By Marcus Blake
Karate Kid Legends is here! Did we need this movie, of course not! However, sometimes we get really fun movies that are completely unnecessary. This is certainly one of them. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining about the movie even though I have quite a few criticisms. I enjoyed the movie and it’s worth watching especially if you’re a Karate Kid fan. And this movie did what I thought was the impossible… it actually made the Jackie Chan Karate Kid movie better despite the fact that it has nothing to do with karate but kung fu. I know, I’m still just as confused as you are. But this movie also proves that Jackie Chan’s character of Sensei Han is great and should be part of The Karate Kid universe. And despite all the faults of this movie, the best part really is Jackie Chan and Ralph Macchio teaming up like it’s a “karate buddy cop film.” The chemistry is there. The one-liners are great. And more importantly, their action scenes are good.
Now the basic story of Karate Kid Legends is pretty much recreating the original Karate Kid movie and Jackie Chan’s Karate Kid movie. The story centers on a new student in a new city, he likes a girl, he gets bullied, and then enters the big bad karate tournament within the film where he will eventually take on his nemesis. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking, isn’t this story played out? I agree, but that doesn’t stop the movie from being fun because here are the best parts of the film. You get great characters that you can easily connect to. You get a lot of great martial arts scenes. And you get a great dynamic between Jackie Chan and Ralph Macchio. Despite the same old tire plot, there’s enough that makes it fun to watch especially with all of the great action scenes. But it’s not a great movie. It doesn’t have the same emotional connection that you get with the first Karate Kid movie or even part 2. I will say that it’s a better movie than the Jackie Chan / Jaden Smith version which literally is a carbon copy of The Karate Kid. It’s almost as if they did a shot-for-shot remake of the original Karate Kid much like Spielberg did with West Side Story! But this film has a lot more going for it because at least the main protagonist is a lot more likable. Ben Wang is a great actor and always plays characters that are easy to root for. Plus he’s a lot more talented as a martial arts actor than anybody that we have seen before throughout the Karate Kid universe. But it’s almost like this should have been The Karate Kid movie we got with Jackie Chan instead of the one with Jaden Smith. I liken it to a Windows operating system where they have to make a good operating system to fix the bad one you made previously. But there are definitely likable characters and some interesting subplots with the main girl and her father running a pizza place. Ming-Na Wen does a great job of playing the mother, but let’s face it she’s good at anything she does even if she’s not given a whole lot to work with. And like all karate kid movies, the best part of the movie always comes down to the karate tournament… this film is no exception. It may not make sense in the traditional sense of past karate tournaments in the same universe. It may seem like a tournament that likens itself to street racing in the Fast and the Furious movies, but it doesn’t matter because it gives us a lot of good action and that’s why you probably want to see this movie. But this storyline is played out and that’s one of the film’s biggest downfalls.
As I said there’s a lot to like about the movie, but there’s nothing original about the movie and that’s what really keeps it from being great. I’ll admit that my nostalgia for the first two Karate Kid movies blinds me a little bit to the fact that they’re not overly great movies, but what does make them better than what there are is the emotional connections between the characters. You get a lot of sadness and regret with your characters as they overcome their past. Karate Legends deals with that to a point but also glosses over everything to run towards the action. I just don’t feel the same way about the character’s past that I do with the first two Karate Kid movies. It’s almost as if the filmmakers wanted to make a campy teenage karate movie with a lot of great action in one-liners but skip all the emotion that comes with the baggage surrounding the characters. Yes, you get flashbacks of the tragedy that happened to the main character’s brother… but there’s still more grief that’s never dealt with. Perhaps there’s a deleted seen or two that addresses these things and it’s disappointing if they didn’t make it into the film, but Karate Kid movies have never shied away from the tragic circumstances of its characters.
The Cobra Kai show constantly dealt with that and made you sympathize even with the villains that you love to hate. But my biggest problem with the movie… the villains. At least we sympathized and found something likable when it came to Johnny in the original Karate Kid movie. All his friends weren’t straight-up bullies who committed violence for the sake of violence. Johnny’s big beef with Daniel was literally over a girl and having to deal with kind of a crazy Sensei but you at least sympathized with him because he was a war hero. When it comes to the primary antagonist, Connor, there’s no reason to care. He’s just a bully that has no redeeming value and his sensei is just a two-bit thug who has no honor. While it’s easy to make that argument with John Kreese, at least in the movie we start to understand his motivations and of course, they explored a lot more in the Cobra Kai series. But there’s nothing in this movie that makes you connect with the main Karate Kid villain and his sensei. They’re generic, they’re predictable and downright boring! The only redeeming quality of the character Connor is when he at least bows to his opponent when he recognizes that his opponent is either better or at least just as good as he is. There’s one moment of respect and maybe some regret. But the film gives us no reason to sympathize with the villains and the only way we care about villains in any story is when we find some redeeming value or can sympathize with them. The villains could have been written so much better, I would have at least appreciated it if there was a Cobra Kai-like karate gang as in the first movie, but there isn’t. There’s no point leaving giving the villain’s names. You could have called them generic assholes and that would have been perfectly fine.
What really makes me mad about this film is despite the fact that they’re essentially recreating the original Karate Kid movie, the filmmakers missed all of the emotional connections with the characters that made the original films great. It seems that the only thing they wanted Karate Kid Legends to be is an action/comedy movie without the emotional weight that centers the characters in the story except for a few flashback scenes that show the big brother tragically dying. However, it’s not enough Even the scene with Han and Daniel talking about Mr. Miyagi seemed very short and to the point without any real emotion. So did they just want to make an action movie and not the same kind of drama as with the previous films? But like I said, it’s a fun movie and it makes the Jackie Chan Karate Kid movie a lot better. This movie feels more like his do-over. It is a nice way to connect both universes that were already previously set up in Karate Kid Part 2 when Mr. Miyagi ended up in China and came back and how the two families are connected. It’s a nice way to do it, but there’s so much more to the story that gets left out and maybe this is where they should have just had a series. Hopefully, The Karate Kid universe grows and we get to revisit some of these characters with the mixture of Kung Fu and Karate.
There’s definitely a lot of potential there and if nothing else a way to expand these stories without having to rely on legacy characters that prop up the story…something that was pointed out by critic Jimmy Alford in our conversation about the film. I agree. It’s a good way to transition to the new generation, something to think about as they expand the Cobra Kai universe. Karate Kid Legends had a lot of potential to be a more emotional movie than it is, but it is a fun action movie with a lot of great one-liners so yes I think it’s definitely worth seeing in the theater, but for trying to recreate the original storyline, it falls short of what made the Karate Kid and The Karate Kid Part 2 and in a sense the third movie great. And it can certainly take some lessons from the Cobra Kai series where the redemption stories are fantastic. I hope that we get to see more of these characters and expand on their journeys because if this is the only time that we get to see them then I feel a little short-changed. Maybe there be a sequel or two that leads the main character into a bigger tournament kind of like what Cobra Kai did with the Seika Taikai tournament. However, for me despite as many problems as I have with this film, I still had fun with it and there is one scene that makes up for everything… this is a spoiler!!! Having a cameo from William Zapka’s Johnny at the end of the movie was fantastic and has a great nod to the success of the Cobra Kai series. Maybe this film serves as a great introduction to a larger universe of connecting all of these characters… Maybe that’s the best thing that can come from the film!
By Jimmy Alford
“Karate Kid: Legends is a patchwork of nostalgia and missed potential!”
After six seasons of Cobra Kai reinvigorated the Karate Kid brand, Karate Kid: Legends arrives as the new entry in more than a decade, promising a multigenerational union of two iconic branches with Ralph Macchio’s Daniel LaRusso and Jackie Chan’s Mr. Han. I’ll admit, on paper, this crossover should excite fans. In the execution … it’s a chaotic mix of new and old talent, recycled plotlines, and jarring storytelling decisions. The movie is still entertaining despite the missed opportunities.
At the heart of the fifth addition to the Karate Kid series is Li Fong, played by Ben Wang. He’s a Beijing-born teen who has a complicated relationship with kung fu. His mom, played by Ming-Na Wen, takes a job in New York and whisks him away from his Uncle Han, played by Jackie Chan. Dad is never mentioned, so I guess Ben is a product of mitosis or asexual reproduction. The opening act of the film is promising. Wang is charming with decently sincere emotional range and impressive physicality in his action sequences. His chemistry with Mia, played by Sadie Stanley, and her dad Victor, played by Joshua Jackson.
In this first half of the movie we get a fun, grounded spin on the familiar “mentor and student” dynamic. The film teases a fresh angle: Li becomes the shifu by guiding Victor back into fighting shape for an upcoming boxing match. A match that will settle debts to a loan shark, who just happens to run a karate dojo and train Li’s rival. This twist on the formula is clever and effective … until it’s not.
The audience is greeted with an abrupt pivot shortly after the box match, with no real discussion or growth and character development coming from what was the major plot of the first half of the film. Match is over and we’re moving on. I’m not going to spoil the outcome, but I feel the writers either forgot about how the fight ended, or just has no idea how boxing works. I feel it’s the latter, because they don’t know how karate tournaments work either. Regardless, Victor would have gotten the purse for the fight.
With the original storyline abandoned, a second movie begins. Li is now training. He has gone from shifu training a former professional boxer back to getting the crap kicked out of him by Han. Again some pretty big disrespect to boxing as a martial art. The kung fu novice can train a former pro boxer, but is still learning fundamentals from his uncle, Han who has arrived suddenly, and vaguely without much reason. I chuckled that Han breaks into Li’s house, and attacks him in the dark. This is American, sir. Jackie Chan is legendary, but he’s not dodging the bullets I think would most likely come his way during this dramatic entrance.
While not as random, but still weird, Ralph Macchio’s Daniel LaRusso then makes an entrance. The whole background where Han somehow met Myagi in 1985, seems rushed and poorly written. I will admit there was no overthinking any of it, Han shows up, talks with LaRusso for 10 minutes, says some cryptic stuff, and poof … plot holes are sown up?
At the end of the day, Legends seems to want new blood added to the franchise, but has to prop itself up with these franchise legends, marketed as co-leads. They appear more like glorified cameos.
Another curious choice in Legends is how it completely sidesteps the events of the 2010 reboot. I totally get that the film wants to focus on a new story and keep things simple by not tying back to Dre Parker or Cheng, but it’s still strange. There’s not even a passing reference to any of it. Chan is back as Mr. Han. You’d expect at least a nod to his former student. That said, it’s not a dealbreaker for me. I truly disliked the 2010 Karate Kid. I was not surprised at all to read that that movie was backed by the China Film Group Corporation, basically the biggest cash cow for film production in Asia. So yeah, they were all about losing karate and replacing it with China’s martial art claim to fame. Columbia Pictures took the money and made a soulless cash grab film. Now we have to deal with the messy legacy and retcon our way into somehow including karate and kung fu. After watching the film, LaRusso is the only link to Karate in the film. There is no karate actually performed. At best it’s mixed martial arts.
Not to let Han off the hook, his new lifestyle is odd. In 2010 he was a maintenance guy, and now he’s suddenly running a sleek dojo and seems to be doing quite well financially. I guess it would be hard to get a humble handyman, an extremely expensive plane ticket. The movie doesn’t explain how he went from fixing water heaters in Beijing to training students in style. Like everything else in the movie, it just happens. It’s not a huge problem. The film wants us to go along with it, and for the most part that’s fine.
From here on out, the pacing nosedives. What felt like an intriguing new chapter becomes a speed-run through an obligatory Rocky-esque training montage, complete with a Street Fighter-styled on-screen countdown, a weird rushed tournament, and an emotionally weightless finale. The final act sacrifices introspection and coherence in favor of quick resolutions. Legends is the shortest film in the franchise at 94 minutes, and it feels like it.
Many of those quick resolutions needed screen time. The tournament was super weird and over the top for no reason. If you remember the tournament in 1984’s Karate Kid, then you’ll likely still recognize modern karate tournaments. They haven’t become free-for-alls where you knock out your opponent and fight off angry spectators. Li’s staunch resolute mom caves for almost no reason, the angry emotional girlfriend is won over with Pepsi and bad singing. I will admit that scene is fantastic and hilarious, but super easy. Li’s PTSD associated with fighting is brought up, but never resolved.
As far as I’m concerned, Li’s mental hangups just got beaten out of him. It went like this: Li – “Fighting makes me freeze up and think of my dead brother.” Han – “Yeah … widen your stance.” Then Han whacks Li in the face with a log. Then LaRusso throws Li down a flight of stairs. That last part didn’t happen, but you get my point.
The villains are the film’s weakest link, lacking both depth and presence. Conner, played by Aramis Knight, is the main antagonist and local karate champion. He’s little more than a stock bully with no clear motivations beyond being a dick. In the past rivals like Johnny Lawrence or even Cheng were given depth, but not Conner. Just a one-note tough guy menace. This problem extends to the other antagonist in the film, O’Shea, played by Tim Rozen. He’s that loan shark I mentioned earlier. He’s barely explored. They’re both undercooked and unimpressive.
Despite all of this, the film isn’t without merit. Wang’s performance is electric. His action sequences, especially in the alley behind Victor’s pizza shop, are well-choreographed. Chan and Macchio are great together. They are both truly funny, and there are a lot of really funny moments throughout the film.
In the end, I don’t know who this movie is for. Legends wants to be many things: a tribute, a reboot, a unifier of the Karate Kid universe. I feel it’s a fascinating mess. Older fans may enjoy seeing familiar faces and younger fans will like discovering Li and Mia. I don’t believe either will get everything they want. It’s still fun. My kids will like it. My six year old will want a gi and start kicking ass. 6/10.