fighter he really is — further displayed in Cobra Kai, years after Mr. Miyagi’s passing, where he trounces Johnny (mind you, in the very same dojo) and Daniel (in their first bout), and is even able to give Chozen one heck of a fight.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight:
  • Just the fact that this film, while easily the worst of the LaRusso trilogy, still manages to have a huge impact in the Miyagiverse after all (and not a victim of Fan Discontinuity). Daniel is well-known in the community as a two-time All-Valley champ and continues to grow as a karate master by completely taking Mr. Miyagi's and Terry Silver's trainings to heart, Silver himself makes his grand return and solidifies himself as Daniel's Arch-Enemy (even better, his impact on Daniel and Cobra Kai given his revenge scheme is shed to light), Mike Barnes returns as a completely reformed person (doing even better than both Johnny and Chozen), and Jessica Andrews, while the least developed of Daniel's Love Interests, played a crucial role in setting him up with her cousin Amanda as his future wife and even fixes their marriage by telling her the truth about Silver! As a matter of fact, Cobra Kai even manages to find ways to make the film look better with new revelations of Silver's behavior in Part III, Barnes's motivation of bullying Daniel setting himself apart from Johnny, and Jessica (again) playing a role in Daniel's later life.
  • Kreese and Terry's experience in Vietnam is finally revealed in season 3 of Cobra Kai, and shows just why these two guys who are otherwise total assholes have such a strong loyalty and Villainous Friendship.
  • Mr. Miyagi's "must not lose to fear" speech to give Daniel the resolve to defeat Barnes in the tournament. Daniel uses this moment decades later in Cobra Kai to help his daughter face her fear of Tory.
  • Daniel's relationship with Jessica becomes this with the revelation in Cobra Kai that she's the cousin of his wife, Amanda, and was in fact the one to introduce him to her.
  • Also Daniel's relationship with Mike Barnes, now that the latter has completely reformed. As a matter of fact, Barnes himself sheds new light on his bullying being all part of his contract in Part III (which could give the audience the impression that he really isn't harassing Daniel For the Evulz). To add on further, of all three of Daniel's rivals, Barnes turned out far better than Johnny and Chozen - genuinely wanting to apologize to Daniel instead of either resenting him (unlike Johnny) or trolling him (unlike Chozen).
  • In regards to the frustration of Daniel (and the audience) over Mr. Miyagi avoiding conflict for most of Part III, the fifth season of Cobra Kai explains the heartwarming (and sad) reason behind it. An older, wiser Daniel eventually realizes that Mr. Miyagi acted that way to protect those around him by not accidentally making the situation worse instead of better from abusing his power with "Might Makes Right" violence. He waits first to assess the situation and only acts when it's absolutely called for so that when he helps, it actually counts.
  • And speaking of Mr. Miyagi, Daniel takes his advice completely to heart when Miyagi mentions that Miyagi-Do is mainly root karate for Daniel; he will have to adopt his own style of karate. Daniel does exactly that in Cobra Kai Season 4 climax when he finally accepts Johnny's teachings and encourages Sam to use them in her tournament fight against Tory. Daniel himself takes it a step further in Season 5 when he combines both Miyagi-Do, Eagle Fang, and even Terry Silver's QuickSilver method to take down Silver himself!
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • After getting his ass handed to him by Mr. Miyagi, Terry Silver raves, "You think this is the end of it, old man? I'm gonna open Cobra Kai dojos all over this valley! HELL, I MIGHT EVEN TEACH FOR FREE!!! FROM NOW ON, WHEN PEOPLE SAY KARATE AROUND HERE, ALL THEY'LL MEAN IS COBRA KAI KARATE! JOHN KREESE'S KARATE! YOU WON'T EVEN BE A MEMORY!" Daniel fires back, "Yes he [Miyagi] will! You won't!" 33 years later, Daniel is the one who is teaching karate lessons for free, and everyone remembers his two tournament wins. As for Silver?
    George: "Therefore, we the All-Valley Committee of 1985 issue a lifetime ban on Cobra Kai for the unethical and unsportsmanlike conduct shown by senseis Terry Silver, John Kreese, and their student, Mike Barnes."
    Daniel LaRusso: Well, there you have it. We're sorry we wasted your time, Mr. Lawrence, but...a lifetime ban is a lifetime ban.
    Ron: Whoa, hold on. Let's hear what the man has to say.
    Sue: Mr. Lawrence, what is your relationship to this Terry Silver?
    Johnny Lawrence: Ma'am, I have no idea who that even is.
  • Everything about Terry's over-the-top villainy becomes even funnier after Cobra Kai reveals that he was high on cocaine for most of the movie. Some of Harsher in Hindsight is also mixed in, as Silver was using the drugs to escape from the horrors of the Vietnam War and his inner demons. And more so when it is shown that the cocaine was doing little more than bring out what was already there for Silver...
  • The idea that the winner of the previous All-Valley tournament would have a free pass all the way to the finals was filled with so much BS that when Cobra Kai Season 1 comes around, the All-Valley committee has (possibly) long retracted the rule given that Xander Stone, the defending champion of the 50th All-Valley tournament, has to continue working his way up the tournament only for Miguel Diaz to defeat him in the semis. Even Johnny outright calls this "bullshit" when Daniel mentions it to him word-for-word.
  • Mixed with Harsher in Hindsight (since this confirms Kim Sun-Yung as the Greater-Scope Villain of the entire The Karate Kid franchise), but it's understandable that Daniel (and the audience) assumed Silver was bullshitting about being trained by Kim Sun-Yung since Silver was pretending to be nice and civil to Daniel and Mr. Miyagi. Then Cobra Kai Season 5 has Chozen revealing to Daniel that Kim Sun-Yung was real the whole time and that Silver wasn't lying, making Daniel's realization and shock actually kinda priceless.
    Silver (Part III) : "Excuse me (to Daniel and Mr. Miyagi), my name is Terry Silver. My Master is Kim-Sung Yung of South Korea"
    Daniel (Cobra Kai) : Whoa, whoa, wait... That's a real person? I thought it was some mumbo jumbo that Silver came up with.
    Chozen: No. He is very real.
  • During The Internal Reveal that Silver is Evil All Along, he mocks Daniel to do the crane kick ("do the crane, Danny boy!"). When Daniel finally defeats Silver in combat during the Cobra Kai Season 5 finale, guess what the Finishing Move is.
  • Even better, prior to Daniel using the Crane Kick to finish Silver off, he takes Silver's torturous teachings to heart and uses the QuickSilver against him. And considering how badly Daniel beat Silver, it paid off big.
• It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: The general complaint concerning this film is that the plot is very similar to the first one. This is especially disappointing when compared to Part II, which successfully raises the stakes by having Daniel travel to Okinawa and be forced into a fight to the death, only for this movie to have him competing in a tournament he's already won and with a free pass to the final.
• Jerks Are Worse Than Villains: Silver is the main villain and too ham-tastic to hate. Mike Barnes is decidedly less popular, but the hate died down once it was revealed he was obligated to harass Daniel in his contract and he grew into a likable Family Man who fully accepts responsibility for his actions. The one character who is still universally despised to this day is the referee who repeatedly permitted Mike Barnes' obvious fouls with only a mere warning and empty disqualification threats.
• Just Here for Godzilla: Many viewers claim to only watch this film for Thomas Ian Griffith's hammy performance as Terry Silver.
• Love to Hate: Terry Silver is the most entertaining part of the movie, being singled out by critics and moviegoers alike.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Terry Silver is Daniel's mother.^Explanation Given the popularity of Epileptic Trees speculating that Karate Kid film characters (especially Silver) are secretly related to Cobra Kai characters, some fans have jokingly suggested that Silver is secretly Daniel's mother based on the scene where he "saves" Daniel from Barnes at Miyagi's house and replies "Maybe" to Barnes derisively asking "Who are you, his mother?"
  • The referee's leniency towards Barnes's blatant fouls on Daniel in the tournament has led to YouTube comments speculating the referee would only give Barnes a warning even if he did things like maim or kill Daniel. The typical response to whatever Barnes does to Daniel (all the way up to murder) is something like: “That’s it Barnes, one more violation and you’re disqualified!”
• Narm Charm: Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert both found Thomas Ian Griffith's over-the-top performance as Terry Silver to be the best and most redeeming quality of the third movie — and they're far from alone in that assessment.
• No Yay: Terry Silver’s demeanor towards Daniel is decidedly creepy.
• Sequelitis: One of the weakest films, especially since the plot copies the first. Even Cobra Kai will occasionally mock the film by making jokes surrounding its most disliked elements.
• So Bad, It's Good: Terry Silver's Large Ham performance is perhaps the movie's one redeeming quality.
• Special Effect Failure: Daniel and Jessica's rappelling down to the bonsai has some laughable green screen work in the closeups, plus an obvious indoor model for the medium shots, with only the occasional long shot of stunt doubles actually doing it.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • The idea of Daniel having an Evil Mentor with him slowly being corrupted probably sounded a lot better on paper. However, Daniel's only negative action as a result of Silver's influence is to punch one Jerkass in the face and immediately regret it, when this concept could have had a lot more conflict derived from it.
  • Daniel went through a lot of physical and emotional development over the course of Part II, which is largely forgotten come this film. It could have been really interesting to see Silver going up against a confident and competent Daniel, who might see through some of his plots (but not all of them), and one who can actually stand up to Barnes and the goons the first few times they come calling. It could have been really cool to see the hero, having previously faced a Duel to the Death, be much less open to bullying and intimidation this time around, forcing the bad guys to step up their game to be a credible threat to him. Silver would have to quickly modify his plan on the fly to cope with Daniel being far more formidable than he initially assumed, which would only make him that much more memorable of a villain.
  • Many fans have also argued that it would have made more sense for Part II and Part III to have swapped plots, so that there could have been a steady escalation of stakes throughout the series, with the second movie focusing on Kreese's revenge plot and the third movie upping the stakes again with the trip to Okinawa and fight to the death.
  • Having Kreese and Silver fight Mr. Miyagi together could have been an awesome moment, as it might have made him seriously sweat, and really underline just how dangerous they are. Instead, Miyagi takes out Kreese in about ten seconds, and then only has to work a little to beat Silver.
• Took the Bad Film Seriously: Thomas Ian Griffith as Terry Silver gave it his all for this movie, even though the film was lambasted by critics, the fans, and even John G. Avildsen and Ralph Macchio.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Miyagi initially not wanting to train Daniel for the tournament is meant to be seen as him trying to keep Daniel from becoming a violent bully, but at some point, it becomes ridiculous. Their store has been trashed, their house has been robbed, the police won't do anything, Barnes attempted to murder Daniel and threatened to beat Jessica (or worse) right after. Miyagi's response is to do nothing about it, which only makes it easier for Silver to manipulate Daniel.
• Values Resonance: Daniel decides that college isn't for him and starts his own business. Nowadays, with college no longer seen as nearly as viable in securing a job as it once was, Daniel's choice is seen more positively.
• Vindicated by History: Though still generally thought of as the weakest film of the original trilogy, Part III is seen in much higher regard than when it was first released, thanks to the popularity of its new villains, Terry Silver and Mike Barnes, and how gloriously their actors chew the scenery, which at least makes the film entertaining. The fact that Cobra Kai manages to make several heartwarming and thematically appropriate Call-Backs to the film while having well-received returns for Barnes, Silver, and Jessica has also helped with its re-evaluation. They have also filled in some holes such as revealing Terry's behavior was due to abusing cocaine to cope with his trauma from Vietnam or separating Johnny and Mike Barnes' characterizations by making one a Jerkass Woobie who never had a stable upbringing and was hurting over his girlfriend (one of the only people who gave him a sense of worth) dumping him, and the other a Punch-Clock Villain who was under contractual obligation to harass Daniel but came to enjoy it.

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