Cobra Kai Renewed For Season 2 On YouTube Red

Barely a week after its initial release, YouTube Red's Cobra Kai series is already looking to stick around for a while. 

The buzzworthy series, which was released by YouTube on May 2, is officially coming back for a ten-episode second season, according to a report by Deadline.

The series is a follow-up to the events of The Karate Kid, picking up on characters from the film after more than 30 years. 

Ralph Macchio reprises his role as Daniel LaRusso, the titular Karate Kid — but the real star of the show is William Zabka, who played LaRusso's martial arts rival Johnny Lawrence in the original movie. 

Cobra Kai sees the two characters on starkly divergent paths in middle age, with LaRusso's life having gone fairly well in the intervening years, and Lawrence's life on the rocks. 

Chasing redemption after the humiliating defeat he suffered as a younger man, Lawrence reopens the Cobra Kai karate dojo, looking to train a new squad of karate kids in hopes it will help give his life some much-needed direction.

The revival of his one-time enemy pulls LaRusso, who has had an emptiness in his life since the death of mentor Mr. Miyagi, back into the karate fold — and just like that, the long-dormant rivalry is on again.

Rounding out the cast for the sequel series is Xolo Mariduena, Tanner Buchanan, Mary Mouser, and Courtney Henggeler, playing the new generation of martial artists and their families.

Cobra Kai's three showrunners are Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg, known for American Reunion and the Harold & Kumar series, as well as Josh Heald, who wrote Hot Tub Time Machine.

"Continuing the Karate Kid saga with YouTube Red has been a dream come true," Heald, Hurwitz, and Schlossberg said in a statement at the time of the second season's announcement. "We are grateful to all our creative partners for giving us the freedom to revisit and expand the LaRusso/Lawrence rivalry. And we are truly exhilarated by the tidal wave of support from fans of this story, both old and new."

The series has been critically-acclaimed for its self-aware humor since its debut, and also drawn a lot of curious eyeballs, with the first episode scoring over 20 million views within eight days of being published.

Cobra Kai streams exclusively on YouTube Red, and you can check out the first two episodes for free right now.