Write On: 'Cobra Kai' Showrunners Jon Hurwitz, Josh Heald and Hayden Schlossberg

“We were all six or seven years old when [the first Karate Kid
movie] came out. So all of us saw it in the theater and I think
for all of us, it was probably the first time any of us had seen
a movie where there was such an amazing twist that happened. The
whole time, we’re thinking that Daniel LaRusso's not learning
[karate], that he's doing all these chores for this guy and then
suddenly it's, ‘Wait! He's been learning karate the whole time!’
So anyone who watched the movie was blown away by that moment,
but when you're six or seven it's a formative memory.


So it was a movie that was meaningful to all of us,” says Jon
Hurwitz, showrunner and executive producer of the Netflix show
Cobra Kai.


In this episode, I speak to all three showrunners of Cobra Kai,
Jon Hurwitz, Josh Heald and Hayden Schlossberg about what the
show means to them now that we’re in the sixth and final season.
We discuss why they thought it was imperative to tell the story
from the character Johnny Lawrence’s (William Zabka), point of
view and they hint at the possibility of a new spinoff show –
perhaps about a young Mr. Miyagi – coming soon.


They also shared their advice for writing a spec script. “It's
really tough to stand out. And that's what you have to figure
out. In our early scripts, it was that first page – it was being
R-rated and provocative and saying something that gets you
noticed and stands out in the marketplace. Because if you're just
writing a genre story, it's just like why?” says Josh Heald.


To hear more about the sixth season of the show and their great
advice for writing spec scripts, listen to the podcast.