Cobra Kai Season 6 Part 3's Major Saved By The Bell Cameo, Explained

Contains spoilers for "Cobra Kai" Season 6, Part 3

Whenever a well-known franchise gets revived decades after it was last relevant, there's always a concern it's being done to cash in on cheap cameos and ill-placed nostalgia. "Cobra Kai" has had its fair share of cameos too, but they've worked in tandem with telling a larger story. Some of the guest stars featured over the years include Elisabeth Shue and Tamlyn Tomita returning as Ali Mills and Kumiko, respectively, from previous "Karate Kid" entries. 

"Cobra Kai" Season 6, Part 3, however, has a different kind of nostalgic cameo that fans of "Saved by the Bell" surely recognized. On Season 6, Episode 12, Daniel (Ralph Macchio) and his wife Amanda (Courtney Henggeler) set up Chozen (Yuji Okumoto) on a blind date with Amanda's friend Winnie. The latter also happens to be Moon's (Hannah Kepple) mother, which is appropriate as she's also very much into alternative ideologies and the hippie lifestyle. 

Winnie's played by Elizabeth Berkley Lauren, who's best known for playing Jessie on "Saved by the Bell." Lauren may not have starred in any "Karate Kid" movies of the past, but it's a fun cameo and gives her another shot at being in a successful legacy sequel after her last one sputtered out and failed.

A "Karate Kid" reboot, focused on the villain from the first movie and debuting on YouTube Red, could easily have been relegated to the garbage bin of nostalgia. But something pretty incredible happened: "Cobra Kai" quite literally never died. Even when YouTube Red (subsequently renamed YouTube Premium) went defunct, Netflix picked up "Cobra Kai" to continue its incredible run, proving there was far more to this show than met the eye. It even inspired other franchises to follow suit.

Following the debut of "Cobra Kai" in 2018, "Saved by the Bell" was revived on Peacock in 2020. Mario Lopez, who played A.C. Slater in the franchise, told GQ, "It was such a smart, clever way, the way ['Cobra Kai'] blended the nostalgia and this updated version. So [I said], if we can emulate that, then I'm down." Much like "Cobra Kai," the "Saved by the Bell" reboot primarily followed a younger cast at Bayside High, with Lopez's Slater being Bayside's new P.E. coach while Elizabeth Berkley Lauren's Jessie was the school's new counselor. In addition to "Cobra Kai," the reboot's showrunner also cited "21 Jump Street" and the 1990s "Brady Bunch" movies as inspiration.

Sadly, "Saved by the Bell" didn't last as long as "Cobra Kai." Peacock canceled the show after two seasons, despite the first season being the most watched Peacock original series in 2020. But Lauren is getting another shot at reboot gold with her brief yet significant appearance on "Cobra Kai."

Elizabeth Berkley Lauren's "Cobra Kai" hippie character, Winnie, is a far cry from the actor's more level-headed Jessie Spano on "Saved by the Bell." While she only appears in one episode, she foreshadows several characters' fates when Chozen agrees to have her perform a tarot card reading. Chozen picks the Death card, and Winnie asserts it means something disastrous: "Literally, it means that someone you know is gonna die. Like, very soon. Maybe even more than one person." The ominous prediction seems to come true, as both John Kreese (Martin Kove) and Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith) both apparently die a couple of episodes later when Silver's boat explodes. 

Chozen next picks up the Empress card, which, as Winnie explains, predicts his journey will soon come to an end and he'll meet someone new. Chozen then flashes back to his romantic encounter with Kim Da-eun (Alicia Hannah-Kim), making it clear where he'll wind up. By the end of "Cobra Kai," Daniel oversees Miyagi-Do, Johnny trains pupils at Cobra Kai, and Chozen goes to be with Da-eun, who's still training her own students, with the implication that those two will get together for good. 

In this way, Chozen's journey with Daniel and Johnny ends while a new one begins. While this means it's unlikely he'll crop up in "Karate Kid: Legends," he gets a joyful conclusion all the same. After his more murderous tendencies in "The Karate Kid Part II," Chozen winds up with one of the best redemption arcs in the franchise – while Elizabeth Berkley Lauren gets herself a credit on one of the most successful reboots of the past decade.